Sony PS4 at E3 2018: The Last of Us Part 2, Death Stranding, Kingdom Hearts 3 and more

Sony's conference was uneven, but one thing was undeniable: the games delivered.

Andrew Gebhart Former senior producer

Mark Serrels Editorial Director

Mark Serrels is an award-winning Senior Editorial Director focused on all things culture. He covers TV, movies, anime, video games and whatever weird things are happening on the internet. He especially likes to write about the hardships of being a parent in the age of memes, Minecraft and Fortnite. Definitely don't follow him on Twitter.

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Andrew Gebhart

Mark Serrels

June 12, 2018 10:43 a.m. PT

4 min read

Coming into E3 2018 you got the sense that Sony was in a comfortable spot.

In the current console race, it's in first spot. Clearly. It also has a suite of online exclusives. It didn't need to do anything spectacular here, and it sort of didn't. But it also did?

In short: Sony's E3 2018 presser is one of the most uneven conferences I've ever watched, but it didn't even matter when the games are this good.

The Last of Us Part 2 is everything ramped up

Watch this: E3 2018: The Last of Us Part 2 gameplay revealed

04:46

Sony's show kicked off in a church with a weird Kingsman reference and some truly terrible sound. Turns out the church was just an elaborate, expensive way for Sony to segue into its first gameplay trailer for The Last of Us Part 2.

Thankfully it delivered.

Developer Naughty Dog is known for strong writing and well put-together cinematics. The trailer opened with a really interesting dramatic cutscene that transitioned seamlessly into our first look at how the game will play out in practice.

The Last of Us Part 2 looked familiar to anyone who played the original: short, sharp, brutish, with a hyperreal portrayal of violence unlike anything I've ever seen in video games . This is a different kind of violence: not celebratory, but driven by an absolute need to survive.

Everything has been ramped up here: the animations, the combat, the stealth mechanics. It just looks like a far more delicate and elaborate version of the original.

It looks awesome.

Ghost of Tsushima looks wild

Watch this: E3 2018: First look at Ghost of Tsushima

04:13

This was a surprise for me. I had no idea what this game was, but I was impressed.

It's a samurai game set during the Mongol invasion and it's such a glorious, artfully created video game. It's clearly combat driven, and (technically) hack and slash, but it looks driven by counters and timing -- more like Arkham Asylum or Dark Souls than say... God of War. This is a good thing.

Surprise, here's a new Remedy game!

That game is called Control.

Usually Remedy turns up at Microsoft E3 conferences. It was a little strange to see it announce a new video game with Sony.

It looks interesting. Similar in aesthetic to Quantum Break , but it also seems to hark back to the good old days of Max Payne. Control definitely looks like a video game playing to the strengths of the studio developing it.

Kingdom Hearts 3 was... definitely Kingdom Hearts

I am not a Kingdom Hearts fan. This seemed absolutely goofy as hell and I had no idea what was happening.

Your best bet is to head to our Kingdom Hearts 3: everything you need to know post!

Death Stranding was as insane as you'd hope

Where do I even start?

Jesus wept.

This trailer began with what looked like some bizarre exploration with Norman Reedus carrying a whole heap of crap on his back.

When I insist on carrying up all the groceries in one trip... pic.twitter.com/PMNh2j5Gvv
— James Willems (@JamesWillems) June 12, 2018

And of course it descended into insanity. Kojima really is the David Lynch of video games and Sony has clearly given him a lot of money to indulge his wildest whims. I am here for it.

Spider-Man is Arkham Asylum at warp speed

I'm still not sold on Spider-Man. This trailer felt like one tremendous quick time event with some button mashing. The hyperfast pace left me a bit queasy. I could (and probably will be) wrong about this, but I'm not certain this is going to be as good as many hope.

What else?

It was a busy show for Sony.

It showed off a Resident Evil 2 remake, which I'm down for. There's a new Nioh trailer, which looked pretty good.

From Software also announced a VR game. Which was weird.

All in all, a strange show for Sony. The presentation was flat out bizarre, but the games were good.

What's after Sony?

The PlayStation presentation is the next-to-last press conference before the doors officially open for E3 2018 on Tuesday. The big finale is the Nintendo Direct livestream, Tuesday, June 12: