Click "read more" to find out what I think about the rest of the conference, as well as watch a trailer of what The Legend of Zelda might look like in HD
Everyone expected to have their socks blown off by the announcement of Nintendo's new system, now known as the Wii U. Did it deliver? I'd answer that question with a resounding yes. Nintendo's goal with the Wii U is to deliver something for every type of gamer, both casual and core. They acknowledged that the Wii's lack of HD support was one of the main causes of this schism in the first place, so Nintendo is making sure this system is a graphical power house. It supports 1080p, is more powerful than the Xbox 360 and PS3 (although we don't know by how much), and can stream content to it's greatest new feature, the touch screen controller. But all of that power wouldn't mean anything without great software, which is why Nintendo announced some of the best third party support a Nintendo system has seen since the NES days. They showed a demo reel featuring core games like Dark Stalkers 2, Ninja Gaiden 3, Aliens: Colonial Marines, Tekken, and Batman: Arkham City. EA, Ubisoft and several other publishers and developers also announced their excitement for the system and their intent to develop for it.
Click "read more" to find out what I think about the rest of the conference, as well as watch a trailer of what The Legend of Zelda might look like in HD
0 Comments
As predicted, the PS VITA (now the official name of the NGP) was the star of the press conference. The system will start at $249, which might cause some trouble for Nintendo if Sony has a solid library of games to back it up. AT&T will be the official 3G and wireless internet provider of the handheld. Uncharted: Golden Abyss, Street Fighter x Tekken, ModNation Racers, Little Big Planet were major titles announced for the system, with more to come.
On the PS3 front Sony announced exclusive content for several third party games, including Battlefield 1943 on Battlefield 3's disc and the first Bioshock included on Bioshock: Infinite's disc. Speaking of Bioshock: Infinite, it now supports the Move peripheral. Previously announced titles like Uncharted: Drake's Deception and Resistance 3 both had delicious looking trailers.Sony also stressed the importance of 3D gaming, announcing a 3D a Playstation branded monitor bundle that will be available for $499 and include PlayStation 3D glasses, Resistance 3, and an HDMI cable. Extra glasses will be available at the steep price of $69.99. New games announced include the much rumored Starhawk and Sly Cooper: Thieves in Time, both of which are likely to be very good. Dust 514, a new MMO from the developer behind Eve Online, will launch next summer and feature interactivity between the PS3 and VITA. Many games will feature interactions between the PS3 and VITA, even allowing you to take some games on the road with you. Click "read more" to find my verdict and a trailer for Uncharted: Drake's Deception. Ubisoft had a very strong press conference, showing off epic trailers for both Farcry3 and Assassin's Creed Revelations. Four player co-op looked like a lot of fun for Rayman: Origins, I'm excited to get my hands on that. Brothers in Arms: Furious 4, developed by Gearbox, was also announced and looks as though it was heavily influenced by a recent Quentin Tarantino movie. On the casual games front, Ubisoft announced that Just Dance 3 would be available for Wii, Xbox 360 and PS3 this Fall. They also announced a Kinect exclusive mini game collection, Raving Rabbids Alive & Kicking, that looks to be goofy fun.
Click "read more" to read my verdict and watch a trailer for Assassin's Creed Revelations. EA really came out guns blazing for this years e3 conference, literally. The publishing giant showed intense trailers for both Mass Effect 3 and Battlefield 3, two games that will surely be up there for game of the year contention. EA also announced Sims Social, allowing gamers to play a lower resolution version of the hugely popular life simulation on Facebook. I expect this game to be a social gaming phenomenon, making most people forget all about Farmville and whatever else they are playing these days. Need For Speed: The Run was the only questionable title shown, it allows drivers to get out of their cars and... well run. I'm not to sure that is a feature everyone was clamoring for in their Need for Speed.
Click "read more" for my verdict, as well as a trailer for Battlefield 3. Microsoft showed off a lot of nice titles at e3, including surefire hits like Halo 4 and a 10th anniversary remake of Halo: Combat Evolved, as well as updates to popular Kinect titles like Dance Central 2 and Kinect Sports Season 2.In a shocking move Peter Molyneux announce that Fable: The Journey is a brand new Kinect game that is completely on rails. Forza 4, due October 11, will also make heavy use of the Kinect peripheral. We also saw high profile third party games like Mass Effect 3 and Ghost Recon: Future Soldier seeing strong Kinect integration.
The Xbox 360 itself is seeing updates too, with a new Kinect based UI due this fall, as well as a streaming television service searchable by Microsoft's own Bing engine. The system will also enable cloud saving in the near future, saving your hard drives from being over encumbered as well as enabling gamers to use their profiles on the go. Click "read more" to find out what I thought of the conference, as well as watch a teaser trailer for Halo 4. Nintendo will hold its media event at 9AM PDT on Tuesday, June 7. As many already know, Nintendo will be announcing their new home console at this year's e3. I think that this year will be about showing core gamer support, while also offering something different and unique that the casual gamer can get behind as well. The core gamer will obviously get behind the jump in power that Nintendo's next console will offer, rumored to be a half step above that of the Xbox 360 and PS3, whereas the casual gamer might find solace in the 6" touchscreens that are said to be on the controllers. The system will also likely be backwards compatible with Wii games and peripherals. Will the vitality sensor that made an appearance a couple of years ago make a reappearance, this time built into the controller from the get go? The most important rumored detail might be the fact that the system will be able to stream content to the controller's 6" screen, thus making it a portable console on its own. Everyone knows the portable market is king in Japan right now, this might be Nintendo's first attempt at a hybrid of sorts. There will also likely be a surprise or two that no one has even guessed about the system's functionality. After all, Nintendo is anything but predictable.
On the software front I expect a strong line up of both casual and core games, Nintendo no doubt saw the error of their ways last generation. Not creating a destination for core gamers early on left the Wii out in the cold later on in the generation. Whereas power might have been a problem during Wii's life span, its successor won't have to worry about that for at least two years. Even then Sony and Microsoft aren't likely to come out with super expensive machines that will blow Nintendo's out of the water. I imagine Nintendo will tout vastly improved third party support and a much stronger online presence, bolstered by a surprise partner, as reasons for the hardcore gamer to return to the fold. On the 3DS front we are likely to hear a lot more about the eShop, 3D video and movie support, as well as the next round of high profile titles. I expect to hear a ton of information about Super Mario 3DS and maybe even a 2D Metroid for the series 25th anniversary. The system will need a couple of tricks up its sleeve to compete with the NGP, as it has strong momentum coming into e3 going up against a system that hasn't met sales expectations. On the Wii front I bet we will see a blow out on The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword information, as well as the U.S. announcement of the new Kirby game by HAL Laboratories. We might even see a couple of surprise localizations like Xenoblade and The Last Story. I wouldn't be surprised if Nintendo also detailed plans on how the Wii's successor would upscale these games to make them look really good on the new system. This is bound to be a really exciting e3 for Nintendo fans. Sony's E3 conference takes place June 6 at 5PM PDT, an event that will surely focus on their new handheld NGP. Although I'm sure it won't be called NGP for long, as many rumors are suggesting it will be renamed the PS VITA. Sony will likely gloss over the recent hacking of PSN, instead choosing to focus on Move support in future core gamer oriented titles like Metal Gear Solid: Rising, Ninja Gaiden 3, as well as big first party titles like Uncharted 3 and Resistance 3. There have also been rumblings of a new entry in the God of War and Syphon Filter series, both of which I would expect to see sometime in 2012.
We will hopefully get some concrete information on the NGP's pricing. I am hoping Sony learned from their past pricing mistakes and launch the system at a reasonable price. I think $300-$350 would be a sweet spot for the system, without selling the system for too much of a loss. Speaking of prices, I also expect to see another price drop for the PS3, as well as Move, to make it more attractive to casual users in light of the Xbox 360's recent success in that demographic. The Xperia Play and the expansion of the Playstation brand onto tablets and other mobile devices may also be a focus of the event, but I question how much they will talk about those devices given that they might take attention away from their own dedicated gaming devices. Microsoft's E3 press conference starts on Monday, June 6 at 10AM PDT. What will we see there? I think the most obvious focus will be Kinect, seeing as how that has renewed a lot of interest in the aging platform. I think the system will be around for another two years at least, with core oriented games featuring Kinect integration sustaining the system. I expect to see support in new Halo and Gears of War titles announced, as well as third party titles like Mass Effect 3, Ghost Recon: Future Soldier and a rumored Rainbow Six game. We will also see sequels for Kinect Sports, Kinectimals and Dance Central announced, to keep a wider audience interested in the peripheral as well.
I also expect to see the Xbox 360 touted as an all in one media device, featuring a new streaming television service, as well as Skype integration. Microsoft did just purchase Skype, so I would say that is a highly likely move on their part. Further integration with their Windows Mobile phones is also a possibility, and maybe even a few exclusive games will be announced for that platform as well. Microsoft will also address a major bottleneck with the Xbox 360, disk space and storage. We already know that Microsoft plans on opening up a couple of extra GB on their current disk format, but what about freeing up gamer's hard drives? I think they will have a cloud sharing infrastructure to reveal that will eliminate most of our problems. THQ has finally unveiled the uDraw game tablet they had previously announced for the Xbox 360 and PS3. The tablet features a number of upgrades over its Wii exclusive predecessor, including input at 2000x1600 resolution, multitouch surfaces for "pinch-and-stretch and rotation features, and built-in tilt sensors to mimic the effect placing the Wii remote in the tablet used to accomplish. The bundled software is also improved, uDraw Studio: Instant Artist includes new tutorials and a new interface. THQ also announced that a new version of Pictionary was also planned for the new device. I will be very curious to see how well this does on the HD platforms.
Blizzard is hiring for a "Senior Software Engineer, Console -- PlayStation 3 Specialist" within the Diablo 3 team, suggesting that the game might be headed for consoles.
From Blizzard's website: "This position is responsible for overseeing Playstation 3 (PS3) architecture design," the listing explains, "as well as other PS3-specific game code development to maximize platform performance." Could this be a sign of things to come, or a cruel tease? We might find out during next week's e3, but Blizzard isn't known to make big announcements there, so probably not. |