Plugging A Leak – The Walmart Pre – E3 2018 News
Leaks happen in this gaming industry all of the time, it’s a business where secrets rarely remain secret, and marketing plans can blow up in moments. In recent days, a leak emerged courtesy of Walmart Canada when they posted an extremely large list of games on their site that included a whole host of previously unannounced games from both first, and third parties. The implication is that those games will be revealed at E3 2018 given that the biggest event in the industry is now less than a month away. Join me as I look at each of the “new” games on the list and discuss the likelihood that we’ll hear from them in the near future.
Just Cause 4: It was December 2015 when we saw Just Cause 3, so it’s been a while and we’re probably due. With Square-Enix returning to E3 2018 with a conference this year (albeit a digital one), the first since 2015, it’s fair to assume they’re bringing some big previously unannounced titles with them. Since we’re yet to hear anything from Avalanche since Just Cause 3 released, there’s a decent chance that there’s some legitimacy to this leak. All will be revealed in June though.
Destiny: Comet: A really strange one. Destiny Comet, was a codename for DLC for the original Destiny game, so to see the name re-emerge is quite interesting. Could this be Destiny 2’s The Taken King? Bungie has teased fans that the third expansion to Destiny 2 would emerge at E3, presumably on the Playstation stage, so this makes sense – the naming of said DLC is unusual, however.
Splinter Cell: I feel the presence of this on the list is nothing more than an educated guess, and there’s reason to suspect that the glorious return of Sam Fisher is incoming in a first for this console generation. The initial speculation began post E3 2017, following comments that Sam Fisher hadn’t been forgotten, and now, more recently Sam features in DLC for Ghost Recon: Wildlands. We’ve seen him in a cameo appearance, and so now is the time for the main event. The Ubisoft and perhaps Microsoft E3 stages beckon.
Dragon Quest 2: Now this was one of the weirdest of the bunch. A remake/re-release of Dragon Quest 2, without the same having previously happened to the original entry seems extraordinarily unusual and doesn’t fit with Square-Enix’s recent strategic plans. A typo, and this in fact being Dragon Quest Builders 2 is more likely, but I am also both impressed and surprised by the fact that the listing included both PS4 and XB1 SKUs. No sign of the Switch though.
LEGO DC Villans: Outside of the horrendous typo in the games name, it’s hard to predict the direction of TT’s LEGO games. We’ve seen them play in the DC, Marvel, Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, Jurassic World and Star Wars universes, as well as many more – who is to say that the many villains of the DC universe aren’t the stars of the next LEGO game? LEGO DC Villains is probably the game that has the least rumour or speculation behind it to be legitimate, but that, of course, doesn’t mean it’s not true. Let’s see what happens as E3 closes in.
Borderlands 3: So we know Borderlands 3 is on the way, Randy Pitchford of Gearbox has said as such, and a tech demo of the engine was shown at GDC last year. The wait has been long enough, the hype is there, the development of the game has been long enough now and when coupled with a supposed leak that revealed an E3 eve announcement – the likelihood of an E3 reveal is high, leak or no leak. We’re so sure of this one that we already have some video about it, check out Patched
Rage 2: This was a surprise amongst the list. Rage was a somewhat positively received Bethesda game that released last gen that never received much fanfare. It was a shock when it appeared, but what was even more shocking is how much Bethesda has leaned into it since. We don’t know yet whether the Walmart leak was real or simply an educated guess, but it seems that this guess may have been on the money.

Gears of War 5: One that has been discussed by many, the theory exists that we’ll be seeing one of Halo 6 or Gears of War 5, so if it turns out that it’s Gears, then I wouldn’t be at all surprised. The Coalition kicked off a new chapter for the IP, and with the last release now being 18 months in the rear-view mirror, the time seems about right to learn about the follow-up. Who knows, maybe we’ll be seeing both it and Halo 6?
Forza Horizons 5: Surely this is a typo and Microsoft isn’t pulling another Windows 9 *hint: they skipped from Windows 8 to 10 back in the day*. If betting took place on E3 announcements, Forza Horizon 4 would be among the shortest odds of any speculated game, but given that the team at Playground are reportedly working on an RPG as well, there are the seeds of doubt in my mind that by juggling multiple projects that maybe Forza Horizon 4 isn’t going to hit its normal Q3/Q4 release window.
Assassin’s Creed: Ubisoft brought back Assassin’s Creed in a big way last year courtesy of Origins, but are Ubisoft so bold as to return to their annual release ways? It’s not out of the realms to suppose that we’ll see a new Assassin’s Creed announced at E3 2018, regardless of whether or not it releases in 2018 or not. Perhaps the promotional campaign for this new game, which is supposedly set in Greece, will have a longer tail than previous entries, we’ll soon know.
So those were the big hitters revealed in the Walmart leak of this past week. What do you think of those prospective games? Do you think this “leak” is genuine? What about my take on the likelihood of each occurring? Sound off in the comments below or reach out to me via Twitter to tell me what you think, and get excited, E3 is less than a month away.