Poll: How Would You Grade The Summer Game Fest 2023 Showcase?

Bit too long man, didn't even watch the whole thing. But nice selection of games.

Very underwhelming. Bring on Xbox on Sunday!

Some slow points but overall it was good. Went with a B but might settle on C as I look at a list of all games shown.

I really wish Geoff would stop the host format and just have it be trailer after trailer. He doesn't need to give us his little input before and after each reveal.

There were some good games, especially if you are platform agnostic.

One of the worst I can remember. 0 surprises and the main event was a game we knew already? That a lot of people can't play?
Horrible show.

Apart from prince of Persia and maybe Sonic I don't think there's a single other game there that I'd pay for. What a waste of time! Felt the same after Sonys showcase. Hopefully MS can sort it out

Generally underwhelming IMO. Some of the parts were just odd DLC from the Sony showcase like AW2 looked great but it had like 30 seconds new footage after the previous trailer or the Spiderman 2 just revealing the release date. Overall not good but could have easily been worse. Probably they are keeping some stuff for Gamescom and TGA as well and not revealing all the cards.

It was a decent showing, I'd go with a 7/10

@OrfeasDourvas agreed. I thought the whole point of this was big surprises and premieres. So disappointing

C grade, 100% better than the PS showcase but hope for more at XGS on Sunday.

A lot of padding, but some decent announcements. I gave it a B.

Boring as hell.

I don't know how Geoff did it, but he actually made the PlayStation Showcase look decent

Far too long. Geoff is boring host. The crowd added nothing. Most were games we new of already.

Sonic probably stole the show for me. But overall it was definitely bang average.

'Fine' is the best description. A few things of interest, some actual release dates, but nothing spectacular. There were a lot of announcements you'll go 'oh yeah, that was a thing' a year or two from now when they shut down. I'd say it was a 6, maybe a 7 if you owned a PS5 since they definitely got more announcements.

At least as far as info went. The host, crowd, & guests added nothing, and there's no reason this couldn't have been a digital-only event.

Thought it was an A ! Easily beating the PS travesty lol.

Warhammer, Like a Dragon, Sonic, Path of Exile, Lies of P, Alan Wake 2 and putting a date on Spiderman for those who want it. Easy A imo

With as mid as the last couple shows have been, Xbox has a real chance at stealing the thunder this not-E3 season. I will have to wait and see, because I will never question Microsoft and their ability to screw up an easy victory.

I graded a C as there were only some real info of some release dates. Feel for the show as nobody was going to give them something to show if they could show it themselves. Shows you why E3 died…

Pretty meh, a couple of interesting games, only 1 Unreal Engine 5 game and it looked stunning. And no surprise he hyped up and closed with a PlayStation exclusive, which I really could not care less about and am confused why they are announcing it now? Sundays show should be much better, fingers crossed.

I was expecting an F, so exceeding my expectations and handing a solid C transformed this show into a respectable B

C-
Tons and tons of points lost just for having trailers for TV shows.

Also, am I the only one that thinks that Nick could not wait to get out of that stage? That hand shake gave me hell of a lot of cringe...

It was ok. I gave it a C, but not because it was bad. I think it was on the same level as Sony's Showcase, but the low energy of the audience brought down the show a bit.

Lies of P and Sonic were my favorites, but Sand Land, Like a Dragon, and Party Animal all looked like a lot of fun. Very happy to see that most of those games were also coming to Xbox.

C. It was a good show with decent variety but really only 2 things appeal to me and they were games I was already going to get day 1 anyway. Hopefully Sunday is a banger!

It was...fine. Nothing all that exciting and it really made me miss E3.

@InfamousOrange Agree with that! This is not a patch on what E3 was in its best days.

Going with straight C. Prince of Persia, Lies of P date, and Like a Dragon date were cool.

Between C and B
But the dev talk was a big S

@Utena-mobile

but the low energy of the audience brought down the show a bit.

On that note... am I the only one that thinks the audience was instructed to clap? I mean... who claps with excitement for yet another Final Fantasy mobile game???

@Tharsman Roflol. Yeah, that was really weird. And one of the funny things was that one of the few times the audience cheering felt authentic was when they thought the door dash Final Fantasy promo was something else.
I legit laughed at that part. The host did too. lol.

I'll give this showcase a 72 on metacritic score

I guess I'll give it a C. Highlights for me were Alan Wake II, FFVII Rebirth, Space Marine 2 and Nicholas Cage.

The dorito pope's presence makes it an automatic F- for me.

I watched it live on Pushsquare but got tired of the xbox digs seriously why does a site dedicated to PlayStation talk so much about Xbox. Its sad. Gonna buy play magazine from now on, avoid push. They make me feel dirty having a PS5 haha.

So I came on here to watch it live. Obviously excited for spiderman 2, but having them day they're confident on the release date smells like a delay =/ hope not. The show itself was...I didn't like it. Its not E3 and it felt weird, I truly believe Geoff is out of his depth. He keeps trying to ve this angel figure that's come down from the gaming heavens to bless us with an event he thinks is better than E3 but truthfully, E3 had bigger reveals, bigger crowds, bigger mic drop moments.

Because that's the thing about events like this, you want new reveals, big shocks, a wow moment where the crowd goes wild. Like God of war reveal, or the declaring of a new console. What we got was updates on games we knew were coming out. We got weird release date announcements done awkwardly. It just felt....eh.

Sorry, that's my opinion and obviously it's down to how I personally felt about it. I think im not over the death of E3 yet.

good lord, this is what replaced e3

I'm not gonna lie, I missed the Bill Clinton Kid from last year.

Did not watch it live so could skip every interview which make it bearable. The show would be a ton better if Geoff would not show his face and just put trailer after trailer...

Why was the Spiderman-2 release date not on their own showcase, the same regarding Final Fantasy VII rebirth, why oh why wasn't that on the PS showcase, would definitely lifted the whole show.

Alan Wake 2 looked good though I'd rather we just played as Alan Wake only. Final Fantasy 7 Remake part 2 looks amazing can't wait for that it was an OK show was hoping for more big surprises.

Pretty good. Lies of P - release date and demo was a very cool surprise.....until I played the demo.

Wish we'd got one more shock, Silent Hill 2 or MGS game play would have been fantastic.

@Utena-mobile @Tharsman "Please be excited?"

Yeah, the audience really didn't seem very enthused at all about any of the show, until the FF door dash moment, and then the real FF7R2 moment. Until then I thought the mics were down for the audience.

@Somebody I don't like geoff, but the whole point is the host format, trailer after trailer is a grotesque waste of time. I want the 'trailer after trailer" fad to stop. Post-iwata Nintendo turned the format into that boring youtube autoplaylist, and then Sony copied it. I don't even bother watching those anymore, they're not interesting, they're not timely, they have no context, it's why Sony's show was unwatchable. Just trailers with no context to the point you don't even know what you're watching it's just a blur of moving color and sound. You don't need a "presentation/showcase/direct" to watch trailers. You have youtube and a search bar 24/7 available to watch that. A presentation needs to actually present something with additional context.

Don't get me wrong, I don't like Geoff and I don't think hes the best presenter, but bad as he is I'll watch a show being presented...I really won't bother watching a show that's little more than a playlist of youtube videos anymore.

@NEStalgia the host format is awful. It inflates the show while contributing nothing. A 2 hour show with 40 minutes of gaming content. I tune in to see games, not an ego pushing their personal brand and plugging sponsors. It's clear that Geoff Keighley cares just as much or more about promoting himself than highlighting games. It truly is just a "look at me" format.

Nintendo perfected the showcase format and I'm glad Sony and Xbox have learned from them, just wish Geoff would too.

@Somebody I don't disagree about Geoff, the personal brand and sponsors. You're right and he's not a great host, I'd take Mr Caffeine before him

But the Nintendo and Sony format it's HORRENDOUS and useless. Like I said I haven't watched a Nintendo "show" in years. It changed to a YouTube playlist. I don't need a "presentation" to just watch a YouTube playlist . There's no point to their scheduled presentations if it's not a presentation just a playlist.

Just because Geoff is a bad presenter doesn't mean a good presenter doesn't add critical value. E3 shows and even Geoff's have critical commentary to tell you what you're seeing in larger context you can't get in a trailer. Rapid fire trailers with no context or explanation are forgettable and uninformative.

I utterly absolutely disdain the trailer reel shoes. It is not a substitute for an actual presentation at all. I don't like Geoff as presenter any more than you but I do want the format to continue. Just with someone else.

@NEStalgia I somewhat disagree [about presenters]. Yea, a show should have some talking. Ideally, IMO, on top of a gameplay presentation.

Personally I think Nintendo Directs are a master class on how to do this. I just decided to re-watch the February one just to see if it was not just first impressions, but they do a good job of talking, sometimes over the trailer, sometimes after, its always fast.

Watching a dev bragging about why they think their work is amazing bores the hell out of me... and watching a host fake excitement about a pre-scripted presentation makes me roll my eyes so hard it hurts.

Edit:
Nintendo directs [the full directs, not the minis] are definitively not just playlists of trailers. I suggest you check the link I provided and at least spot-check it. They do quite a bit to present things over without eating time in between showcases.

I'd give it a 3/5. There were some interesting/decent game trailers, but didn't walk away feeling hyped. Kinda just meh feeling. Some other things that stood out to me:
1) It felt like Sony was really trying hard to makeup for their poorly received showcase. I guess I understand the strategy to spread out among two events, but the end result left both just feeling okay, but nothing great.
2) The quality of the show felt sort of low budget. The screen, script, videos, ads, etc showed lots of poorly planned transitions that at times through off the audience.
3) Geoff is not a fun person to watch or listen to, IMO. He should just introduce the show but find someone else to emcee.
4) It felt empty a lot of times, with a small half-awake audience. Just didn't mesh well...

There WERE some good games shown though, and I liked the mixture of having a celebrity on stage and also some devs. I like the general direction of games announcements this time of year, but there still isn't a cool general showcase that nails it. They need to capture the excitement that came from E3 events back in the day. Live demos galore that can be discussed and shown off, etc. and also would love to see more online audience give-aways to keep us engaged. I liked that they did the limited addition Xbox and wish they would do that more often!

@NEStalgia I'm okay with a creator/dev/exec taking a few minutes to expand on a trailer but I don't need a consistent host throughout the entire show pretending to react to the reveals.

My favorite part of a good show is when a trailer just starts and im left guessing at what it is for awhile until the grand reveal. Nintendo is great at the misdirection in their trailers. Geoff (and most hosts) think they are adding something to the reveal by hinting at what it is before hand then telling me how excited i should be after. Just plain ruins it for me.

A host of any presentation is almost always relying on their personality to make up for the lack of content in the presentation whether it is an award show, game show, sales pitch, etc. In the end I was only there to see games, not Keighley or some streaming star.

@Tharsman Oh man, so much cringe in those voiceovers like a 90's toy commercial for super rad action hero figurines. Make it stop!! I'd honestly rather take Geoff. I can't stand him, but it doesn't repulse me as much as those over RADICIAAL!! sounding voiceovers with the music in the background.

IDK, I liked the Iwata era Nintendo Directs where it felt like humans presenting a product. I love the Sony presentations in that era and prior where it was humans presenting products. Xbox...eehh..not so much. The impersonal polished informercial of the new Nintendo and Sony formats....just...not at all interested. I'll read the roundup on IGN after. The video is just gross.

The good part about the Nintendo one was Miyamoto coming out at talking....which was presenter-style which goes right back to my original opinion. But I'm also not a Ritalin addled hyperactive that needs everything fast fast fast faster who's watching the video while grinding an MMO and catching up on Netflix on a 3rd screen while texting people like many seem to.

@NEStalgia @Somebody I think at the end there is one thing we can all agree on: Geoff is cringy, has the charisma of a peeled potato, and is way too interested in trying to turn himself into some kind of "super star".

@Somebody Yeah I'd be more down for that. Kind of like some of the XBox shows did with just the announcer of the PA with "Please welcome to the stage.....so-and-so...." and exciting music plays and lights flash as a dev gets up on the stage and talks about their game. Totally cool with that, and way better than the rapid-fire-trailer infomercial thing.

And I agree about the misdirection in trailers being fun. That was classic E3, too. The presenters didn't used to give things away, they'd finish their piece on the previous trailer, then step aside and the lights go down, or a studio is named, and a trailer plays, and yeah, it was always great having that "What is this? WTF is this? It's Final Fantasy! Wait! No...no it's not...it's....wait...it's....Metal Gear? No. That's not....Oh! It's Fable!" kind of moments.

@Tharsman LOL yeah, that we can all agree on, all the time! I believe he's been described well as "the Ryan Seacrest of video-games" but I think that's too generous. Seacrest is much more likable. Kinda.

@Somebody @Tharsman I especially liked his "when I started this in my spare bedroom a few years ago" self congratulations minutes before hobnobbing with Nicolas Cage. Or his opinion earlier in the week that he's a one man equal to the whole ESA, but better and wiser.

Although it's a tough call which is harder to stomach. 45 minutes of Geoff as MC, or the 5 minutes of Grand Theft Jimbo as MC in the Sony showcase 😂

Thank you Craig for lowering the music volume while speaking, a basic thing that many people don't do!

Incredibly underwhelming. Didn't see anything interesting bar FF7-2 and I ain't even played the first one yet.

was only interested in the sonic game...
learning FF7 Rebirth is gonna be >100 or 100+GB is disheartening.