Nick's E3 Roundup

Hey kids. Since this week was the big E3 show in LA I thought I'd share some of my impressions of what I thought from the major press conferences and some of the game's I'm excited about getting my hands on in the future. Let's start off with the big three gaming giants. First off before I get into this, I want to say I am a little sick of when people talk about E3 it's always who won, like it's the Super Bowl. You can rank how well the press conferences went, but it's all in the presentation and what games and products they have to show off. I'm still going to put them in the order of which I liked the most, so it's just my opinion. It's not that they won the show, it's the one I liked the best.

Microsoft

Let's start it off with the 360 that I thought was the weakest one this year. After reading how the show went online I was a little leery about loading it up on my DVR. It literally was FPS, Kinect, Kinect, FPS, Tomb Raider Reboot #2, Halo 10th Anniversary, Kinect, Halo 4. ZZZzzzzz... Other then the fact that YouTube was going to be coming to the Dashboard I could care less. I skipped most of it. I don't need a playthrough of Gears of War 3, because we all know it's going to be amazing. I'm actually keeping away from anything regarding the game because I want it all to be a surprise when I finally play it. The SECOND Tomb Raider reboot looks like it could be fun, I hope there'll be another giant T-Rex battle. I hope the 10th Anniversary Halo will be a full release, but it sounds like an XBLA game. I'm looking forward to playing the remastered co-op over Xbox Live. Halo 4 was kind of a "duh" moment. We all know they won't let the Chief sleep for another few years. I hope who's ever at the helm will make a fun game.

The Kinect stuff was just borring. Oh boy, I can play Ghost Recon while waving my hands! I have to yell "LIGHTSABER ON!!" and even roll around in a giant hamster ball around Disney Land! Woopty shit. They showed off how you can use the microphone in Mass Effect 3 for the dialog choices as well as telling your squad what to do. The dialog part is stupid, but being able to tell the computer what to do in a firefight seems like it'd work better then bringing up a menu to tell each character what to do. I'm just not buying a 150 dollar add on when the 360 comes with a damn headset in the first place!

Unless you count the Halo 10th Anniversary game there was nothing about Xbox Live Arcade titles. It's a shame because I get the most excited about what's coming out for download every week. I own more XBLA games then I do actual games on my 360. I'm never going to get a Kinect. So I don't care that I can tell my Xbox that I want to listen to Lady Gaga or watch a movie on Netflix. I don't want to spend 150 bucks so I can just use the microphone or see it wave my hand to reload a gun. They really fell on their face this year. Also is it me or every time I see that guy walk out with his huge sunglasses on I just want to punch him in the face? Overall this was my least favorite of the three major companies.

Nintendo

The Big N came out of the gate swinging. They were almost saying, yeah, the 3DS launch line up sucked, here's the games you actually want! So that was great seeing Star Fox 64, Super Mario 3DS and another Luigi's Mansion will be coming. Though after sitting down and playing Sarge's 3DS last week I'm still not sold on it. For me 3D means the stuff is coming at you, jumping off the screen. I see how it adds depth to a normally flat picture but it doesn't seem worth the 250 dollar price point to me right now. Even after they launch their AAA games I still will hold out for a price drop and the typical Nintendo redesign that might have a better screen, battery life or something else. I'm still pissed that the 3DS isn't region free. One of my favorite things about all Nintendo handhelds up till now was being able to play everything that comes out, no matter where the game's from. I doubt they'll change it up, but not being able to play a zany Japanese game that will never see the light of day in the US is a shame.

What made me really happy was all the love for The Legend of Zelda 25th Anniversary. Skyward Sword is coming out this year with a special controller bundle, sold. A world tour of the music being preformed by a symphony, get me tickets when they hit Radio City! Tons of downloadable games including Four Swords Adventures, the best Zelda game NOBODY played!? I'm kinda upset at the games that they had but didn't show off at the conference. They had two new Kirby games, one for the DS and another one for the Wii that has four player co-op! Looks like a hell of a lot of fun. Kirby Superstar is one of my favorites.

Now we move onto the new Wii U, which sounds like a corespondents school to me. "TV/VCR Repair, Heating and Air Conditioning or get your degree! Only at the new Wii U!" Nintendo should have been more clear with the Wii U to start with. I know after Reggie came up and spoke to the people on G4 that this was an entirely new console, but they wanted to focus on the new controller. Everybody hit the mark on being pretty much an iPad with buttons. They didn't really go into the power of the console. People were saying the game footage was all 360 and PS3 footage and the demos were just that, tech demos so nothing to show off what the machine can do.

What I've been hearing is that you can only use one new controller per system. Even if a buddy comes over with their own Wii U controller you can't use more then one. So only one person can use the new controller and everybody else has to use a Wii Remote or another type of controller. I really hope they work out a solution. It'd be awesome to have your own screen for when you play a sports game like Madden Football where you have all your plays on your controller so your buddy doesn't know if you're going to call a blitz or go for a long bomb pass. Also, if they don't do another version of Pac-Man Vs. I'm going to be really upset.

I think the price point is going to make or break the Wii U. This thing is going to be really expensive. An HD Console and the new controller is not going to be cheap. It's not going to be the 250 dollars like with the Wii. I'd be really shocked to see it go for less then 400 bucks when all is said and done. I love the idea but I want to see more of what they can do with it. Also, I want to see if all of the other Wii controllers are backwards compatible with the Wii U. The new controller looks pretty good, but I want to be able to use my Tatsunoko Vs. Capcom joystick for the new Tekken game and sometimes I just want to use a normal controller so I hope they'll continue to support the Classic Controller. .

Sony

I think that this was Sony's show this year. After the recent events of the hacking of Playstation Network it was great to see that they came out with a serious tone and didn't have Kevin Butler jumping around on stage like a clown. I'm glad they acknowledged what had happened and apologized to pretty much everybody. Not just the people that got their credit card info stolen, but also to the game developers that lost money and even the whiny little pricks that just want to play Killzone for hours on end.

Just like Microsoft, Sony had to once again say that the Move was here to stay. Once again, woopty shit. Thankfully they didn't show off a lot of Move only titles that Microsoft seemed to do. I'm glad they give you the option to use the Move or a normal controller. I like some NBA 2K but I'll stick to a normal controller, thanks very much. Even when they touted off Resistance 3 that it could use the Move gun, they still showed the game off with normal controllers, rather then the Ghost Recon trailer. Eeep!

The new Playstation Vita surprised the hell out of me. I was hearing what they were going to be doing with their new handheld but I'm very happy with what I see. The price point at 250 puts it right in line with the 3DS and depending on what they have out at launch I see myself getting a Vita before the 3DS. I loved how it's got two touch screens. The pad in the back seemed pretty cool that you could use it instead of putting your fingers on the screen and not seeing what was going on. In the Uncharted demo I liked how they stressed that you could play the game the way you wanted, not forcing you to tilt the system or touch the screen. Choice is what I like. I love now it FINALLY has two duel analog sticks! Playing FPS games on the go is going to be great.

The one thing that I still don't like it that it seems to be downloadable games only for it. I still want to own the game and instructions and box for my games. I don't want to save my games on a cloud and download them as I please. What if I can't get a good Wi-Fi signal? I'd just rather put the game in and go. Speaking of signals what made me laugh the most was when Koz from Sony announced a 3G version of the Vita that would exclusively use AT&T for the 3G service. Almost all of the people in the audience erupted in boos! You'd think after Apple did so well with the iPhone that they would not bother with AT&T for their new toy? Other then that I'm looking forward to what the Vita can do and what games we'll be able to play on it.

Now for the games of E3. As I said with Gears of War 3 I want to surprise myself with some games, so stuff like Arkam City I'm staying away from. All I want to know is the date the game comes out. Street Fighter X Tekken looks great. I was watching Maximilian's video from E3 and all he had to say was "It feels a lot like Rival Schools to me now.." SOLD!! I just hope the Tekken characters will have some tools to get around projectile heavy characters. I hope Bob and Bryan will be in the game. (They'll also be my team in Tekken Tag 2) Speaking of Tekken, Namco/Bandai announced Tekken Hybrid. It's a Blu Ray disc that comes with the new 3D Tekken movie and a newly remastered HD version of the original Tekken Tag Tournament! And oh yes, it has Tekken Bowling too! Rayman Origins looks beautiful and looks like a lot of fun to play with a second player.

But...there can can only be one. The game of the show! This is a brand new PS3 and Playstation Vita exclusive. It's a four player beat em up developed by Vanillaware, the same people that gave us Odin Sphere and Muramasa. The head developer worked on the Capcom CPS2 Dungeons and Dragons Beat em' Ups and he says this is the game he's wanted to make for almost 13 years now since the Dreamcast. Ladies and Gentlemen I give you...Dragon's Crown!!

That wraps up my E3 Roundup! Hope you had fun! Check back in next week for the rest of the floor tours of FunSpot!