E3 2014 Mario Maker - PIRANHA PLANTS

The most purely wonderful thing at E3 not called No Man's Sky or Batman falling off a building, Mario Maker lets players build their own 8-bit Super Mario Bros levels. As a design tool Mario Maker looks pretty straightforward, using the touchscreen on the Wii U gamepad for some dragging and dropping. This trailer shows off player designed levels overstuffed with enemies in easy, point hoarding positions. Presumably it'll be equally easy for sadists to design their own impossible, Shobon Action style nightmares.

E3 2014 Bayonetta 2 - SCHOOL RUN

Platinum Games serve up another exciting title on a console I do not own. Thanks guys! In the first Bayonetta, the titular character beat up the Heavenly host, Bayonetta 2 dumps her in hell to battle a series of bosses that could have sprung from the first Devil May Cry. I wonder if there's been a push to tone down the stripper pole sexuality of the original now that Nintendo are publishing? Bayonetta's new haircut and outfit are borderline respectable.

E3 2014 Yoshi's Woolly World - CRAFTY

A quick glance at Nintendo games and it's easy to come away thinking they're Fisher Price toys for babies. Stick around for the entirety of this trailer for Yoshi's Woolly World and it becomes clear this is a game heaving with hidden depths. You can amble along bouncing off the walls and delighting in the plinky plonky music or you can scour the landscape hunting down secret collectibles and using power-ups to find new paths. It's up to you.

E3 2014 Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain - DIAMOND DOGS

Four minutes of absolutely bonkers cutscenes taken completely out of context? It must be Hideo Kojima's trailer for Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain! With a horn shaped lump of shrapnel lodged in his head, Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater hero Naked Snake jets around the world sticking his nose into genocide, getting himself covered in blood, and wiping the ashes of his fallen comrades all over his face. Hideo Kojima is tackling serious issues!

E3 2014 Batman: Arkham Knight - NO SHIV

Is that Kevin Conroy back to complete Rocksteady Studio's Batman trilogy? Looks like the malformed sidequest Batman: Arkham Origins is being completely ignored, we're back playing as an older Bruce, complete with a hovertank Batmobile that might have been modified to deal with riots. Verticality seems to be a bit of a buzz mechanic at this year's E3, Far Cry 4 and Sunset Overdrive both feature characters scrambling ever higher to get the best vantage point. Neither of those games even come close to the delights seen here though - leap off a Wayne Enterprises skyscraper and you can paraglide through a version of Gotham City apparently designed by MC Escher.

E3 2014 Uncharted 4: A Thief's End - SURE THING

With The Last of Us Remastered half-way out the door Naughty Dog can knuckle down on the next Nathan Drake game. Uncharted 4: A Thief's End features an older Drake cautiously moving through a very pretty jungle. Given the recent high-level reshuffling at Naughty Dog to accommodate the promotions of some key The Last of Us dev, I think it's fair to assume that this Uncharted will skew a little more sweaty and desperate.

E3 2014 The Last of Us Remastered / Grand Theft Auto V - HD REMIX

It isn't just Microsoft that gets to rummage through its back catalogue for quickie prestige releases. First up Sony have a spruced up version of last-gen stand out The Last of Us ready to go. Incidentally, I wouldn't watch this trailer if you haven't already beaten the game - that spoiler warning ain't there for decoration.

Rockstar also have a max settings version of Grand Theft Auto V waiting in the wings. Initially announced as a PS4 title, GTAV has since been confirmed for Xbox One and PC as well. I wasn't a massive fan of the game, as it churned on the storyline bottomed out and mission design erred on the irritating, but I'll be damned if I don't want to play this again on my PS4. They've got us by the balls with HD re-releases!

E3 2014 No Man's Sky - ELITE

For all the AAA bluster at this year's E3, nothing even comes close to the scope and ambition of Hello Games' No Man's Sky. Players are able to explore worlds with procedurally generated landscapes - if this clip is anything to go on, think a series of prehistoric Proteus planets - before jumping into a little spaceship and blasting off into the cosmos to do it all over again somewhere else. Mix in, at the very least, sauropods and an insistent electronic beat, and you have what looks like a masterpiece in the making.

E3 2014 Let It Die - GUY SAVAGE

Let It Die is Suda 51 and Grasshopper Manufactures's PS4 exclusive. Details are scarce, and the trailer isn't much help, but it looks like the Killer7 studio are taking a pass at a competitive online version of Rockstar's sociopathic sneak 'em up Manhunt.

E3 2014 Abzu - POD

Abzu is the new game from a pair of ex-Journey devs, Matt Nava and Austin Wintory. Like their previous game, Abzu seems to be about being a tiny moving part in a vast, otherworldly landscape. The diver character seems to plunging deeper and deeper into the oceans, uncovering increasingly bizarre locations. It looks a bit like Novotrade International's Mega Drive classic Ecco the Dolphin, a rock hard exploring game in which you could hang out with stranded Blue Whales.

E3 2014 Dead Island 2 - HIT 'EM UP

I wish the Dead Island games played like their trailers looked. Instead, the level of interaction usually boils down to the player endlessly encircling unkillable zombies, thwacking them over and over again with a broken oar. Hopefully new team Yager Development (Spec Ops: The Line) have a few tricks up their sleeve.

E3 2014 Far Cry 4 - WHAT TEMPLES ARE OUT THERE?

The Sony conference was on pretty late last night. Think I was up until nearly 4 watching it. I had a vague idea that you could invite people to play Far Cry 4 with you on PS4 without them even owning the game. That doesn't sound right does it? Turns out it's true though. So if you find yourself fresh out of elephants and in need of a lift off the Gyro Captain, start spamming invites.

E3 2014 Bloodborne - PRAISE THE SUN

Demon's Souls director Hidetaka Miyazaki bounces back with Bloodborne, Sony's hardcore gamer coup. Rumours of a secret Souls project have been flying around ever since some bored / enterprising individual spent time cross-checking the credits for Dark Souls and Dark Souls II. Turns out key personal were unaccounted for on the sequel.

E3 2014 The Order: 1886 - STINKY BASEMENT

With the Dead Space franchise buried somewhere in EA's back garden it falls to SCE Santa Monica Studio and Ready at Dawn to bring the spooky. Although you wouldn't know it from this bullet spam advert, the gameplay footage of The Order: 1886 shown last night involved a nervous chap snooping around London's gloomy underbelly evoking the early, creepy, passages of BioShock and the aforementioned Dead Space games. Let's hope there's a little more of that and a little less of this.

E3 2014 Entwined - ANDY ASTEROIDS

Front and centre at the Sony show was Entwined, a twin stick tunnel navigator that looked like a cross between the ascension special effects at the end of 2001: A Space Odyssey and Earthworm Jim's special stages. After the sweaty machismo of the Microsoft conference, Sony decision to lead with colour coded kites and delicate music was a welcome change of pace.

E3 2014 Crackdown - WE LIKE DOMINOES

Zero gameplay in this tease for a new Crackdown but hopefully in the final build you'll be able to drive exploding oil tankers up collapsing buildings into the waiting arms of evil drug dudes. Why else would they lead with that? Adding destruction to Crackdown's nifty cel-shaded superhero formula sounds like an absolute winner. After a rubbishy sequel, this could be a return to form.

E3 2014 Tom Clancy's The Division - "Chris, can you mark some of these guys?"

Yeah Chris. Stop trying to hog all the glory. You can't even shoot good. Tom Clancy's The Division continues to look like a somewhat exciting jaunt through a post-fall city, Ubisoft selling hard on an idealised version of in-game communication. Our window into this world is Chris, a guy who'd rather paint the landscape with bullets than actually help his team mates out. Yeah, thanks Chris. Good job. 

E3 2014 Cuphead - BY GOLLY!

Continuing the vague trend of everything at Microsoft's conference looked like a futuristic version of a Mega Drive game was the delightful Cuphead. Question! Would I like to play an Alien Soldier style run and gunner that looks exactly like a Fleischer Studios Popeye cartoon? Yes. Yes I would. Thank you Studio MDHR.

E3 2014 Sunset Overdrive - SHABAAM!

Open world superhero games are becoming as ubiquitous as first person shooty shoot, so it's a good job Sunset Overdrive dev Insomniac Games remembered to pack some charm. This Xbox One exclusive stays looking like the Sega Dreamcast as a video game genre. Jet Set Radio mechanics with Crazy Taxi colours and, hang on. What was a decent third-person carnage game on Dreamcast? Blue Stinger? That was shite. Spawn: In the Demon's Hand? No. That wasn't much better. Okay, this is where my analogy falls apart. Sorry. SUNSET OVERDRIVE WOOO! Genuinely has me considered an Xbox purchase.

E3 2014 Inside - PLAY DEAD

Another coup for Xbox was Play Dead's Limbo follow-up, Inside. Although, judging by the garbled language used to boast about the exclusive, Inside should make it to other consoles eventually. Like its forebear, Inside looks like a depressing trudge through an incredibly dangerous environment in which absolutely everything wants to tear you apart. Excellent! Can't wait.