My take on E3 2011

Another E3 has come and gone and I feel like sharing my thoughts. Like last year, I didn’t get a chance to actually attend the event, but I’m mostly using this post to discuss the big three press conferences and also briefly discuss the games I am most excited about (in no particular order). Just based on the conferences, this year was pretty exciting, but there was a real lack of huge announcements at the show, which is always a let down. But anyway, let’s run down the big three!

My take on E3 2010

By WorldDude

Time for a brief post summing up my thoughts on this year’s E3. This post is a bit late, and I wanted to do a post on each individual press conference like last year, but life happens! As it stands, I’m just going to do a quick summary of what I thought of the big three press conferences, and give a summary as the best and worst parts of each conference. I’m also going name the ten games that caught my eye at this year’s show (in no particular order).

Why Infinity Ward is taking a bold step in video game narrative

Infinity Ward, the developer behind Call of Duty 1, 2, and the original Modern Warfare is coming back with the year’s most anticipated game. And there has already been some controversy over their decision to have some (or maybe most?) of the battles taking place on American soil. They showed off a brief glimpse of the White House in ruins as a massive battle took place right on the very grounds we once thought of as safe. Of course, Fallout 3 did the whole “destroyed Washington D.C.” thing a year ago. But if it’s Call of Duty? Damn, then it’s a problem! But the real controversy seems to be stemming from the very first level in the game.

Independent games fuel our gaming futures

I really and truly love to support independent game developers. Without them, where would we get such classics like Braid or World of Goo? Those are two examples of indie games released just last year, with many more still to come in the months and even years ahead. Most gamers at some point in their lives wanted to get into the industry; I was one of them! I considered so many career options, but thought to myself “why not just do something that involves what I love?” Now? I’m an English major who wants to simply write about games instead of designing them. But there are plenty of young developers out there, some of whom could have the next big idea.

The invasion of downloadable games

Downloadable games, they aren’t anything new, but they are certainly here to stay. One company in particular, Sony, seems determined to support and rely on downloadable games. They are releasing an entire portable system based around the entire concept of downloading games to store on the system, the PSP Go. There is no doubt that downloadable games will go away any time soon, even if the PSP Go fails. With a soon to be released PSP game becoming a PSN only title, and the download only release of Patapon 2, it’s clear that Sony is testing out the waters before jumping in.

The Zelda Concept Art Game: Best game ever?

Yes, I am excited about a new Zelda game. But I’ve talked to people who have determined, based on a piece of concept art, that this Zelda already has a chance of being the game of the year (for whatever year it comes out in) and possibly the best Zelda ever. Yes, based on concept art. I bring up Twilight Princess, they say “That was just the beginning. A GameCube port with some Wii features. This new Zelda is going to kick ass.” Okay, maybe those aren’t the exact words, but it’s my interpretation of it.

Indiana Jones and the Blog Post of Excellence

First, a little history lesson about the very soon to be released (tomorrow actually), Indiana Jones and the Staff of Kings. It was originally slated to be an internally developed LucasArts project for all of the major consoles, and it had me excited. There hasn’t been a good Indiana Jones game since Fate of Atlantis, so why not? Sure, it had a good chance of being terrible, but I was willing to give it a chance. The project was pretty much forgotten about after its big E3 unveiling a few years back, but recently it has emerged from the dead. The Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 versions are pretty much dead, but the game is still being developed by LucasArts for the Wii, DS, PS2, and PSP. No, this isn’t the next generation game that had a lot of been very excited a few years back, but it’s the closest thing we are going to get. But while the game itself doesn’t look incredibly impressive, there is a very good reason why the Wii version of the game may be worth checking out.

E3 09: Nintendo and Sony take the stage

The last two of the major press conferences, Nintendo and Sony, happened today on the first official day of E3. Both press conferences, in my opinion, did not impress as much as Microsoft’s, but both were generally enjoyable and had a lot of surprises on hand. I can safely say that, due to the press conferences, that this is the best E3 in quite a while. It’s definitely approaching the levels of awesome that we haven’t gotten since E3 2006.

E3 09: Microsoft surprises on the first unofficial day of E3

Microsoft opened up E3 with a very entertaining, very surprising, and overall great press conference. I must say I was pleasantly surprised with what Microsoft showed, and like last year, believe it’ll be tough for Nintendo or Sony to beat them. Sony has a lot to live up to especially, but I have a feeling that people are more excited by announcements than anything else. Sony may not bring nearly as many with an already stellar line-up of games for this year. But this is about Microsoft, and what a show they had.

Pre-E3 discussion 03: Sony

Since Sony is the last up to bat, following what could be two AMAZING press conferences, we have to expect for them to continue the tradition and end on a pretty high note. After Sony’s embarrasing and downright terrible showing at E3 2005, they’ve improved greatly with the last three press conferences. I’m pretty impressed to see how far Sony has come since the launch of the PS3, which while not nearly as successful as they predicted, definitely has had quite a strong line of exclusive titles.

The PSP Go is already announced, so it leaves no surprise when they talk about it at E3. Some said they weren’t going to announce anything, others said they would. Well, it’s official, but I’m not a big fan of it myself. And from what I’ve heard from others, they don’t seem to be too happy with it themselves. I think the ugly button interface and the lack of UMD support really hurt it. I can safely assume Sony won’t completely stop supporting the original PSP though, it would only alienate their fanbase more. But yeah, I expect to see a lot of the press conference centered around that.

PS3 slim? Or even a PS3 price cut? The first, I’m not entirely sure about. I can’t imagine a PS3 working at any smaller of a size, unless they cut out…well, pretty much everything from the machine. The PS3 is so damn huge because of everything inside of it, mainly dealing with the Blu Ray technology. The PS3 price cut definitely seems a LOT more likely though, since they clearly want to catch up to Microsoft (and even surpass them) at this point. They also need a very strong first party title, like God of War III or Gran Turismo 5, to help get more people to buy the system.

As for game announcements, I don’t see much happening in that department, but I could be surprised. They’ve got Uncharted 2, God of War III, Ratchet and Clank: A Crack in Time, Heavy Rain, and MAG. Plus, the yet to be seen but sure to be talked about Gran Turismo 5 (which I doubt will look that much better than GT5 Prologue). Not sure what else they could announce, but it seems like the very solid line-up they already have will be enough for most people.

Overall, Sony doesn’t really need to blow anyone away with a huge announcement, but people will expect it anyway. With their very strong line of games coming out this year (and some next year), it’s hard to say we’ll see any big game announcements, but I expect something is coming, whether it be a new game or something involving the PS3 or PSP hardware itself. We’ll see, we’ll see.