Microsoft – Only showing games to be released this year was an interesting gimmick, but ultimately I felt that it was a mistake. It did a great job of showing off the 2007 release list for the 360 which is, in my opinion, by far the best of the three consoles, only to leave 2008 and beyond as something of a vacuum that left the door open for the other two to take the plaudits. The likes of MGS4 aren’t coming out this year but they still carry a lot of weight as franchises.
And why did Microsoft choose to show only their 2007 titles and then show Resi 5 anyway? Why not just show other future titles and plug the strength of the 2007 lineup? They could easily have had their cake and eaten it.
The show itself fairly poor until it was saved by some excellent gameplay footage of big games like Call of Duty 4 (plus online beta!) and Assassin’s Creed. I’m still as hot for Halo 3 as I ever was after that trailer, as well, although it was admittedly not a brilliant trailer. It’s just that they played it safe, had their aforementioned high points, a couple of low points (the Madden thing was…ugh), and came out just affirming what we already knew: that the Xbox 360 has a strong 2007 lineup. They need a huge X07 or TGS now.
Overall: C+
Nintendo – I don’t doubt that every mainstream outlet on the planet is writing glowing features on Wii Fit as we speak and it’s going to make ridiculous amounts of money, but that show was a lesson in how to alienate your hardcore fans. I’m admittedly a lapsed Nintendo fan and a Mario game doesn’t do it for me like it used to (I’ll still buy Mario Galaxy and Metroid Prime 3 for sure, though), but nothing there did it for me. What was there except Wii Fitness and half a dozen new Wii peripherals? Vision Training? Not even any big DS announcements!
Mario Kart? It looks the same as Double Dash and they already did it online on the DS. No Animal Crossing. Little new on Smash Bros except a release date met with dead silence. The focus on Wii Fit meant that it ended up coming off like an infomercial for a step machine like you get on Five US when CSI isn’t on, and just affirmed for me that Nintendo and the Wii is no longer going with what I, as a gamer, want.
Overall: D
Sony – Mainly given the advantage of following Nintendo’s show and having only to be better than last year, Sony only really had to show some games that weren’t coming out this year in order to ‘win’, and they did. It started badly with some cringe-worthy Home skits and a painful appearance by Chewbacca, as well as so many plugs that it felt like I was watching Casino Royale again (“Spider-Man 2, now available on Blu-ray Disc, DVD, and UMD from Sony Pictures Home Entertainment”; “connect your PSP to your Sony Bravia flatscreen TV”; “Home on my Sony-Ericsson mobile phone”), but then it was uphill.
The new PSP is a good improvement even if it didn’t have internal memory (I’ll buy one when it gets hacked), Echochrome looks cool, and MGS4, Uncharted, and Killzone all look superb. For the first time since E3 2005 I’m seriously considering when I plan to buy a PS3 and which game is going to do it.
Overall: B+
Overall, though, I think we can all agree that the new E3 is a disappointment for those of us who like to sit back and enjoy the show. Bring back the old one, I say!
Even if the big show isn’t the same as it used to be (I miss it already), that doesn’t mean that the big companies aren’t up to their old tricks. This is what my money’s on the big three announcing at their conferences – which start with Microsoft’s a fortnight today – along with a few outside bets.
Microsoft
- $100/£80 price drop across all SKUs.
- Halo 3 campaign demo, hopefully closer to the real thing than last time.
- Ninja Gaiden 2. I then spend an hour trying to clean up the mess I made.
- Some real PGR4 and Fable 2 video.
- Rare bringing back one of their classics (I don’t think it’ll be Killer Instinct, for the record).
- At least one current PS3 exclusive coming to 360.
- Shenmue III. Please? If enough of us believe they’ll have to do it.
Nintendo
- Lots and lots and lots of sales graphs.
- Animal Crossing Wii shown and it’ll be a kind of walled-garden MMO: you live in your town with friends over the net, using WiiConnect24 to let anyone mess around in the persistent town at any time. Ban this sick burglary simulator!
- Mario Kart Wii.
- More Smash Bros shown, with a new feature that we haven’t seen. I’ll be upset if the Ouendan team isn’t in it. Sonic finally making it in is an outside bet.
- A new console for the Virtual Console. Neo-Geo?
- Miyamoto waves something around and Reggie has a new line for the fanboys to run into the ground for the next year.
Sony
- Absolutely no sales graphs whatsoever.
- $100/£75 off PS3.
- PSP redesign.
- Killzone 2 is finally shown and looks very good, albeit no E3 05 trailer.
- Home and LBP. Lots of comparisons to MySpace put me off it even more.
- Sony ruins their palindrome with the announcement of the force feedback Sixaxis. Shockaxis?
Any thoughts or predictions of your own are, of course, welcome.
There was some question over whether or not this would even make the list this year, but once I got it the result was never going to be in doubt. I’ve said it before and I’m sure I’ll say it again: there’s nothing like a new Zelda.
Admittedly Twilight Princess doesn’t really do anything new to those who’ve played one of the three previous 3D Zeldas, but why mess with a winning formula? It’s ultimately the same classic game with nicer graphics (considering the hardware, at least), a good story, and a nice long quest to work through. If they can deliver a new Zelda every few years with only those tweaks, I’ll be very happy.
But what this game did for me more than anything is that it validated the Wii controller as being usable for more than minigames. This couldn’t be further away from a minigame and yet I find it hard to imagine playing the GameCube version of this game. Some things, I thought, don’t work as well as others (the fishing, for example), while some such as drawing a sword and aiming work seamlessly and intuitively, which is what Nintendo seem to be aiming for with the Wii as a whole.
So, out of the many games to come out in 2006, Zelda gets the nod from me. When the only area that I can really think of any room for improvement is in the graphics, it’s clear that they’ve made something great.
Happy new year, everyone!
That’s the last pun, I promise.
New console aside, I haven’t felt this excited about a new game (Zelda, in this case) since Ocarina of Time back in 1998. As much as I love my other consoles nothing gives you that warm, fuzzy feeling more than a new game from Nintendo when they’re on flying form. I think it’s that je ne sais quoi that the GameCube lacked and the DS restored for me.
But alas, although I have my Wii that’ll have to wait for now. Zelda and Trauma Center are in a separate order and left earlier, so they should arrive imminently, but the delay has given me some time to fiddle with the console and included software, which is nice. Every cloud, as they say…
While both the 360 and PS3 try to out-monolith each other, Nintendo deserves credit for making what is really the only one of the three next-gen consoles to have a lot of aesthetic appeal. They know it, as well, packing in a stand to sit it vertically rather than taking the obvious opportunity to leave it out and charge a tenner for it. Add in the nice luminous slot-loading drive – the first one I’ve seen that can handle 8cm discs – and the minimalist fa?ade which beautifully complements the DS Lite and, for the first time in a while, you have a Nintendo who are trying to make their kit look cool and desirable. No Fisher Price jokes this time. (more…)
It was probably inevitable, but I expected to last longer than a week after I first played the bloody thing. Paid more than the US retail price but it was the only way I was going to get one this side of Christmas.
I’ve just seen IGN’s ten reasons to wait for a Revolution, but has the irony escaped anyone else that the second reason they give is “Same Games, Prettier Graphics” and then goes on to list a new Zelda, a new Metroid, and a new Smash Bros as reasons to get a Revolution? Those won’t be the same games with better graphics?
OK, so we’ll get them with some quirky new control scheme but will they really be new gaming experiences or will they be the same games shoehorned onto the new controller? To give Nintendo credit they’re far better with original concepts than either Sony or Microsoft, but even their new stuff isn’t always as new as they’d tell you – The Wind Waker took a shocking new direction but was essentially Ocarina of Time with cartoony graphics and dull sailing sections, and although the DS has some great stuff now what was Nintendo’s first big game for it? Super Mario 64 with either less-than-ideal digital controls or unworkable analogue controls. While a Metroid Prime might work with the Revolution controller without any concessions, I really can’t see a Zelda or Smash Bros on that controller without some kind of add-on, which essentially makes them the “Same Games, Prettier Graphics”.
Maybe Nintendo will prove me wrong, but if they want to gain the popularity that Mario, Zelda, and Metroid can afford they’re going to have to stick to the status quo and not make it so that we have to swing a remote as if it was Link’s sword. Their original concept really needs original games, as the DS has shown, and when one of the main selling points is that it plays Nintendo’s whole back catalogue (same games, same graphics?) is that going to happen?
