So… today starts with the Microsoft keynote at 10.30am Pacific. Then Nintendo and Sony has theirs tomorrow. This might be an interesting E3… especially for Nintendo’s part, since they have not really announced any lineup for the rest of the year, and that will most likely come. There will also be hands-on opportunities with Dragon Age and Rock Band 2, so the press feed will probably only make me drool even more over these (especially Dragon Age since I still want to see gameplay footage from it). Activision split from ESA, but will hold their own show nearby as well. [URL=http://kotaku.com/5024660/your-e3-lineup-roundup]Kotaku has a list of the official E3 presence[/URL], but that does not include any secret titles yet to be announced (duh!).

I also honestly expect to see Sony do something to the PS3. Mostly because the PS3 is sold out everywhere in Sweden and they haven’t really been able to get any restocks at all the past month or so. Wether it’s a new SKU with bigger hard drive or something more drastic, it looks like something will happen. Of course… they might save it for Leipzig later this summer if it’s only for the European market. But then it’s foolish to hold off sales already.

MS Press Conference over. Biggest news:

New Xbox Interface. 3D avatars and stuff. Live Parties where you can watch movies and stuff with friends online.
Portal: Still Alive coming to Live Arcade!!!
Final Fantasy XIII coming to Xbox 360 as well
Rock Band 2: 84 songs on disc, 20 free downloads, can import songs from Rock Band 1 disc.
Fable II in October
Gears of War 2 in November
Fallout 3 to get DLC exclusive to 360 and PC
More movies, tv shows, rentals on Live

Nothing has me hugely excited so far, at all just seems like MS is trying to catch up with certain features and aspects of their competitors’ systems. I’m interested to see what Sony and Nintendo have up their sleeves.

And Bungie… while not officially speaking on E3, they have spoken about a game announcement for quite a while now, and their website now has a splash screen with a countdown timer aiming for wednesday. Also, EA press conference right now. Dead Space sounds promising as does Mirror’s Edge.

Biggest news so far is probably still official lack of exclusivity for FFXIII. While talked about for ages, having it official is a harsh blow towards Sony.

Bleh, no gameplay of Dragon Age was shown during the E3 conference… just the same trailer as posted the other day.

E3 lost its gusto when it went away from its absurd booths and performances.

Nothing is really exciting but the Xbox Live updates are welcomed. Caching the entire game to the HD seems crazy but I thought about it and it’d been nice for playing Mass Effect or GTA4 to cut back on load times. I haven’t been playing any games as of late. I did play an entire game of Civ 4 at work, which consisted of the entire day.

What I want to play.
Spore…. Spore…. um…. Spore? Oh yeah, Spore, maybe Fallout 3 and Fable 2 but mainly Spore. With the lack of any huge titles, its kept me from gaming. Notably I can’t boot Bootcamp because my eSATA isn’t bootable so I haven’t been Windows Gaming as the only way I can use Windows is VMWare but I don’t really care. Spore has a Mac version. I am happy.

Favorites so far:

• Marvel: Ultimate Alliance 2 official (not sure it was before, even if it was more or less confirmed)

• [URL=http://www.gametrailers.com/player/36281.html]Mirror’s Edge GamePlay[/URL]. Not only is the story written by Terry Pratchett’s daughter… the game looks really sweet, like a first person prince of persia in a modern world.

• [URL=http://www.gametrailers.com/player/36315.html]Fallout 3 Gameplay Footage[/URL]. Now this is droolworthy. Seriously. The targeting system feels a lot like the original and the game feels a lot like Fallout in this footage. Hopefully Bethesda did pull it off.

• [URL=http://www.gametrailers.com/player/36270.html]The New Prince of Persia Game[/URL]. I think the new style of cell-shading looks absolutely stunning. Not sure if they’re trying to make some Ico kind of gameplay with the girl or what… but I’m starting to look forward to this one.

• [URL=http://www.gametrailers.com/player/36279.html]Fable 2[/URL]. I have a soft spot for this one, since it seems to deliver so much more than the first one, and I liked that one enough. This one delivers cooperative play on top of that.

• [URL=http://www.gametrailers.com/player/36299.html]Ghostbusters[/URL]. Still not sure what I think of this game, but at least it looks like an ambitious enough project.

Mirror’s Edge looks like Riddick (The Xbox game) mixed with Assassin’s Creed to me… Parkour, the EXTREME game for today’s EXTREME gamer.  Actually I want to play it, looks like a nice break from regular FPSes.

Fallout 3 looks a little less interesting to me after that preview, more a way to pack super ultra violence in a FPS-light. Granted they focused on the action, I was hoping for more wacko Post Apocalyptic future to explore in the deserts of So-Cal in MadMax fashion.

Fable looks like Fable to me which is good. I used to think I hated RPGs, then I just realized I hated Japanese story telling and turn based combat.

Thanks for link ups in HD.

SPORE!

Nintendo Press Conference over.

Quick Recap:

We sell a shitload of console and games. Wii will most probably pass the 360 in total sales in the US this month… the rest of the world already ahead.

Animal Crossing: City Folk for the Wii… run around in a cartoon world and play with your friends. Introduces Wii Speak! A microphone designed to be placed on the TV and let the whole room speak. The game looks like an overly cute Second Life.

New Guitar Hero DS game, since the last one was just released after all. They’re even quicker than Harmonix. Will introduce song sharing and something like that. I honestly don’t give a shit… Trumpet Hero would make more sense with that interface.

Grand Theft Auto: China Wars! Designed from the ground up for the DS with the same sandbox gameplay as the normal GTA.

Wii Music. 50 instruments, drums with balance board support, drum school. For the rest of the instruments you basically hit the buttons like mad and the game corrects your mistakes more or less…. they still made it sound extremely off key at times though.

Snowboard game using the balance board… Shaun White? Ubisoft. Graphics looking decent.

The new MotionPlus adapter to make the Wiimote much more precise, with 1:1 movement control. New Wii Sports game set on the beach to use it. Includes swordfighting with duels.

Sony Press Conference done with.

What was said:

We kick major booty. PS2 still doing well after 9 years. PS3 catching speed and PSP dominating.

Resistance 2 looking nice… demo very similar in parts to the GoW demo… just bigger and browner.

LittleBigPlanet used to present the numbers…. looking extremely awesome actually. Will be very interesting.

Home will be awesome, Sony says. Kind of looks so too.

New Ratchet & Clank game for PS3 on PSN only. Cheap and short… probably episodic.

Movie and TV shows to purchase and rent on the PSN, in SD and HD. Decent pricing and apparently pretty decent DRMs. Several studios on, Lionsgate, MGM, Warner and more.

Resistance for PSP. Looks like a chunkier version of the first. Third person mode. Looks polished for a portable shooter.

New PSP bundle coming aimed at younger audience.

DC Universe online on PS3 presented by Jim Lee. Graphics looking like WoW vs. Freedom Force. Not a bad thing.

80GB HD standard in the PS3 from now on… but a new 80GB without BC? At least “the same features as the 40GB” and that’s without BC. My only prediction about E3 came true! I think I can survive with 80GB…. might still get a 320GB before starting to use it… but it’s not as certain now.

People claiming that they’ve learnt how to use the PS3 better now… they tell us to expect better looking games in the future.

God of War 3! Biiiiiig surprise! /sarcasm. Can’t wait though. No gameplay shown.

Infamous. 3rd person realisticilish looking superhero game. Looks very interesting.

MAG: Massive Action Game. Online game with 256 person battles. Trying to push the PS3 to the limit…. “not possible anywhere else”. Squad groups of 8 with “officers” proved by experience. First gameplay shown. Campaign in eastern Europe/former russia somewhere. Graphics looking like a standard first person shooter… just with massive online mode. Amazing animations too if this truly is gameplay. This could be epic.

Ubisoft talk over as well….

Didn’t pay much attention. Appearently there was awesome footage of Prince of Persia, the game is built on the Assassin’s Creed engine and they try to innovate best they can. The girl with you is there to help and cannot die or get in your way. She helps you fight and reach higher places.

They also announced “I Am Alive”... which by all means seems to be a survival/desperation game instead of survival/horror. [URL=http://www.gametrailers.com/player/36319.html]Trailer here[/URL].

Some other trailers from the day (or yesterday that I missed):

[URL=http://www.gametrailers.com/player/36435.html]Spore[/URL] and [URL=http://www.gametrailers.com/player/36429.html?type=mov]More Spore[/URL]
[URL=http://www.gametrailers.com/player/36414.html?type=mov]God of War 3[/URL]
[URL=http://www.gametrailers.com/player/36419.html]Infamous[/URL]
[URL=http://www.gametrailers.com/player/36416.html]LittleBigPlanet presents Sony sales[/URL]
[URL=http://www.gametrailers.com/player/36413.html]DC Universe[/URL]

Thanks for the E3 highlights in 60 seconds.

Saved me a bunch of hassle having to look around everyplace else when Johan throws it all together nicely. Since the majority of it all revolves around consoles, I can’t say I’m hugely excited. As usual, I know my buddies with the 360s, Wiis and PS3s will buy up some of these future titles. I’ll probably play co-op GoW2 with the same friend as I did with the first game.

Ghostbusters looks pretty awesome I have to say as a child of the 80s who grew up watching the cartoon, collected the toys, etc. I hope it turns out to be a “sleeper title” which gains much satisfaction and praise after release. They managed to get all the original actors from the movies to voice which is already a huge plus.

To think it only took the loss of 5 years of absolute domination of hardware sales to make sony find a non-bore-people-to-death way to present their numbers.

Jim, King of Awesome - 16 July 2008 02:37 AM

Since the majority of it all revolves around consoles, I can’t say I’m hugely excited.

Yeah… but then it’s mostly been the 3 console manufacturers’ keynotes so far. But add EA and Ubi and there’s still only 3 “pure” PC games…. Sims 3, Spore and Dragon Age… and on the floor or something there’s the Warhammer MMO…. but even [URL=http://www.gametrailers.com/player/36482.html?type=mov]the new Wolfenstein game[/URL] and [URL=http://www.gametrailers.com/player/36503.html]Far Cry 2[/URL] will hit consoles right away.

While many of the games comes to PC as well… it’s getting second place. It’s starting to become a home of MMOs, console ports, Sims and casual web games. It feels like PC is turning into the new Mac when it comes to gaming. Which is sad, because I still enjoy gaming on my Mac.

Time for a video summary of the full last day!

[URL=http://www.gametrailers.com/player/36532.html]More Prince of Persia gameplay[/URL]. Still looks amazing.
[URL=http://www.gametrailers.com/player/36540.html]LittleBigPlanet[/URL] when not presenting Sony sales.
[URL=http://www.gametrailers.com/player/36528.html]Fracture[/URL], the game where you deform the environment as a weapon.
[URL=http://www.gametrailers.com/player/36527.html]The Force Unleashed[/URL]. Probably the most exiting StarWars game since KotOR.
[URL=http://www.gametrailers.com/player/36476.html]Red Faction: Guerrilla[/URL]. Red Faction returns with massive destruction.
[URL=http://www.gametrailers.com/player/36538.html]Ratchet & Clank Future: Quest for Booty[/URL]. The new short game on PSN.
[URL=http://www.gametrailers.com/player/36539.html]Wario Land: Shake it.[/URL] Amazingly enough a 2D platformer on the Wii.

Penny Arcade’s Summary of the press conferences:

[IMG]http://www.penny-arcade.com/images/2008/20080716.jpg[/IMG]