Daily Briefing: Friday 7th January

Turns out that Fallout television series is going ahead after all

This one has been a pretty long time in the making, as Bethesda first announced their partnership with Amazon and Kilter Films way back in July 2020. The project has since essentially floated around in public attention stasis ever since, but we got a bit of news this week with confirmation that there’s actually a decent bit of talent attached to it.

• According to a new report from Deadline, the Fallout series’ debut episode will be directed by Jonathan Nolan, who is best known as the co-creator and executive HBO’s Westworld. Geneva Robertson-Dworet and Graham Wagner have also been appointed as showrunners. Robertson-Dworet is best known for co-writing Captain Marvel and the 2018 Tomb Raider movie, while Wagner co-executive producer Silicon Valley. Nolan will also executive produce the series alongside Westworld co-creator Lisa Joy and Athena Wickman.

E3 won’t have a physical show again this year

That’s directly from show organisers The Entertainment and Software Association (ESA), who released a statement confirming that they have made the decision due to “ongoing health risks surrounding Covid-19 and its potential impact on the safety of exhibitors and attendees.” This will mark the third year in a row that E3 will not run in a physical show format.

• E3 has followed an all-digital format these past few years in the absence of a physical show but, interestingly, there hasn’t yet been any mention of a replacement show. Last year had three days of livestream coverage alongside a media experience app that got roundly bodied on social media. Considering the amount of difficulty E3 was having staying relevant even before the pandemic, it was widely believed that this run of digital shows would mark the end of the show entirely. The ESA don’t seem ready to give up just yet, though, stating that they “remain incredibly excited about the future of E3 and look forward to announcing more details soon.” So there you go.

Star Wars: Jedi Fallen Order sequel could be revealed soon

This latest batch of rumours comes courtesy of industry insider and “throw every at the wall and see what sticks” leak merchant Jeff Grubb who, speaking on a recent Giant Bomb stream, claimed that EA are gearing up to reveal the sequel for in and around June. That’s typically when E3 would be running and, though there hasn’t been a physical show these past few years, a lot of publishers have stuck to the timeframe from announcing new projects.

• According to Grubb, EA and developers Respawn Entertainment want to reveal the hotly-anticipated sequel “in a significant way” in the next few months. This would, in turn, give publisher and developers alike plenty of time to get the hype train moving ahead of a possible release at the tail end of this year. Respawn advertised  several job openings for a high-profile Star Wars game and Jedi Fallen Order turned out to be a real hit when it released earlier that year. It was a commercial and critical success, as well, releasing to generally positive reviews and selling over 10 million copies by 2020. So that’ll keep EA happy, if nothing else.