EA really disappointed this year with one of their worst showings.

EA held their press conference today and to be honest, it was kind of underwhelming… like a lot. This is definitely a transition year for the company, but everything shown was less than I expected.

Let’s start with their intro. Starting an annual show off with a developer diary isn’t the best thing to do when trying to build hype and awareness for one of your projects. No attack on what was shown for “Star Wars Battlefront,” but for a game teased a year ago, one would think they would have something outside of a few running animations and in-engine footage. This wasn’t the only game that got this treatment. “Mirror’s Edge 2” was announced last year with some rendered gameplay, and we got some actual gameplay here, but it just didn’t deliver too much excitement. This is where EA needed to sell the game, especially given that it’s a not a huge commercial success. This could be the last E3 we see “Mirror’s Edge 2” and the message here wasn’t very strong.

Surprisingly “The Sims 4” had a better presentation than most of what EA showed today. I’m not knocking “The Sims” in anyway, but the games it blew out of the water are normally heavy hitters. The nameless experiment that Criterion Games showed should not have been. Even with the warning that it was very early in development didn’t prepare me for that. That was a failure on EA’s behalf.

We did get some exciting gameplay from “Dragon Age Inquisition,” but I was excited to see something “Mass Effect” related, which I did… in the form of another developer diary. While I admire the intimate look into all of these studios, this is not the place to show it. Add the video to your YouTube channel if anything.

The “Dawngate” MOBA was very underwhelming and sits at the bottom with other presentations.

The sports were all hit and miss. Nothing really is changing in “Madden 15,” but we did get some technical wrinkles ironed out in terms of defense which is, well, so exciting! And what the hell was going on in that “PGA Tour” snippet. Is golf that boring of a sport where you have to recycle “Battlefield 4” animations and have me hit a golf ball over a massively destructive ship? That was just sad. “Fifa” continues to hype up the crowd and usually satisfies every year, so no surprise there. I fairly enjoyed the outing of the first “NHL” game for the PS4 and Xbox One, although still not much to see except for some upgrades and much appreciated graphics. Finally, “UFC” had a great showing with a fight featuring the legendary Bruce Lee knocking out his opponent with a swift kick. I’m liking what they are doing with this franchise to make it look and feel authentic.

“Battlefield: Hardline” closed the show with an explosive cops and robbers scenario in downtown Los Angelas. The game is just different enough to warrant  the subtitle and not a 5. I was not expecting a beta for the game to be available today, so that was very pleasing. May I mention that this is a true beta, not just a demo that’s two weeks early to stress test your servers.

THE BREAKDOWN

Overall, this was a lackluster display from the video game juggernaut. This was EA’s worst showing in a while. I get that it’s a transition year and more will be shown at the next E3, but I was just so underwhelmed. Their key franchise sort of saved the show, but they were already too deep in the bored juice to surface. Hopefully EA will have something to show from their developers next year.

What did you think of EA’s press conference this year? What was your favorite game shown? Let us know in the comments below.