This year, Microsoft kicked some serious ass. While their first-party future will still take some time to be realised, Microsoft’s third-party offerings were incredibly exciting. From Devil May Cry 5 finally emerging from the darkness to a hat trick of Gears of War announcements, Microsoft was throwing punch after punch in their press conference, with knockouts aplenty finding their mark. Did you miss all of that hot action? Well here's a handy round-up for you.

EA’s latest efforts were distracting enough to plaster over old wounds as the likes of Anthem and Unravel 2 earned plenty of love from anyone watching. In case you missed it, here’s the usual handy breakdown of everything that EA had to offer this year.

Anthem is Bioware's first new IP in ten years, and is a standout from their library. See what the developers had to say and show from E3 2018.

I tried. I tried really hard, in fact. Unfortunately, the Anthem hype has got ahold of me something fierce as Bioware unveiled a brand new cinematic trailer for the upcoming epic looking sci-fi FPS/MMO/RPG during the EA Play event happening at E3 right now. Boasting a hell of a cover of Muse’s Uprising, this trailer is jam-packed full of crazy …

I’m excited, I’m revving to go and I’m more than willing to endure a literal 24 hours worth of air travel just to get to E3 this year. Why? Because some of the finest games in the land will be on show there. Games that will define the greatest interactive medium ever made, push them in new directions ad just be a bloody hoot to play. Here’s a list of ten such games, that the Critical Hit massive is eager to experience.

Anthem has already been labelled as a Destiny killer, even though the game that killed Destiny was Destiny itself. The next big game from EA and Bioware definitely looks like it’s been set in the Destiny mould – with a focus on long-term appeal and regular content drops.

Mass Effect Andromeda's painful path of life after launch did have an impact on developer Bioware and their plans for the upcoming Destiny challenger Anthem, as a new direction was forged for the studio.

According to a Dragon Age panel at Havencon this weekend, Bioware may not have survived at all if EA hadn’t bought them.