All of the characters come out at video gaming's big show.
Lots of big news is piling out of E3 2009, and today is only the first day the Exhibit doors are open. Of course it helps that Microsoft, Ubisoft, and EA (three of the biggest exhibitors) held their individual press conferences yesterday. Nintendo and Sony had their press conferences this morning. All together, there was a lot of news to process.
Microsoft holds the Xbox 360 platform. During their press conference yesterday they showed off some of the exclusive titles that were coming to the 360 in the next year. They also announced upcoming Facebook, Twitter, and Last.fm integration with their 360 operating system. More interesting was the revelation of motion camera technology.
Microsoft’s plans for this new technology was for people who were too intimidated by video game controllers to be able to affect what’s on screen without having to pick anything up. Playing a sports game like tennis would involve the player to merely swing their arm as if they were holding a tennis racket (even though nothing would be in their hand).
Microsoft also announced a second Halo game. After showing a demo of the upcoming Halo: ODST title, the Bungie representative announced that Halo: REACH would be release in 2010. Despite Master Chief’s swan song in Halo 3, Bungie and Microsoft still have plenty of the Halo universe to cover.
Big titles were also detailed at the Electronic Arts and Ubisoft press conferences. You can expect Assassin’s Creed II later this year as the sequel takes the silent assassin action to Italy. You’ll find yourself equipped with Da Vinci’s inventions as you take on the aristocracy in Venice. EA will be publishing Tim Schafer (of Monkey Island fame) title Brutal Legend this fall.
I got a chance to play the demo for Brutal Legend on the show floor today. The humor, while mature, is cartoony, and Jack Black’s voice acting breathes character into the lead Eddie Riggs. Eddie is a roadie who is transported to another dimension that blends metal music with mythology. You’ll attack enemies with an ax and your guitar (also an ax). The game also features a system that has the player playing notes on the guitar to open new areas or activate events (much like The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time’s ocarina mechanic).
Nintendo announced lots of games (with few extra peripherals). New Super Mario Bros. will bring a new 2D Mario title to the Wii, while Super Mario Galaxy 2 won’t be released this year, it’ll follow up the 2D action with more interstellar Goomba-stomping. Nintendo also pulled the veil off of Wii Fit Plus and provided more details about Wii Sports Resort. Both will improve upon the much played Wii titles through the inclusion of deeper, more varied games. While Wii Fit Plus improves on both the number of games and the accuracy of the balance board, Wii Sports Resorts introduces many new games while only retaining Tennis and Bowling from the original Wii Sports. Wii Sports Resort will also come packed together with the Wii Motion Plus technology. This small add on adds extra functionality and sensitivity to the Wii Remote.
Sony showed off some of their hotly anticipated titles like God of War 3. Possibly the biggest news from Sony was what we had already heard about. The Playstation Portable will see a new iteration in the form of the PSP-Go!, a handheld that forgoes disc based media for 16 gigs of flash memory. Titles will be downloaded from the Playstation Network store. The PSP-Go! also features a new aesthetic by taking the shape of a smaller device with slide out controls.
Tomorrow will bring further game demos, as well as That’s the Name of the Game’s preview of the upcoming Beatles: Rock Band title.
You can check out more of Daniel’s writing on Video Games at playreadwrite.blogspot.com.
