Reminder the 2d era was race n Chase when 3D era started with 1 and both Sequels were not numbered
Massively Multiplayer: Gaming In The New Millennium
- Thread starter RySenkari
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E3 2008 (Part 1)
(Authors' Note: I was planning on making E3 2008 a two part show as usual, but I managed to get the Nintendo keynote finished, and so instead, I'm going to go ahead and post the whole Nintendo keynote as part 1! Part 2 will be Apple, along with Acclaim and EA's announcements, and then part 3 will be Microsoft, Activision, Ubisoft, PC coverage, a news feature, the Best of Show awards, and some wrap-up.)
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Nintendo Keynote- E3 2008
Nintendo's E3 2008 keynote starts right off with footage from a brand new Nintendo Sapphire game. It shows a brief trailer that depicts the familiar Arwings, symbolizing immediately that this is indeed a brand new Star Fox game, and shows both cutscene and gameplay footage depicting the Arwings engaging in a variety of space battles, both in rail shooter mode and All Range mode. The most striking new thing about this game, apart from its exceptional graphics, was its introduction of brand new weaponry for the Arwings. Gone is the three-tiered laser system, replaced with what looked to be at least a dozen new and different weapons which can be switched out on the fly. Each weapon seems to have a normal mode, a second stage mode, and a charge mode, and can be seen to work on different kinds of enemies. Apart from that, this is definitely a Star Fox game and plays much like its predecessors. The plot seems to involve a massive interspatial rift that's allowing cosmic horror beings to come into the galaxy, and the Star Fox team has to take them down. We saw footage of a spectacular multi-stage boss fight involving some kind of space Cthulhu, and also some footage of the Star Fox team flying through Corneria City as an enormous space beast wrecks buildings all around them. While no real villain or storyline seemed to emerge other than “the Star Fox team fighting giant eldritch space abominations”, that seemed to be enough for the crowd, which applauds the HD visuals and spectacular set pieces. We then saw a logo for the game, its title reveal (Star Fox: Mission Cosmic), and a release month, September 2008. Following that came more footage of the already revealed HD F-Zero title for the Sapphire, which showed off a wide variety of tracks, all of which looked amazing in high definition. The game looks tougher and faster than ever, with the cars zooming on elevated tracks with tons of loops, anti-gravity, and harrowing hairpins. The game appears to retain the series' appeal to hardcore gamers, and unlike Mario Kart, noobs definitely need not apply. The trailer also revealed an online mode with a competitive ladder, so Nintendo really seems to be playing up the series' reputation as a test of racing skill. The trailer also unveiled seven brand new racers, including a beautiful woman clad in purple named Lady LeChique, and a tall, blonde, and somewhat arrogant racer named Aron Zephyr. Captain Falcon of course returns in his iconic blue racer, and we're looking forward to taking these all these cars for a turn around some very tricky tracks when the game launches this August. After those two games were shown off, Satoru Iwata and Bill Trinen took the stage, along with Katsuya Eguchi. Iwata briefly explained Star Fox: Mission Cosmic and the new F-Zero game (which will simply be called F-Zero), and Trinen serves as somewhat of a translator. After this brief discussion of both new games, Trinen slowed things down to reveal another title. This was a segment about Big Bad Hero 2, which we've heard a little about before but the E3 keynote definitely revealed some great new footage. The trailer introduced us to the heroine Brigid, who once battled the evil sorcerer Nero, and the trailer was essentially just a two minute cutscene of the two fighting. Following a climactic scene in which Brigid and Nero are clashing with one another, the trailer ends, and some gameplay footage is shown with the player taking the role of Brigid during this opening fight. Right away, we can see that the graphics have vastly improved from the previous game, the high definition visuals make everything really pop, the battle scenes are a lot smoother, everything is really bright and polished and both Brigid and Nero look really good with all the additional detail. After some gameplay footage of this fight scene, there's some footage of the player using Nero to solve a couple of puzzles, and a couple of the game's brand new features are shown off, with the new battle systems and spell casting system highlighted. The game seems to play a lot more smoothly than the original one did, and everything looks greatly improved over the original game, which itself was quite good. The presentation ended with a quick one minute trailer showing off some of Nero and his friends' latest antics, and then the game's release date, November 11, 2008, was revealed, much to the cheers from the fans (out of these first three games, I'd say that F-Zero got the most cheers, closely followed by Big Bad Hero 2, and finally Star Fox: Mission Cosmic, which was cheered quite a bit but not with the same fervor as the first two games).
After the reveal of what seems to be Nintendo's big 2008 second half tentpole first party titles for the Sapphire, Iwata and Eguchi left the stage, and Bill Trinen remained, to discuss the Nintendo Network, the Sapphire's online storefront and matchmaking arena. Created in partnership with Sony, the Nintendo Network will be a one-stop shop for classic Nintendo games and online play, and allows for free online gameplay and the purchasing of classic Nintendo titles via the Nintendo Flashback service. Trinen also heavily promotes Club Nintendo, the $50 a year service that includes three free games a month (formerly two at the Sapphire's launch, Trinen announces that starting in June 2008, subscribers will now get three games), discounts on digital titles, and physical bonuses including a subscription to Nintendo Power and the chance to use purchase points earned from buying physical and digital games to buy real world goodies from Nintendo's online store. June 2008's free classic games will be DuckTales for the NES, Super Mario World 2 for the Super Nintendo CD, and Parasite Eve for the Ultra Nintendo. DuckTales and Super Mario World 2 will also be playable on the Supernova. After hyping up the Nintendo Network and Club Nintendo, Trinen calls for the lights to be dimmed, and a familiar theme is played... it's the main theme song to Rare's Killer Instinct series, and that's the cue for Ken Lobb and Martin Hollis to take the stage to reveal Killer Instinct 4 for the Nintendo Sapphire. A sizzle reel of gameplay footage is revealed, showing fighters like Orchid and Fulgore in all their HD glory. It's easily the best looking fighting game of the show, with spectacular new combos and at least seven new fighters. The game looks utterly gorgeous, that can't be emphasized enough: Rare has REALLY worked to test the limits of the Sapphire in the same way that Killer Instinct 3 pushed the Wave hard despite being a launch title. Rare didn't focus on showing much of the game's plot, this was all about gameplay and the killer new fighters, and the brand new Instinct mode that allows players to counter combos with combos, and then counter THOSE combos with even more combos. Killer Instinct 4 was a true showcase of the Sapphire's might, more than perhaps any other game revealed during the keynote, and it's clear that Rare is going all in on this mighty machine. Rare revealed that Killer Instinct 4 won't be ready until 2009, but it'll surely be worth the wait. They then teased us with some Conker footage and a VERY cryptic reveal for something that's probably Velvet Dark-related when Joanna Dark's voice was heard to utter “what is humanity?” during a video of trippy purple fog concealing technological imagery. After the Rare presentation, Trinen then asked the audience to welcome Ted Woolsey and Yoshinori Kitase from Squaresoft to the stage. Then, we saw about a one and a half minute trailer for a new original RPG IP, showing footage of ten characters, each revealing an individual power. It showed off footage of five characters battling enemies in a Tales Of Phantasia-like action RPG system, and then discussed a magical land where all things are possible. The game's logo and title were revealed as Journey To Mysidia, and 2009 was shown as the game's release window. After this trailer, the main segment of the Squaresoft presentation, an in depth look at Chrono Break, coming later in 2008, began. We've already seen details about the gameplay and plot from 2007's Tokyo Game Show and various presentations at Japanese events, along with magazine previews and some G4 footage, but this was probably the most revealing presentation to date, showing off more of the game's protagonist, a young man named Shard, and the different worlds that he visits. The game involves space-time rifts and the merging of time and space to create strange anachronistic environments, such as a medieval space fortress and a steampunk caveman world. Chrono Break's plot seems to have little to do with the previous two games, save for some shared references and musical motifs, but the gameplay remains somewhat familiar. Battles now take place in a sort of action RPG/turn based blend, with attacks being triggered in real time but character movement largely remaining automatic. Combination attacks now happen on the fly and depend on timing and position, but if the player sets things up right it can lead to some truly spectacular attacks. There are said to be at least eight playable characters, with three able to be controlled in battle at once, like previous games in the series. Chrono Break looks really amazing, and with Yasunori Mitsuda returning to compose the game's score and numerous members of the classic “Dream Team” returning, it appears that this game will please Chrono and RPG fans the world over. After the Chrono Break reveal, we got one more brief tease...
-
*Imagery that seems to invoke religious zeal is shown on the screen. Churches, images of godlike beings... in a holy city, we see a pair of ornate black boots walking, trailing the blade of a large sword very similar to the Monado in OTL's Xenoblade on the ground. A deep female voice (belonging to Zelda Williams) can be heard.*
Voice: This world is ruled by false prophecies...
*A woman clad in white, her hands bound behind her back, is seen being dragged through the streets as a woman with black hair observes nearby. The black-haired woman tried to reach the woman in white, but guards hold her back.*
Voice: Prophecies used to subjugate the oppressed, all under the banner of a god we have never seen.
*A shining white light from the heavens illuminates the holy city as a priest cries out.*
Voice: God wills it, they say. That is what they say to justify what they have done to us...
*The woman in white is slammed down against a stone block, her head held in place. The black-haired woman screams and leaps into the air, trying to reach her friend in time.*
Voice: They claim that they have seen his miracles...
*The black-haired woman is blasted back by a powerful, shining light.*
Voice: They claim that they know his will...
*Another voice, that of an old man, can be heard: “For your crimes against your god and against your world...”*
Voice: They claim that he exists at all...
*The woman in white sheds a single tear. The black-haired woman screams.*
Voice: But if he does exist...
*The black-haired woman cuts down a priest with her sword, as symbols on the sword light up and the people run screaming. The old man can be heard shouting: “Blasphemy!”, while a bystander can faintly be heard saying “she wields the Xenoblade!”*
Voice: I will tear him down from heaven and smite him upon the earth!
*A brief bit of battle gameplay footage is revealed, showing a battle system that looks like a cross between OTL Xenoblade and OTL Final Fantasy XIII, with spectacular footage of the black haired woman and two allies fighting some massive beasts with powerful attacks.*
*The black-haired woman is shown holding the blade straight up as she speaks.*
Woman: I am Lilith. Let their misguided faith in their false god be *she slashes to the side, revealing the full glory of the sword* their final fantasy.
*The Final Fantasy XII logo is revealed, all in black, featuring a sword identical to the OTL Monado in faint multicolor. The crowd roars with approval after the teaser ends.*
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The Squaresoft presentation ended after the Final Fantasy XII teaser, and following that, Trinen introduced a pair of developers from Polyphony to the stage. This began a presentation for Gran Turismo 4, announcing the game and showing off a good ten minutes or so of new car footage and amazing graphics rivaling or exceeding the Killer Instinct 4 presentation. Several of the game's new features were announced, but we were mostly blown away by just how good the game looked on the Nintendo Sapphire. The Polyphony folks apologized that the game took so long to develop: it was originally planned for the Wave, but the team decided to start anew when they saw just how powerful the Sapphire would be and how amazing their new game would look on the system. They said that the game was four years in the making and would feature a huge amount of content to make the wait worth it, with over 1400 cars, dozens of tracks including NASCAR tracks, and a revamped online gameplay system. Gran Turismo 4 looked worlds better than Sega Rally, which had launched just a couple weeks before to incredible reviews and had established itself as the pre-eminent racing franchise. Polyphony then apologized and said that fans would have to wait a bit more, until 2009 when the game would finally be ready. Despite the long wait we'll still have to endure, fans were very hyped about the reveal, which pulled in some of the biggest applause of the show. Following up the Gran Turismo 4 presentation, the presentation then turned to the Supernova, and numerous games were shown off, including Pokemon Silver, the enhanced version of last year's Pokemon Black And White. This game will feature the Embrya evolution line, and a brand new subplot about the two Pokemon Blizzeria and Cindake being captured by a mysterious new villain. After the Silver presentation, we saw footage from the new handheld Castlevania title, Dracula's Reign. A 3-D Castlevania game, the first on a handheld, this game involves a new generation of vampire hunters trying to liberate the world after Dracula takes over. It features platforming gameplay combined with action-RPG elements and even a bit of hack and slash action, and could be the best handheld Castlevania game yet. We then saw an RPG named Elvenfall which looked like it could be one of the best RPGs of the year. It features an all-female party of four beautiful elves fighting to save the world from a wicked king, and combines traditional turn based gameplay with gorgeous presentation and music. Justicar, a third person shooter, was maybe the best looking handheld game of the show, and looked as good as any console shooter, giving even The Covenant games a run for their money. We then saw some Metal Gear Cipher footage showing Big Boss sneaking into a weapons factory and meeting the mysterious Paz Ortega, followed by the last game of the presentation, a new Kirby title called Kirby And The Fairy Circle that's coming out next year. Masahiro Sakurai was there to show off Kirby, and at the end of the presentation he dropped a tiny tease for Sapphire Smash Bros.! No new characters were revealed but the game was confirmed to be in development.
Selene, the politically charged sci-fi game revealed at last year's E3, got about a two minute gameplay presentation, showing off the open-ended RPG-like gameplay allowing for lots of player choice and character interaction. The game looks beautiful and the gameplay looks like it could allow for an enormous amount of replay value. We also got a release date for the game, October 7. Then came another teaser trailer: A mysterious planet, struck by an asteroid from space. However, the asteroid wasn't very big and didn't seem to cause most of the destruction and death seen on the planet. A group of soldiers are sent to investigate... suddenly, one of them is attacked by a terrifying creature. A missile strikes the creature, saving the soldier... the savior is revealed to be Samus Aran, and the reveal makes the crowd go wild. Samus speaks with an authoritative voice and seems to be in command of the mission. It's interesting to note that she has a new voice actress for this game, different slightly from Jennifer Hale but no less powerful. The game's title is revealed as Metroid: Starfall, and a 2009 release date is given. After the Metroid trailer, the screen went black and we saw a brief teaser for a brand new IP from Retro Studios. A man is shown stepping out of his apartment building, onto a busy city street. Then, buildings in the city begin to light up, and we see three other people, two women and one man, stepping out of their own buildings. The entire city begins to light up like a classic arcade game, and each of the four who we saw come out of their buildings begin to engage in arcade-style combat against enemies that appear out of nowhere. From what we saw, the game looks to play like an old school arcade game but with a 3-D adventure game aesthetic, and the entire thing looked incredibly surreal but also amazingly fun. The game's name is Arcadia, and nothing else was revealed, we only got the Sapphire logo and the Retro Studios logo and that was it, but the crowd looked quite excited and was buzzing. Bill Trinen said that more information about Arcadia, Nintendo's exciting new IP, would be coming soon. Trinen then thanked everyone for coming, but revealed one final trailer which started to play. It zoomed in on a forested clearing and once the Master Sword appeared, the crowd went wild. Link, looking to be about 12 or 13 years old, awakens in a sleepy village much like his village in the Kokiri Forest in Temple Of Time, but this village is somewhat quieter, and there are no Kokiri in sight. Link walks to the edge of the village, and the camera pans up to reveal a massive forest, spanning an entire continent. The game's title was then revealed: The Legend Of Zelda: Spirit Of The Woods, with a release year, 2009, shown afterward. The crowd cheered again, and this concluded Nintendo's E3 2008 keynote.
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Nintendo Keynote- E3 2008
Nintendo's E3 2008 keynote starts right off with footage from a brand new Nintendo Sapphire game. It shows a brief trailer that depicts the familiar Arwings, symbolizing immediately that this is indeed a brand new Star Fox game, and shows both cutscene and gameplay footage depicting the Arwings engaging in a variety of space battles, both in rail shooter mode and All Range mode. The most striking new thing about this game, apart from its exceptional graphics, was its introduction of brand new weaponry for the Arwings. Gone is the three-tiered laser system, replaced with what looked to be at least a dozen new and different weapons which can be switched out on the fly. Each weapon seems to have a normal mode, a second stage mode, and a charge mode, and can be seen to work on different kinds of enemies. Apart from that, this is definitely a Star Fox game and plays much like its predecessors. The plot seems to involve a massive interspatial rift that's allowing cosmic horror beings to come into the galaxy, and the Star Fox team has to take them down. We saw footage of a spectacular multi-stage boss fight involving some kind of space Cthulhu, and also some footage of the Star Fox team flying through Corneria City as an enormous space beast wrecks buildings all around them. While no real villain or storyline seemed to emerge other than “the Star Fox team fighting giant eldritch space abominations”, that seemed to be enough for the crowd, which applauds the HD visuals and spectacular set pieces. We then saw a logo for the game, its title reveal (Star Fox: Mission Cosmic), and a release month, September 2008. Following that came more footage of the already revealed HD F-Zero title for the Sapphire, which showed off a wide variety of tracks, all of which looked amazing in high definition. The game looks tougher and faster than ever, with the cars zooming on elevated tracks with tons of loops, anti-gravity, and harrowing hairpins. The game appears to retain the series' appeal to hardcore gamers, and unlike Mario Kart, noobs definitely need not apply. The trailer also revealed an online mode with a competitive ladder, so Nintendo really seems to be playing up the series' reputation as a test of racing skill. The trailer also unveiled seven brand new racers, including a beautiful woman clad in purple named Lady LeChique, and a tall, blonde, and somewhat arrogant racer named Aron Zephyr. Captain Falcon of course returns in his iconic blue racer, and we're looking forward to taking these all these cars for a turn around some very tricky tracks when the game launches this August. After those two games were shown off, Satoru Iwata and Bill Trinen took the stage, along with Katsuya Eguchi. Iwata briefly explained Star Fox: Mission Cosmic and the new F-Zero game (which will simply be called F-Zero), and Trinen serves as somewhat of a translator. After this brief discussion of both new games, Trinen slowed things down to reveal another title. This was a segment about Big Bad Hero 2, which we've heard a little about before but the E3 keynote definitely revealed some great new footage. The trailer introduced us to the heroine Brigid, who once battled the evil sorcerer Nero, and the trailer was essentially just a two minute cutscene of the two fighting. Following a climactic scene in which Brigid and Nero are clashing with one another, the trailer ends, and some gameplay footage is shown with the player taking the role of Brigid during this opening fight. Right away, we can see that the graphics have vastly improved from the previous game, the high definition visuals make everything really pop, the battle scenes are a lot smoother, everything is really bright and polished and both Brigid and Nero look really good with all the additional detail. After some gameplay footage of this fight scene, there's some footage of the player using Nero to solve a couple of puzzles, and a couple of the game's brand new features are shown off, with the new battle systems and spell casting system highlighted. The game seems to play a lot more smoothly than the original one did, and everything looks greatly improved over the original game, which itself was quite good. The presentation ended with a quick one minute trailer showing off some of Nero and his friends' latest antics, and then the game's release date, November 11, 2008, was revealed, much to the cheers from the fans (out of these first three games, I'd say that F-Zero got the most cheers, closely followed by Big Bad Hero 2, and finally Star Fox: Mission Cosmic, which was cheered quite a bit but not with the same fervor as the first two games).
After the reveal of what seems to be Nintendo's big 2008 second half tentpole first party titles for the Sapphire, Iwata and Eguchi left the stage, and Bill Trinen remained, to discuss the Nintendo Network, the Sapphire's online storefront and matchmaking arena. Created in partnership with Sony, the Nintendo Network will be a one-stop shop for classic Nintendo games and online play, and allows for free online gameplay and the purchasing of classic Nintendo titles via the Nintendo Flashback service. Trinen also heavily promotes Club Nintendo, the $50 a year service that includes three free games a month (formerly two at the Sapphire's launch, Trinen announces that starting in June 2008, subscribers will now get three games), discounts on digital titles, and physical bonuses including a subscription to Nintendo Power and the chance to use purchase points earned from buying physical and digital games to buy real world goodies from Nintendo's online store. June 2008's free classic games will be DuckTales for the NES, Super Mario World 2 for the Super Nintendo CD, and Parasite Eve for the Ultra Nintendo. DuckTales and Super Mario World 2 will also be playable on the Supernova. After hyping up the Nintendo Network and Club Nintendo, Trinen calls for the lights to be dimmed, and a familiar theme is played... it's the main theme song to Rare's Killer Instinct series, and that's the cue for Ken Lobb and Martin Hollis to take the stage to reveal Killer Instinct 4 for the Nintendo Sapphire. A sizzle reel of gameplay footage is revealed, showing fighters like Orchid and Fulgore in all their HD glory. It's easily the best looking fighting game of the show, with spectacular new combos and at least seven new fighters. The game looks utterly gorgeous, that can't be emphasized enough: Rare has REALLY worked to test the limits of the Sapphire in the same way that Killer Instinct 3 pushed the Wave hard despite being a launch title. Rare didn't focus on showing much of the game's plot, this was all about gameplay and the killer new fighters, and the brand new Instinct mode that allows players to counter combos with combos, and then counter THOSE combos with even more combos. Killer Instinct 4 was a true showcase of the Sapphire's might, more than perhaps any other game revealed during the keynote, and it's clear that Rare is going all in on this mighty machine. Rare revealed that Killer Instinct 4 won't be ready until 2009, but it'll surely be worth the wait. They then teased us with some Conker footage and a VERY cryptic reveal for something that's probably Velvet Dark-related when Joanna Dark's voice was heard to utter “what is humanity?” during a video of trippy purple fog concealing technological imagery. After the Rare presentation, Trinen then asked the audience to welcome Ted Woolsey and Yoshinori Kitase from Squaresoft to the stage. Then, we saw about a one and a half minute trailer for a new original RPG IP, showing footage of ten characters, each revealing an individual power. It showed off footage of five characters battling enemies in a Tales Of Phantasia-like action RPG system, and then discussed a magical land where all things are possible. The game's logo and title were revealed as Journey To Mysidia, and 2009 was shown as the game's release window. After this trailer, the main segment of the Squaresoft presentation, an in depth look at Chrono Break, coming later in 2008, began. We've already seen details about the gameplay and plot from 2007's Tokyo Game Show and various presentations at Japanese events, along with magazine previews and some G4 footage, but this was probably the most revealing presentation to date, showing off more of the game's protagonist, a young man named Shard, and the different worlds that he visits. The game involves space-time rifts and the merging of time and space to create strange anachronistic environments, such as a medieval space fortress and a steampunk caveman world. Chrono Break's plot seems to have little to do with the previous two games, save for some shared references and musical motifs, but the gameplay remains somewhat familiar. Battles now take place in a sort of action RPG/turn based blend, with attacks being triggered in real time but character movement largely remaining automatic. Combination attacks now happen on the fly and depend on timing and position, but if the player sets things up right it can lead to some truly spectacular attacks. There are said to be at least eight playable characters, with three able to be controlled in battle at once, like previous games in the series. Chrono Break looks really amazing, and with Yasunori Mitsuda returning to compose the game's score and numerous members of the classic “Dream Team” returning, it appears that this game will please Chrono and RPG fans the world over. After the Chrono Break reveal, we got one more brief tease...
-
*Imagery that seems to invoke religious zeal is shown on the screen. Churches, images of godlike beings... in a holy city, we see a pair of ornate black boots walking, trailing the blade of a large sword very similar to the Monado in OTL's Xenoblade on the ground. A deep female voice (belonging to Zelda Williams) can be heard.*
Voice: This world is ruled by false prophecies...
*A woman clad in white, her hands bound behind her back, is seen being dragged through the streets as a woman with black hair observes nearby. The black-haired woman tried to reach the woman in white, but guards hold her back.*
Voice: Prophecies used to subjugate the oppressed, all under the banner of a god we have never seen.
*A shining white light from the heavens illuminates the holy city as a priest cries out.*
Voice: God wills it, they say. That is what they say to justify what they have done to us...
*The woman in white is slammed down against a stone block, her head held in place. The black-haired woman screams and leaps into the air, trying to reach her friend in time.*
Voice: They claim that they have seen his miracles...
*The black-haired woman is blasted back by a powerful, shining light.*
Voice: They claim that they know his will...
*Another voice, that of an old man, can be heard: “For your crimes against your god and against your world...”*
Voice: They claim that he exists at all...
*The woman in white sheds a single tear. The black-haired woman screams.*
Voice: But if he does exist...
*The black-haired woman cuts down a priest with her sword, as symbols on the sword light up and the people run screaming. The old man can be heard shouting: “Blasphemy!”, while a bystander can faintly be heard saying “she wields the Xenoblade!”*
Voice: I will tear him down from heaven and smite him upon the earth!
*A brief bit of battle gameplay footage is revealed, showing a battle system that looks like a cross between OTL Xenoblade and OTL Final Fantasy XIII, with spectacular footage of the black haired woman and two allies fighting some massive beasts with powerful attacks.*
*The black-haired woman is shown holding the blade straight up as she speaks.*
Woman: I am Lilith. Let their misguided faith in their false god be *she slashes to the side, revealing the full glory of the sword* their final fantasy.
*The Final Fantasy XII logo is revealed, all in black, featuring a sword identical to the OTL Monado in faint multicolor. The crowd roars with approval after the teaser ends.*
-
The Squaresoft presentation ended after the Final Fantasy XII teaser, and following that, Trinen introduced a pair of developers from Polyphony to the stage. This began a presentation for Gran Turismo 4, announcing the game and showing off a good ten minutes or so of new car footage and amazing graphics rivaling or exceeding the Killer Instinct 4 presentation. Several of the game's new features were announced, but we were mostly blown away by just how good the game looked on the Nintendo Sapphire. The Polyphony folks apologized that the game took so long to develop: it was originally planned for the Wave, but the team decided to start anew when they saw just how powerful the Sapphire would be and how amazing their new game would look on the system. They said that the game was four years in the making and would feature a huge amount of content to make the wait worth it, with over 1400 cars, dozens of tracks including NASCAR tracks, and a revamped online gameplay system. Gran Turismo 4 looked worlds better than Sega Rally, which had launched just a couple weeks before to incredible reviews and had established itself as the pre-eminent racing franchise. Polyphony then apologized and said that fans would have to wait a bit more, until 2009 when the game would finally be ready. Despite the long wait we'll still have to endure, fans were very hyped about the reveal, which pulled in some of the biggest applause of the show. Following up the Gran Turismo 4 presentation, the presentation then turned to the Supernova, and numerous games were shown off, including Pokemon Silver, the enhanced version of last year's Pokemon Black And White. This game will feature the Embrya evolution line, and a brand new subplot about the two Pokemon Blizzeria and Cindake being captured by a mysterious new villain. After the Silver presentation, we saw footage from the new handheld Castlevania title, Dracula's Reign. A 3-D Castlevania game, the first on a handheld, this game involves a new generation of vampire hunters trying to liberate the world after Dracula takes over. It features platforming gameplay combined with action-RPG elements and even a bit of hack and slash action, and could be the best handheld Castlevania game yet. We then saw an RPG named Elvenfall which looked like it could be one of the best RPGs of the year. It features an all-female party of four beautiful elves fighting to save the world from a wicked king, and combines traditional turn based gameplay with gorgeous presentation and music. Justicar, a third person shooter, was maybe the best looking handheld game of the show, and looked as good as any console shooter, giving even The Covenant games a run for their money. We then saw some Metal Gear Cipher footage showing Big Boss sneaking into a weapons factory and meeting the mysterious Paz Ortega, followed by the last game of the presentation, a new Kirby title called Kirby And The Fairy Circle that's coming out next year. Masahiro Sakurai was there to show off Kirby, and at the end of the presentation he dropped a tiny tease for Sapphire Smash Bros.! No new characters were revealed but the game was confirmed to be in development.
Selene, the politically charged sci-fi game revealed at last year's E3, got about a two minute gameplay presentation, showing off the open-ended RPG-like gameplay allowing for lots of player choice and character interaction. The game looks beautiful and the gameplay looks like it could allow for an enormous amount of replay value. We also got a release date for the game, October 7. Then came another teaser trailer: A mysterious planet, struck by an asteroid from space. However, the asteroid wasn't very big and didn't seem to cause most of the destruction and death seen on the planet. A group of soldiers are sent to investigate... suddenly, one of them is attacked by a terrifying creature. A missile strikes the creature, saving the soldier... the savior is revealed to be Samus Aran, and the reveal makes the crowd go wild. Samus speaks with an authoritative voice and seems to be in command of the mission. It's interesting to note that she has a new voice actress for this game, different slightly from Jennifer Hale but no less powerful. The game's title is revealed as Metroid: Starfall, and a 2009 release date is given. After the Metroid trailer, the screen went black and we saw a brief teaser for a brand new IP from Retro Studios. A man is shown stepping out of his apartment building, onto a busy city street. Then, buildings in the city begin to light up, and we see three other people, two women and one man, stepping out of their own buildings. The entire city begins to light up like a classic arcade game, and each of the four who we saw come out of their buildings begin to engage in arcade-style combat against enemies that appear out of nowhere. From what we saw, the game looks to play like an old school arcade game but with a 3-D adventure game aesthetic, and the entire thing looked incredibly surreal but also amazingly fun. The game's name is Arcadia, and nothing else was revealed, we only got the Sapphire logo and the Retro Studios logo and that was it, but the crowd looked quite excited and was buzzing. Bill Trinen said that more information about Arcadia, Nintendo's exciting new IP, would be coming soon. Trinen then thanked everyone for coming, but revealed one final trailer which started to play. It zoomed in on a forested clearing and once the Master Sword appeared, the crowd went wild. Link, looking to be about 12 or 13 years old, awakens in a sleepy village much like his village in the Kokiri Forest in Temple Of Time, but this village is somewhat quieter, and there are no Kokiri in sight. Link walks to the edge of the village, and the camera pans up to reveal a massive forest, spanning an entire continent. The game's title was then revealed: The Legend Of Zelda: Spirit Of The Woods, with a release year, 2009, shown afterward. The crowd cheered again, and this concluded Nintendo's E3 2008 keynote.
AeroTheZealousOne
Monthly Donor
Is it just me or was it this that gave it away that it was gonna be Final Fantasy XII? I mean, you did reveal that to us earlier...
EDIT: Forgot to mention that I am hyped for Chrono Break as well.
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Finally caught up on updates. Blackheart Villainous is quite an interesting game, of course. It seems like, ITTL, it’s one of the first games to explicitly offer a more pacifistic mode of play.
Also, Final Fantasy XII? Awesome.
Also, Final Fantasy XII? Awesome.
It'll be covered in the next few weeks, either in its own update or the spring recap.
E3 2008 (Part 2)
Acclaim Keynote Summary
Acclaim's 2008 keynote was perhaps their most highly anticipated to date. The company's fortunes have been rapidly improving after fending off an acquisition bid in 2005 and acquiring Dark Horse Comics, and Acclaim has expanded into a full-blown multimedia company with interests not only in video games, but in comics and television as well. The biggest game that Acclaim revealed in its presentation was Divine Wrath 4, which will be the first multiplatform installment of the series, after the last two were Xbox exclusives. Divine Wrath 4 will not only be in arcades, but will come out on the Sapphire, iTwin, Xbox 2, and will even have a full version on both the iPod Play and the Supernova. The game will feature many of the characters from previous games, and introduced the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse as playable characters. However, the biggest reveal was saved for the end, where we saw God himself (yes, THAT God, the one from the Bible) as a playable character. Depicted as a muscular old man in a tattered robe with a long white beard, God had a powerful voice and even more powerful fists. No character was spared from God's wrath, we saw him beating down on Lucifer and Hades, as well as Zeus, Thor, Osiris, and even poor Santa Claus. God's finisher looks to be a purifying holy light that can burn the flesh off a screaming enemy's bones, and we saw him use it on the Hawaiian volcano goddess Pele to great effect. God was very positively received by the crowd, and we can't wait to get biblical with this game next year. We got footage of Turok: The Unending War, the first seventh generation Turok game that will be released to consoles in July, and depicted a battle between an army of dinosaur hunters and a horde of undead riding prehistoric creatures. The game continues the series' traditional outlandish first person action and will allow Turok and his allies to enhance their strength throughout the game. Most intriguingly, Acclaim also revealed a brand new IP that's going to be developed into a multimedia franchise, with a tie-in comic launching next year, a game in 2010, and an Adult Swim action show planned. It follows the story of six gifted heroes, and looks to take classic comic tropes into the new millennium. The new franchise is called Destined, and we'll be hearing a lot more about it in the coming months. Acclaim ended with a sizzle reel of upcoming titles, and the overall reception to their keynote, which lasted about 30 minutes, was highly positive. This company clearly has some excellent games in the works, and looks to take the worlds of gaming and entertainment by storm.
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Electronic Arts Keynote Summary
EA devoted a LOT of time to Madden 2009, but that was to be expected. The new Madden game looks excellent from a graphical perspective, and the ability to have an individual player improvise on the fly during a play will make competitive games a lot more unpredictable. EA also showed off the new Encounter title, Encounter: Time Wars, which serves as a prequel to the previous two games and has the evil aliens going across time to abduct various people, with the primary antagonist being a World War I soldier. The game looks to blend various gameplay styles to create something more than the typical FPS, and could be the franchise's most interesting installment to date. That game will be released in July. We then got an in-depth look at Fallout: The Boneyard, coming later this year. EA had a lot more to show of the game, and it's really taking shape well, looking much prettier and more complex than the original two Fallout titles. It's a fully 3-D game with an over the shoulder perspective, but gives the player a massive world to explore. It'll launch on PC, Xbox 2, iTwin, and Sapphire in November. We were also shown footage from the new Terminator game being published by EA. It's scheduled for release next year and is slated to follow the events of the first two films from the perspective of Kyle Reese and then Sarah Connor. It definitely captures the tone and feel of the films and could be the best adaptation of this classic film series to date. EA's keynote didn't give us much in the way of surprises, but the company has a solid lineup of blockbuster games slated for release, games which will no doubt be among the top selling titles of the year.
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Apple Keynote – E3 2008
Apple's keynote began with Reggie Fils-Aime taking the stage to tout the success of the Apple gaming ecosystem, boasting that the Apple iTwin was the best selling console of the current generation, the iPod Play has sold dozens of millions of units worldwide, and the iPhone has merged the worlds of the internet and gaming together in a way never seen before. He then said that Apple is just getting started, and will continue to bring the best games for the best value, and that this year's E3 would be all about the games, starting with Virtua Fighter 6. We got a tease of this game at E3 2007, and more information has been revealed throughout the past few months, but this was definitely our biggest look at the game yet with its release just a few short weeks away. We already know all of the new fighters... or do we? Reggie took the opportunity to reveal two guest fighters: Valerian from Valerian And Laureline, and in a massive surprise, Mega Man as he appeared in the Mega Man Next series. Mega Man mostly showed off his hand to hand combat skills but could also use his blaster to attack foes, and was seen battling Dural in a cutscene that made the fans go wild. Yu Suzuki came on stage for this part and was having fun brawling it out with Reggie in a Mega Man vs. Valerian showdown. After about ten minutes discussing the game (and briefly teasing Suzuki's Psystriker, coming later this year, and the upcoming Shenmue Trilogy for the iPhone and iPod Play, Suzuki left the stage and Reggie showed us another trailer for No One Lives 4Ever, which is also coming next month. As the title would imply, it's the fourth mainline game in the No One Lives Forever series, and once again sees superspy Cate Archer return. This time, she's up against four deadly counterintelligence agents, each of whom have their own agenda and own plot that threatens the world. The game features motion controls and a fun new cel-shaded style that looks worlds better than the original trilogy, and could be one of the iTwin's biggest hits of the year. Of course, though Virtua Fighter 6 had the longest presentation, the biggest game of Sega's E3 presentation was clearly Commander Keen: Billy's Brave Odyssey, with another ten minutes or so devoted to trailers and gameplay footage from the game. Ion Storm personnel, including Warren Spector who came on stage to massive applause, proudly showed off footage from both the main adventure mode and the multiplayer mode, and gave us the most footage yet of the game's primary antagonist, the nerdy thief boy Reynard who had appeared in the MTV Video Game Awards trailer and the 2007 GameInformer magazine article and had already accumulated a cult following. During the presentation, just a few seconds of footage of Reynard with Billy Blaze and friends was shown, indicating that he might perhaps be playable, much to the crowd's delight. Spector and Tom Hall showed off the game's intuitive motion controls which gave Keen and his allies a ton of brand new moves to use on enemies and discover secrets. The presentation showed off both brand new worlds and returning worlds from previous games, including a world from Sonic The Hedgehog 2, Westside Island. The presentation left the gathered crowd buzzing, and got a significantly more positive reaction than either of the first two games. The game's release window was revealed as September 2008, just four short months away.
Following the Commander Keen presentation, the announcement of Valerian And Laureline 2, due to be released next year, was a bit underwhelming despite the reveal of some beautiful visuals and exciting new worlds. The game itself seems to play similar to its predecessor, so the crowd could be forgiven for not getting too excited about it. The next trailer, however, got everybody standing: Phantasy Star VIII, which showed off some beautiful open worlds and some really dark dungeons, was a feast for the senses, and is expected to be released early next year. The game's trailer showed its characters on a planet filled with strangely colored vegetation, exploring mysterious dungeons that hold magical secrets. The gameplay looks to be traditionally turn-based, but with some twists including the use of technology in battle to gain an advantage over magical enemies. The game's subtitle was revealed as Phantasy Star VIII: Beneath The Spectral Canopy. The crowd loudly applauded the Phantasy Star VIII trailer, but save for a few hardcore fans, the reception to the reveal of an all new Monkey Island game exclusive to Macintosh and iTwin called Return To Monkey Island was much more subdued, despite some innovative uses of motion control and some fairly hilarious jokes between Guybrush and Elaine Marley. After the reveal of Return To Monkey Island, Steve Jobs finally took the stage, touting the iPhone to a mixed reaction from the crowd. Jobs said that the iPhone was poised to become the greatest gaming device ever made, touting a wide selection of downloadable games from the iTunes Store, both Sega classics and new original titles, increasing compatibility between the iPhone and the iTwin, including the ability to stream Sonic Duo on the go, and the reveal of numerous new titles, including an iPhone exclusive full port of Virtua Fighter 6, a brand new Virtua Fighter mobile puzzle game, and a series of exciting new games for both the iPhone and iPod Play. Jobs promoted the Shenmue Trilogy compilation, which had already been hyped up earlier by Yu Suzuki, then showed off an exclusive Panzer Dragoon title called Panzer Dragoon Metamoria, which would play as a traditional rail-based title like the first two games and Orta. Metamoria would be available for the iPod Play, but would also have a special iPhone/iPod Touch version featuring enhanced graphics and touch controls. It looked absolutely gorgeous, and Jobs himself seemed like he was having trouble pulling himself away from the iPhone demo version of the game. When Jobs finally was able to stop playing, he showed off another game, Sonic: The Time Emeralds, that would be coming to the iPhone and iPod Play in September. The game plays like a classic Sonic platformer and features the time traveling mechanic from Sonic CD, with Sonic able to travel to three different versions of each of the game's seven worlds. Jobs said that the game would connect with Sonic Duo, allowing players who owned both games to unlock a secret world in each game. Jobs then showed off Party Karts, which we've seen a bit of but haven't seen very much of until this E3. The game looks and plays much like Mario Kart, but is geared heavily toward multiplayer play, with racing and battle modes and eight different minigames to compete in. The game actually looks like a lot of fun, and its focus on minigames and battle modes separates it from Mario Kart, though the two games will definitely be compared heavily to one another. After Jobs showed off Party Karts, he and Reggie showed off some quick footage from numerous iPhone mobile games, then segued into a segment featuring indie titles, particularly a physics-based game called World Of Goo that will be coming to the iTwin in late 2008 and the iPhone in 2009. World of Goo has players connecting goo balls to one another to form bridges and other structures, and looks to be heavily physics-based, one of the more innovative titles we've seen in some time. A few other indie games were shown for both the iTwin and iPhone, including a strange card-based RPG taking place in a series of labyrinths called Kronus Calling, and a running-based platform title where players can build structures as they run to keep themselves alive. Apple seems to be investing heavily in indie publishers, and if they can find another Pixelworld diamond in the rough, their investments will pay off heavily. Speaking of Pixelworld, Apple also hyped up some more expansions for that title during this segment, including new content based on Commander Keen and Mega Man, and a new mode in which players can create their own mini-RPGs.
Steve Jobs then left the stage, and Reggie gave a quick monologue before going into a sort of “check this out!” montage in which footage from various upcoming games was shown. It started off with a teaser for August's upcoming Breath Of Fire reboot, which is a brand new game loosely based on the plot of the original title but with brand new gameplay mechanics, plotlines, and presentation. Titled Breath Of Fire: Dragon Reborn, the game looks to be an action-RPG with a battle system inspired by Street Fighter, and looks to relaunch Capcom's most prominent RPG franchise on the iTwin with a bang. Speaking of RPGs, we got a small teaser trailer for the upcoming Full Metal Alchemist 2, which will feature a brand new protagonist but the familiar alchemy and steampunk motif of the first hit game. We know this game will also be coming to the Sapphire, but this trailer confirmed rumors that the game would be a multiplatformer, also coming to Apple's iTwin. Another sort of “multiplatform confirmation” trailer then appeared in the form of a brief tease for Thrillseekers 2, coming next year. It showed the six main characters of the original game stepping out onto what looked like a stage, facing both adoring fans and what appears to be other teams of extreme athletes from around the world. The game's tagline, “The World Is Watching” appeared, along with the release window, 2009. Following that, we got a much more substantial trailer/gameplay preview of an exclusive iTwin title coming later this year, No More Heroes, a wacky but graphically violent hack and slash game which looks to take heavy advantage of the iTwin's motion controls, with its otaku hero, Travis Touchdown, using dual blades and nunchuks to carve a path through his enemies. No More Heroes looks like a lot of fun, and shows that not only can the iTwin support more family oriented games like the Commander Keen series, but that it can also support mature titles too, including the next game to be shown. This trailer, one of the most terrifying of the show, depicted a facility where hideously mutated creatures roam freely, as a creepy male voice narrates, discussing the experiments he's conducted and the ones he has yet to conduct. After this, we see a modern cityscape, and a woman getting a phone call. She takes out her cell phone and we see that her name is Violet Alvarez, a reveal that causes those who recognize the name to cheer. What Violet hears on the other end of the phone makes her gasp and drop it to the ground. We then see her roaming alone through the facility, trying to avoid the creatures as the creepy voice returns. The last thing we hear after a cut to black is Violet screaming “HELP ME!!!” at the top of her lungs. Then the name of the game appears: Three Mile Island, prompting more cheers from the crowd. The release date is given as October 21, 2008. Reggie and one of the game's developers then discuss the game as gameplay footage is shown. The game takes place 17 years after the events of Return To Three Mile Island, in an alternate 2008. Violet Alvarez is now a college professor, and a group of her students have been kidnapped while on a vacation, luring her to the abandoned Three Mile Island facility, where a malevolent scientist has started radiation experiments there. Why this person wants Violet to come to the facility is not revealed, but it's implied that she won't be the only playable character, and it's also implied that the game will focus heavily on psychological horror rather than shooting gameplay. After the presentation ends, Reggie has one more game to reveal from Apple's newest game development studio. The game's still in an early stage of development, but he promises that more will be revealed at next year's E3. For now, he just can't resist showing what they have so far. The trailer reveals the name of the production studio, PlatinumGames, and shows off an extremely sexy and rather tall woman who is revealed as a powerful witch. She battles angels with her fast-paced moves, all in a spectacular over the top fashion that makes Sadira Blackheart look like Mother Teresa and Dante look like Cecil the Turtle. After the saucy trailer in which we're treated to some of the most incredible hack and slash action that's ever been seen in a video, the name of both the character and the game is revealed: Bayonetta. The trailer gets perhaps the biggest applause of Apple's entire presentation, and of course, Bayonetta is coming exclusively to the iTwin.
Acclaim's 2008 keynote was perhaps their most highly anticipated to date. The company's fortunes have been rapidly improving after fending off an acquisition bid in 2005 and acquiring Dark Horse Comics, and Acclaim has expanded into a full-blown multimedia company with interests not only in video games, but in comics and television as well. The biggest game that Acclaim revealed in its presentation was Divine Wrath 4, which will be the first multiplatform installment of the series, after the last two were Xbox exclusives. Divine Wrath 4 will not only be in arcades, but will come out on the Sapphire, iTwin, Xbox 2, and will even have a full version on both the iPod Play and the Supernova. The game will feature many of the characters from previous games, and introduced the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse as playable characters. However, the biggest reveal was saved for the end, where we saw God himself (yes, THAT God, the one from the Bible) as a playable character. Depicted as a muscular old man in a tattered robe with a long white beard, God had a powerful voice and even more powerful fists. No character was spared from God's wrath, we saw him beating down on Lucifer and Hades, as well as Zeus, Thor, Osiris, and even poor Santa Claus. God's finisher looks to be a purifying holy light that can burn the flesh off a screaming enemy's bones, and we saw him use it on the Hawaiian volcano goddess Pele to great effect. God was very positively received by the crowd, and we can't wait to get biblical with this game next year. We got footage of Turok: The Unending War, the first seventh generation Turok game that will be released to consoles in July, and depicted a battle between an army of dinosaur hunters and a horde of undead riding prehistoric creatures. The game continues the series' traditional outlandish first person action and will allow Turok and his allies to enhance their strength throughout the game. Most intriguingly, Acclaim also revealed a brand new IP that's going to be developed into a multimedia franchise, with a tie-in comic launching next year, a game in 2010, and an Adult Swim action show planned. It follows the story of six gifted heroes, and looks to take classic comic tropes into the new millennium. The new franchise is called Destined, and we'll be hearing a lot more about it in the coming months. Acclaim ended with a sizzle reel of upcoming titles, and the overall reception to their keynote, which lasted about 30 minutes, was highly positive. This company clearly has some excellent games in the works, and looks to take the worlds of gaming and entertainment by storm.
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Electronic Arts Keynote Summary
EA devoted a LOT of time to Madden 2009, but that was to be expected. The new Madden game looks excellent from a graphical perspective, and the ability to have an individual player improvise on the fly during a play will make competitive games a lot more unpredictable. EA also showed off the new Encounter title, Encounter: Time Wars, which serves as a prequel to the previous two games and has the evil aliens going across time to abduct various people, with the primary antagonist being a World War I soldier. The game looks to blend various gameplay styles to create something more than the typical FPS, and could be the franchise's most interesting installment to date. That game will be released in July. We then got an in-depth look at Fallout: The Boneyard, coming later this year. EA had a lot more to show of the game, and it's really taking shape well, looking much prettier and more complex than the original two Fallout titles. It's a fully 3-D game with an over the shoulder perspective, but gives the player a massive world to explore. It'll launch on PC, Xbox 2, iTwin, and Sapphire in November. We were also shown footage from the new Terminator game being published by EA. It's scheduled for release next year and is slated to follow the events of the first two films from the perspective of Kyle Reese and then Sarah Connor. It definitely captures the tone and feel of the films and could be the best adaptation of this classic film series to date. EA's keynote didn't give us much in the way of surprises, but the company has a solid lineup of blockbuster games slated for release, games which will no doubt be among the top selling titles of the year.
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Apple Keynote – E3 2008
Apple's keynote began with Reggie Fils-Aime taking the stage to tout the success of the Apple gaming ecosystem, boasting that the Apple iTwin was the best selling console of the current generation, the iPod Play has sold dozens of millions of units worldwide, and the iPhone has merged the worlds of the internet and gaming together in a way never seen before. He then said that Apple is just getting started, and will continue to bring the best games for the best value, and that this year's E3 would be all about the games, starting with Virtua Fighter 6. We got a tease of this game at E3 2007, and more information has been revealed throughout the past few months, but this was definitely our biggest look at the game yet with its release just a few short weeks away. We already know all of the new fighters... or do we? Reggie took the opportunity to reveal two guest fighters: Valerian from Valerian And Laureline, and in a massive surprise, Mega Man as he appeared in the Mega Man Next series. Mega Man mostly showed off his hand to hand combat skills but could also use his blaster to attack foes, and was seen battling Dural in a cutscene that made the fans go wild. Yu Suzuki came on stage for this part and was having fun brawling it out with Reggie in a Mega Man vs. Valerian showdown. After about ten minutes discussing the game (and briefly teasing Suzuki's Psystriker, coming later this year, and the upcoming Shenmue Trilogy for the iPhone and iPod Play, Suzuki left the stage and Reggie showed us another trailer for No One Lives 4Ever, which is also coming next month. As the title would imply, it's the fourth mainline game in the No One Lives Forever series, and once again sees superspy Cate Archer return. This time, she's up against four deadly counterintelligence agents, each of whom have their own agenda and own plot that threatens the world. The game features motion controls and a fun new cel-shaded style that looks worlds better than the original trilogy, and could be one of the iTwin's biggest hits of the year. Of course, though Virtua Fighter 6 had the longest presentation, the biggest game of Sega's E3 presentation was clearly Commander Keen: Billy's Brave Odyssey, with another ten minutes or so devoted to trailers and gameplay footage from the game. Ion Storm personnel, including Warren Spector who came on stage to massive applause, proudly showed off footage from both the main adventure mode and the multiplayer mode, and gave us the most footage yet of the game's primary antagonist, the nerdy thief boy Reynard who had appeared in the MTV Video Game Awards trailer and the 2007 GameInformer magazine article and had already accumulated a cult following. During the presentation, just a few seconds of footage of Reynard with Billy Blaze and friends was shown, indicating that he might perhaps be playable, much to the crowd's delight. Spector and Tom Hall showed off the game's intuitive motion controls which gave Keen and his allies a ton of brand new moves to use on enemies and discover secrets. The presentation showed off both brand new worlds and returning worlds from previous games, including a world from Sonic The Hedgehog 2, Westside Island. The presentation left the gathered crowd buzzing, and got a significantly more positive reaction than either of the first two games. The game's release window was revealed as September 2008, just four short months away.
Following the Commander Keen presentation, the announcement of Valerian And Laureline 2, due to be released next year, was a bit underwhelming despite the reveal of some beautiful visuals and exciting new worlds. The game itself seems to play similar to its predecessor, so the crowd could be forgiven for not getting too excited about it. The next trailer, however, got everybody standing: Phantasy Star VIII, which showed off some beautiful open worlds and some really dark dungeons, was a feast for the senses, and is expected to be released early next year. The game's trailer showed its characters on a planet filled with strangely colored vegetation, exploring mysterious dungeons that hold magical secrets. The gameplay looks to be traditionally turn-based, but with some twists including the use of technology in battle to gain an advantage over magical enemies. The game's subtitle was revealed as Phantasy Star VIII: Beneath The Spectral Canopy. The crowd loudly applauded the Phantasy Star VIII trailer, but save for a few hardcore fans, the reception to the reveal of an all new Monkey Island game exclusive to Macintosh and iTwin called Return To Monkey Island was much more subdued, despite some innovative uses of motion control and some fairly hilarious jokes between Guybrush and Elaine Marley. After the reveal of Return To Monkey Island, Steve Jobs finally took the stage, touting the iPhone to a mixed reaction from the crowd. Jobs said that the iPhone was poised to become the greatest gaming device ever made, touting a wide selection of downloadable games from the iTunes Store, both Sega classics and new original titles, increasing compatibility between the iPhone and the iTwin, including the ability to stream Sonic Duo on the go, and the reveal of numerous new titles, including an iPhone exclusive full port of Virtua Fighter 6, a brand new Virtua Fighter mobile puzzle game, and a series of exciting new games for both the iPhone and iPod Play. Jobs promoted the Shenmue Trilogy compilation, which had already been hyped up earlier by Yu Suzuki, then showed off an exclusive Panzer Dragoon title called Panzer Dragoon Metamoria, which would play as a traditional rail-based title like the first two games and Orta. Metamoria would be available for the iPod Play, but would also have a special iPhone/iPod Touch version featuring enhanced graphics and touch controls. It looked absolutely gorgeous, and Jobs himself seemed like he was having trouble pulling himself away from the iPhone demo version of the game. When Jobs finally was able to stop playing, he showed off another game, Sonic: The Time Emeralds, that would be coming to the iPhone and iPod Play in September. The game plays like a classic Sonic platformer and features the time traveling mechanic from Sonic CD, with Sonic able to travel to three different versions of each of the game's seven worlds. Jobs said that the game would connect with Sonic Duo, allowing players who owned both games to unlock a secret world in each game. Jobs then showed off Party Karts, which we've seen a bit of but haven't seen very much of until this E3. The game looks and plays much like Mario Kart, but is geared heavily toward multiplayer play, with racing and battle modes and eight different minigames to compete in. The game actually looks like a lot of fun, and its focus on minigames and battle modes separates it from Mario Kart, though the two games will definitely be compared heavily to one another. After Jobs showed off Party Karts, he and Reggie showed off some quick footage from numerous iPhone mobile games, then segued into a segment featuring indie titles, particularly a physics-based game called World Of Goo that will be coming to the iTwin in late 2008 and the iPhone in 2009. World of Goo has players connecting goo balls to one another to form bridges and other structures, and looks to be heavily physics-based, one of the more innovative titles we've seen in some time. A few other indie games were shown for both the iTwin and iPhone, including a strange card-based RPG taking place in a series of labyrinths called Kronus Calling, and a running-based platform title where players can build structures as they run to keep themselves alive. Apple seems to be investing heavily in indie publishers, and if they can find another Pixelworld diamond in the rough, their investments will pay off heavily. Speaking of Pixelworld, Apple also hyped up some more expansions for that title during this segment, including new content based on Commander Keen and Mega Man, and a new mode in which players can create their own mini-RPGs.
Steve Jobs then left the stage, and Reggie gave a quick monologue before going into a sort of “check this out!” montage in which footage from various upcoming games was shown. It started off with a teaser for August's upcoming Breath Of Fire reboot, which is a brand new game loosely based on the plot of the original title but with brand new gameplay mechanics, plotlines, and presentation. Titled Breath Of Fire: Dragon Reborn, the game looks to be an action-RPG with a battle system inspired by Street Fighter, and looks to relaunch Capcom's most prominent RPG franchise on the iTwin with a bang. Speaking of RPGs, we got a small teaser trailer for the upcoming Full Metal Alchemist 2, which will feature a brand new protagonist but the familiar alchemy and steampunk motif of the first hit game. We know this game will also be coming to the Sapphire, but this trailer confirmed rumors that the game would be a multiplatformer, also coming to Apple's iTwin. Another sort of “multiplatform confirmation” trailer then appeared in the form of a brief tease for Thrillseekers 2, coming next year. It showed the six main characters of the original game stepping out onto what looked like a stage, facing both adoring fans and what appears to be other teams of extreme athletes from around the world. The game's tagline, “The World Is Watching” appeared, along with the release window, 2009. Following that, we got a much more substantial trailer/gameplay preview of an exclusive iTwin title coming later this year, No More Heroes, a wacky but graphically violent hack and slash game which looks to take heavy advantage of the iTwin's motion controls, with its otaku hero, Travis Touchdown, using dual blades and nunchuks to carve a path through his enemies. No More Heroes looks like a lot of fun, and shows that not only can the iTwin support more family oriented games like the Commander Keen series, but that it can also support mature titles too, including the next game to be shown. This trailer, one of the most terrifying of the show, depicted a facility where hideously mutated creatures roam freely, as a creepy male voice narrates, discussing the experiments he's conducted and the ones he has yet to conduct. After this, we see a modern cityscape, and a woman getting a phone call. She takes out her cell phone and we see that her name is Violet Alvarez, a reveal that causes those who recognize the name to cheer. What Violet hears on the other end of the phone makes her gasp and drop it to the ground. We then see her roaming alone through the facility, trying to avoid the creatures as the creepy voice returns. The last thing we hear after a cut to black is Violet screaming “HELP ME!!!” at the top of her lungs. Then the name of the game appears: Three Mile Island, prompting more cheers from the crowd. The release date is given as October 21, 2008. Reggie and one of the game's developers then discuss the game as gameplay footage is shown. The game takes place 17 years after the events of Return To Three Mile Island, in an alternate 2008. Violet Alvarez is now a college professor, and a group of her students have been kidnapped while on a vacation, luring her to the abandoned Three Mile Island facility, where a malevolent scientist has started radiation experiments there. Why this person wants Violet to come to the facility is not revealed, but it's implied that she won't be the only playable character, and it's also implied that the game will focus heavily on psychological horror rather than shooting gameplay. After the presentation ends, Reggie has one more game to reveal from Apple's newest game development studio. The game's still in an early stage of development, but he promises that more will be revealed at next year's E3. For now, he just can't resist showing what they have so far. The trailer reveals the name of the production studio, PlatinumGames, and shows off an extremely sexy and rather tall woman who is revealed as a powerful witch. She battles angels with her fast-paced moves, all in a spectacular over the top fashion that makes Sadira Blackheart look like Mother Teresa and Dante look like Cecil the Turtle. After the saucy trailer in which we're treated to some of the most incredible hack and slash action that's ever been seen in a video, the name of both the character and the game is revealed: Bayonetta. The trailer gets perhaps the biggest applause of Apple's entire presentation, and of course, Bayonetta is coming exclusively to the iTwin.
So Kamiya still splits off into Platinum? Guess his better success ITTL wasn't good enough. No More Heroes and World of Goo coming to iTwin are neat surprises too, love how it's getting a bunch of OTL's Wii and multiplat indie games.
Is there any blowback from Mega Man in Virtua Fighter btw? Forget if butterflies changed its reputation, but I always remember it being the no nonsense fighter that didn't have things like scy-fy weapons or magic powers IOTL.
Is there any blowback from Mega Man in Virtua Fighter btw? Forget if butterflies changed its reputation, but I always remember it being the no nonsense fighter that didn't have things like scy-fy weapons or magic powers IOTL.
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Okay calling it now, the extra level in sonic time emeralds will give sonic the chance to prevent sally's death.
Lilith's voice is a bit higher than Kuvira's (Zelda would have begun recording lines for Final Fantasy XII when she was 17) but they do sound very similar.
I'm looking very much forward to sharing TTL's Final Fantasy XII with you all.
There's a great deal of elements from both OTL Xenoblade and OTL Final Fantasy XIII in the game, including Lilith delivering OTL Shulk's "I'LL KILL YOU!" line in pretty much the exact same tone.
Calling it now in regards to politics: Gore's policies will delay the Recession just long enough that he escapes the blame. His successor, most likely Jon Huntsman, gets the blowback from it, especially because, prediction two, he fails to win the popular vote, as Santorum splits it three ways, forcing it to the House. Santorum decries him from the Right, and, with his own party split, Huntsman is a lame duck before he even enters office. in 2012, Santorum is the Republican nominee. Not that it matters, since Wellstone gets his revenge, and becomes President
E3 2008 (Part 3)
Microsoft Keynote – E3 2008
Don Mattrick was once again heading up the Microsoft keynote address, and after a very quick intro speech, he launched right into a new trailer for Michael Bay's upcoming stealth shooter Gray Zone. The game looks much more polished than it did last year, and seems to take place mostly in a Middle Eastern city, with some levels taking place in the desert and one taking place at a massive oil refinery. The explosive trailer concluded with the reveal of a release date for the game: November 18, 2008, several months earlier than expected. The crowd cheered wildly at this, and after the trailer, Michael Bay once again took the stage to show off the game. The entire Gray Zone presentation lasted about 15 minutes, with about half of it focused on the game's multiplayer mode. The multiplayer mode showed mostly deathmatch gameplay, but has some intriguing twists, with cooperative stealth playing a major role. Though Gray Zone is ostensibly a stealth game, it looks like there will be plenty of opportunities for massive firefighters and big flashy set pieces, and Bay is clearly bringing the sensibilities of his big budget action movies to the Xbox 2 with this game. It's the first game to get this kind of Hollywood hype since Manticore, which was somewhat of a disappointment, but Gray Zone looks like the real deal, with a lot more action and a better shooting system than The Covenant 3, better graphics, and more addictive multiplayer. Gray Zone could revivify the third person action shooter on the Xbox 2 if Bay is able to pull it off, and with every big moment in the presentation, the crowd seemed to be quite into it, cheering every explosion and every new reveal of a cool gameplay system. The controls are incredibly intuitive, and Bay says that they will adjust based on a player's preferred style, so if a player isn't quite so good at mechanically aiming, the system will compensate, adjusting the aiming difficulty but subtly reducing other stats to maintain fairness and balance. This system only applies to single player mode, so in multiplayer, you'll still need to be good at aiming. After the Gray Zone presentation that concluded with one more quick trailer and a plot twist reveal that one of the three main characters is a mole working for a terrorist, Bay left the stage, and Mattrick began discussing a few other games, including the new Transporter title (which features Zhang Ziyi's character Lai as a playable character and adds a new multiplayer mode in which players can build their reputation as a transporter just like Frank Martin). After that, we saw some footage from Deep Black 4, the popular FPS franchise's first Xbox 2 outing. The game features improved shooting and a new “alliance” mode, in which players can form a battlefield truce with certain enemies in exchange for resources or information. The Xbox 2's HD graphics look like a major boon for Deep Black 4, making everything look really slick and lifelike, and the cutscene animation is top notch, rivaling anything else the Xbox 2 has to offer. Up next, more footage from The Pact 2, the Xbox-exclusive sequel to 2005's FPS. While The Pact was a critical and commercial disappointment, it sold well enough to justify a sequel, which is co-published by EA and Microsoft and exclusive to the Xbox 2. We've been hearing a bit about the game over the past year, and the EA presentation, which was about a minute, showed off a bit more gameplay and storyline information. The storyline has nothing to do with the previous game but retains the weapon system and also the previous game's level of mission discretion. It looks great, but here's hoping it's better than the first, which was a fairly bad game. We then saw a brief release date announcement trailer for Beneath A Steel Sky, a remake of the classic 1994 point and click title, fully revamped for 3-D. It's a digital download exclusive and is one of the more hyped games for the Microsoft Store's digital marketplace, taking all the familiar story beats of the original game and adapting them into a fully fleshed out, HD adventure. It'll be out in July.
Next up, a brief three minute featurette for Psygnosis' brand new Wipeout game, Wipeout: Run And Gun. Combining futuristic racing elements with vehicular combat, this game looks incredible and will definitely rival F-Zero on the Sapphire as the year's best futuristic racing title. While a bit slower than F-Zero, the new weapons and customizable vehicles add an adventurous element that Nintendo's more straightforward racing game lacks, while distinguishing itself from other titles in its genre. We can look forward to playing the next Wipeout game in the fall. Then, we got a preview of one of the Xbox 2's big games of the show: Predator, based on the classic films and an offshoot of the current Alien game series. Developed exclusively for the Xbox 2, this game features dual storylines: in one, you play as the leader of a squad of humans stranded and trying to survive while the Predator hunts them down. In the other, you play as the titular Predator himself, hunting down a human while also experiencing some of the Predators' elite training rituals. This game is structured like a horror title despite ostensibly being a third person shooter, and looks VERY similar to Metal Gear Solid II: Children Of The Patriots, particularly the Naked Snake flashback segments. Stealth is a major part of the game, and all but one mission is said to take place out in the wilderness, with camoflage being a major factor. Online multiplayer has also been promised, allowing players to be either the humans or a Predator, with a variety of modes including Human vs. Predator mode and a Predator deathmatch mode in which 16 Predators hunt each other down until none remains. This could be one of the best games of 2009, and the crowd was buzzing the entire time it was being shown. Following this, we got a quick look at Spawn: Bloodlust, also coming next year. It's a hack and slash featuring Tod McFarlane's classic comic book antihero, and looks really great with the HD power of the Xbox 2 behind it. The next game we got a look at was For God And Country: Confessed, the sequel to 2005's massive hit FPS title. The game's graphics still have a black and white, faded look to them, but with incredible detail, very cinematic and movielike. John Hagen, the protagonist from the original game, returns and has most of his old tricks and plenty of new ones, and the presentation for this game ended with a one minute trailer of Hagen confessing his sins to a priest, while interspersed cutscenes show Hagen torturing more bad guys and telling the priest that he has no choice but to kill again. It was a dark, gritty, and impressive trailer, and if the previous game is any indication, Confessed will prove to be another major 2009 hit for the Xbox. After the Confessed preview, we were shown a very brief teaser trailer for a game coming in 2010: a platformer starring a fat mouse character with big ears who steals cheese from a band of strange looking aliens. The new game is called Say Cheese!, and it's being pushed as the return of family style platformers to the Xbox. The teaser was quite amusing, but unfortunately, no playable footage of the game was available at the show. Then, we got a presentation a lot of people have been waiting for, a look at Cyberwar 3. Don Mattrick invited Psygnosis' development team up to the stage, and the Cyberwar 3 presentation was mostly five minutes of a thrilling multiplayer deathmatch showing off a lot of the new arenas and weapons, while also showing how much the game's graphics have improved since the original two titles. We've already learned about the campaign's plot from magazine articles and previews, so this presentation was all about the multiplayer action, and there was plenty to go around. As the Xbox 2's pre-eminent FPS title of this year, a lot is being expected of Cyberwar 3, and Microsoft will be counting on the game to deliver if the Xbox 2 is to catch up with the iTwin and maintain its lead over the Sapphire.
The next few trailers were for multiplayer titles, and were shown in fairly rapid-fire fashion. We got more footage from Encounter: Time Wars, which was covered extensively in EA's keynote already. Next up was THQ's Rise A Knight III, an RPG coming to all three current gen consoles and the PC. The world looks huge and the graphics look incredible, and Vermillion Software seems to be going for a more realistic game with this one, as opposed to some of the more fantastical elements seen in series like Elder Scrolls. Rise A Knight III is coming in August, and is one of the more anticipated games of the year. Then, we saw some killer footage from Dead Or Alive, and it looks like the series is headed back to its “sexy” roots, at least from the looks of this trailer footage, with plenty of scantily clad female fighters duking it out in beautiful HD. Next was Activision's Prince Of Persia 3. The company already showed off plenty from this game in their keynote, so most of the footage we've already seen, but we did get to see the Prince solving a puzzle with telekinesis, and Shana running someone through with a sword, which are original to this trailer. Prince Of Persia 3 is coming in December, just in time for Christmas. The last game to be shown in this rapid-fire trailer was Fallout: The Boneyard, and we got to see a neat segment where a demented game show host (voiced by former Family Feud host Ray Combs to hilarious effect) is forcing the protagonist through some insane challenges to save some villagers being held hostage. This segment was followed up by another teaser for what looks to be a 2010 or 2011 release, showing a tall man in a trenchcoat and sunglasses wielding a shotgun and walking through a crime infested city. He walked right into a building full of criminals, walked right up to a man who appeared to be the boss of those criminals, and shot him in the head while surrounded by dozens of that man's subordinates. Then, he walked out of the building, his facial expression daring anyone to try and stop him. We got some very brief gameplay footage of the man using his shotgun and racking up combos, then kicking an enemy down and shotgunning him in the face. The game itself is called Shotty, and the trailer got a cautiously enthusiastic reaction.
Don Mattrick: As you can see from today's amazing presentations, the Xbox 2 remains the number one destination for the biggest exclusives, and the place to play the best games from today's best software publishers. We hope you've enjoyed the show, and we'd like to show you one last thing before we our presentation today.
*The screen fades to black, then opens on a deserted landscape with scrap metal strewn all about. A male voice, full of regret, can be heard speaking.*
Voice: She never came back.
*Sad piano music plays as a woman in an exoskeleton battles against a horde of enemies, showing fierce determination. It's Adriana in the Omniscient, and she's getting numerous System Criticals as she screams in determination.*
Voice: They never found it... the Omniscient. So... there's hope.
*A younger man approaches the speaker, who turns out to be Samuel in military decoration. The man places his hand on Samuel's shoulder, looking sad.*
Younger Man: You know she's gone. She would have come back to you.
Samuel: Yeah... but... she would have kept hoping.
*The sad music continues as we see what's become of the world over the last ten years. War, destruction, rioting, hunger... nuclear fire.*
Samuel: Without Adriana, the world... just fell apart. Zehler tried her best to keep the peace, but...
*A news report shows Zehler speaking at a podium, when suddenly, a sniper's bullet pierces her skull. Secret Service agents rush the stage, only for an explosion to overtake the screen, and then... static.*
*Troops ride out in exoskeletons much like the Omniscient to do battle with a massive invasion of heavy artillery. Explosions rock both sides of the conflict.*
Samuel: We are doing the best we can, Adriana... I promise you.
*Samuel, in a command center, looks stone faced as he contemplates some kind of major military decision. We can see a tear running down his face. Taped to the corner of one of the screens nearby is a small picture of him and Adriana, looking happy together.*
*The music stops. On a deserted battlefield, a young girl, about 11 years old, with short black hair and light brown skin, finds something. It's the headpiece of the Omniscient. She looks and finds some more scrap parts.*
Girl: What's this...?
*She picks up the headpiece. It doesn't fit her perfectly, but she looks at it longingly, and at some of the other scrapped parts.*
Girl: I can make this work...
*We see the girl in some kind of shoddy looking basement, doing all sorts of work and repairs on the parts. She constructs an exoskeleton for herself, with a helmet, a visor, attachments for her chest, arms, and legs, and a couple of multipurpose guns. She does some exercise moves and her body seems to move in superhuman fashion.*
Girl: Whoa...!
*The girl does a few more action moves, even trying out the guns outside on some makeshift targets. We see her in the basement again, and her father calls to her frantically.*
Girl's Father: Sabine, outside, hurry! They are coming!
*The girl looks up with a frightened expression. The village is being attacked by raiders, wielding exoskeletons of their own. Sabine rushes out of the house with her family, but sees that the village is already under siege. She breaks away from her father and runs back toward the house.
Girl's Father: What the hell are you doing?
*The next scene shows the girl in her exoskeleton jumping hundreds of feet into the air, firing missiles down at some hostile soldiers. They fire back at her and she rolls out of the way in midair, landing behind them and sweeping them to the side with her arm before she fires a machine gun at another.*
Sabine: *she lands in the middle of a crowd of hostiles, looking around with a determined expression on her face* I won't let you hurt the people I love any more!
*A rapid-fire cutscene montage showing various scenes from the game, including action scenes featuring Sabine, more political scenes, Samuel angsting but also at times fighting, and the world in pure chaos are shown. Then, we see Sabine sitting in a jail cell, looking pissed off. A man approaches the door and opens it.*
Samuel: Do you know what we called the first one...?
Sabine: *glares up at him, not saying a word*
Samuel: Descending from the skies, a miracle of technology to save the people from above...
Sabine: Just tell me when I get my suit back. It's mine.
Samuel: ...an angel.
Sabine: *flips him the bird* Do I look like an angel to you?
TECHNO ANGEL: IMMORTAL
2009
*As the crowd cheers, Mattrick begins to speak.*
Mattrick: We have a fully playable Techno Angel: Immortal build at the Microsoft booth all week, so you can experience the incredible next chapter of the Techno Angel saga for yourself! Thank you and enjoy the rest of E3!
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Activision Keynote Summary
Activision spent about half of their keynote hyping the next Call Of Duty game, Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. It picks up where the previous game left off, with a full blown war between India and Pakistan and various countries taking sides, including the United States, which is running covert missions for India and hoping to end the war quickly. The game will combine fierce military action with intense political intrigue, but of course the multiplayer looks to be at the center of the show. In addition to appearing on the current gen consoles, it'll also show up on the Nintendo Wave and the two handhelds in a somewhat reduced format. Also on Activision's schedule is Guitar Hero: Meet The Band, which we got to see some special guests play on stage. As the name of the game implies, it will involve not just the guitar, but a microphone, bass, and drums, allowing four people to play together at once. With 90 songs at launch and DLC promised every week for the next six months after the game's release, players will have plenty of songs to jam out to. We also saw footage from Guitar Hero: Family Edition, which will be coming later in the summer and will feature family friendly songs that will be compatible with the Meet The Band instruments once those are released. In addition to its 2008 slate of games, Activision has plenty on tap for 2009, including a new G.I. Joe game, a new heist game called The Corporate Job (the latest in the Casino Job series), and most notably, Thrillseekers 2, a sequel to 2004's female-driven extreme sports game. While we saw only a bit of gameplay footage (which introduces a newly revamped control scheme very reminiscent of the game Skate), which includes 14 different extreme sports including four never before seen in the series, we also learned some details about the game's plot: it'll take place in Japan and feature a worldwide competition betweeen the Thrillseekers, representing the United States, and 19 other nations. Activision teased that over 150 different characters (!!!!!) would be fully playable in the game's freeplay mode, and teased a seventh girl being added to the Thrillseekers' main squad. While the game isn't due until next summer, we're sure to get plenty more details before next year's E3.
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Ubisoft Keynote Summary
Ubisoft... actually didn't have too much to show this time around. Beyond Good And Evil 3, which was expected to at least be teased at this year's show, was a complete no-show, leading to rumors that the game might not be released until 2010. However, we did get some other fun games shown off, including a Watchmen game to tie in with next year's movie, and more footage from Gestation, an exciting new horror/shooter IP about soldiers battling hatchling aliens amidst a destroyed city. Gestation, which has been in development since 2005, is one of the more hyped games of the latter part of the year and could give the upcoming Call Of Duty a run for its money. Ubisoft also teased Assassin's Creed II, due to be released late next year, and announced a portable spinoff of the series for the Supernova and iPod Play. Speaking of portable games, we also got a new iPhone Rayman announcement and the announcement of a The Darkest Night port to the Supernova, just in time for the game's 10th anniversary. No news about a new Darkest console game, but we're keeping our fingers crossed. There also wasn't any news about a new Blackheart game, though Villainous has just been released and so it's likely that we won't see a new game in the series until 2010. All in all, Ubisoft's keynote was a bit underwhelming, but with so many major IPs under its belt, we know that the company is likely to come back stronger than ever in the near future.
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We finally have a release date for SimSociety, Will Wright's incredible new simulation game that's generated more hype than any PC game in recent memory. October 7, 2008 will see the game launch on PC and Macintosh, and EA's booth at E3 was crowded with people gathered to play the latest build of the game, which Wright claims is 95% complete. What we saw of the game when we got our opportunity to play was incredible: a fully interactive cityscape populated with Sims whose actions could be directed but who also had minds of their own and would react realistically to the rules and events that we created. SimSociety allows players to create simulated nations across a vast landscape, a landscape big enough for “at least” 20 individual cities. While these cities can't be built in quite the detail of a Sims house or a SimCity town, they can be micromanaged in fairly minute detail, and individual cities will have their own laws and culture. For example, you can have a highly religious society with one rebellious atheistic city sprouting up in it, and you, as “ruler” of your society, can choose how best to handle it: let the city thrive on its own, challenging your rule, or crush it with military force or even natural disasters that can be attributed to divine wrath from the heavens. SimSociety is more than fun enough on its own, and is fully playable offline, capable of keeping a single player entertained for years. However, it's online that the game truly shines, as players can engage in international relations with other players' societies, or even roam another player's city at a person's eye level, participating in activities within that city. A player can choose not to build their own society at all, but simply live in another player's society in a sort of Second Life-lite kind of social networking experience. In fact, Will Wright says that he expects SimSociety to become the next major social network, with players able to interact with one another on an incredibly personal level. It remains to be seen whether the game can live up to the absolutely incredible amount of hype that's being generated toward it, but every time we get another good look at the game, it seems to get better and better.
-from an article on Gamesovermatter.com, posted on May 29, 2008
Adam Sessler: And, I've got to say, two major genres of games this year that are just stealing the show at this year's E3 are PC simulators and racing games. I mean, of course there's SimSociety, which won a slew of awards last year and looks even more amazing this year. We all know that game's going to be awesome, but then there's Empire: Total War, which looks like the best military simulator game I've ever played.
Chloe Maritzen: Yeah, I couldn't get enough of Empire, it plays so realistically and the competitive games can get so fierce, it's truly a battle of wits and not just mechanical skill. You have to think on such an in-depth level, and it takes this series to the next level.
Sessler: And then there's a new one coming either next year or the year after called Nemo Propheta In Patria.
Morgan Webb: That's a real mouthful.
Sessler: It's a weird name for a game, but it's basically a religion simulator. You have to take a region and sort of craft up their religious beliefs.
Maritzen: Okay, so first we get to actually play as God in Divine Wrath 4 and now we get to play God in this game? There's a lot of religious games coming out this year!
Webb: Don't forget that Lilith in Final Fantasy XII wants to literally drag God out of heaven and smite him upon the Earth.
Maritzen: I want to play that game so much.
Sessler: This Nemo Propheta game, it was in a fairly early build but it was still a lot of fun, you're crafting this nation based on its religion and then you get to actually see that choice play out in a simulated world, like Civilization in a way. So, for example, if they're worshipping kind of a peaceful god, then they'll be a bunch of hippies, spreading peace and stuff, but if you've got them worshipping the god of war, they'll start going out and conquering people.
Ted Crosley: That does sound like a really amazing game. And yeah, I did notice the rise of some really advanced and deep simulators on PC. It's one of the few kinds of experiences you can't really get on a console. It's not the graphical power of these games, because these games aren't very graphically intensive, but it's the level of detail and the number of inputs that would be so clunky on a game controller, you need that keyboard and that mouse to really have the precision to play these deep simulation games.
Webb: Can I just say that I'm looking forward to playing SimSociety more than any other game maybe ever?
Sessler: I don't think it can live up to the hype. I think it's so hyped right now...
Webb: Don't say that!
Sessler: It's true. Has any game that's been called the greatest game ever before its release ever come out and actually been that?
Maritzen: Super Mario Dimensions.
Crosley: Temple Of Time.
Sessler: Has any game in the last ten years?
Crosley: Necrocracy.
Sessler: Yeah, okay, I see your point. Okay, while we're talking about massively hyped games, let's segue into our next big genre that's getting a lot of love here at E3, and that's racing games. This was maybe the best E3 for racing games ever. Not only Gran Turismo 4 was announced, but also games like Wipeout: Run And Gun, F-Zero...
Maritzen: Can we talk about Party Karts, for just a second? It looks really cute and really fun, and I love all the different kinds of weapons and how they went completely over the top with them.
Webb: In the absence of a Mario Kart game being announced, I do think Party Karts is going to get a lot of traction.
Crosley: And the game really does go out of its way to not just be another Mario Kart, I think it actually reminds me a bit more of that Cel Damage game from a few years back, with a real emphasis on weapons and destructive driving.
Sessler: I'm not too interested in Party Karts but I did love the F-Zero footage we got to see, a real hardcore racing game with some wicked fast driving and insane tracks.
Crosley: I'm having trouble deciding which game is a better showcase for the Sapphire, F-Zero or Gran Turismo 4.
Maritzen: Gran Turismo pushes the system a lot more, but F-Zero moves so fast and has a lot of really cool environments. It's hard to say which game I was more impressed with but I'm just glad that finally, FINALLY we're getting another Gran Turismo game!
Webb: No doubt, it sells like hotcakes.
Sessler: Yeah, still one year away though.
Crosley: In the meantime, challenge you guys to another game of Sega Rally?
Maritzen: Oh, it's on!
-from G4's E3 2008 coverage on May 30, 2008
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Game Critics Awards E3 2008
Best Of Show: Gran Turismo 4
Best Original Game: Selene
Best Console Game: Gran Turismo 4
Best PC Game: Empire: Total War
Best Handheld Game: Justicar
Best Peripheral/Hardware: Innervision
Best Action Game: Predator
Best Action/Adventure Game: Commander Keen: Billy's Brave Oddysey
Best Role Playing Game: Chrono Break
Best Racing Game: Gran Turismo 4
Best Sports Game: Total Tournament Tennis
Best Fighting Game: Killer Instinct 4
Best Shooter: Cold War: Enlisted Man
Best Party Game: Party Karts
Best Online Multiplayer: Champions
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E3 2008 was the first E3 since the last of the seventh generation consoles, the Nintendo Sapphire, was launched. While a few intriguing new peripherals were on display, including the new band setup for Guitar Hero and Innervision, a sort of early VR system for PC games that allowed players to experience augmented reality for compatible games, E3 2008 was more about the software than the hardware, and all the big companies had plenty on display.
Nintendo was eager to flex the Sapphire's muscle with the latest installments of some of their biggest franchises, and did just that, with beautiful looking games like Gran Turismo 4, Killer Instinct 4, and The Legend Of Zelda: Spirit Of The Woods. Most of Nintendo's announced games looked great, but most of them also had a big problem: they weren't coming out until at least 2009. Nintendo's 2008 lineup looked a bit spartan by comparison, and though games like Big Bad Hero 2, Chrono Break, and a brand new F-Zero were impressive and won some awards, they didn't awe the crowd like previous years' Nintendo lineups did. Still, E3 2008 proved that the Sapphire had a very bright future, and that early adopters had made a sound investment.
More impressive, at least for 2008, was Apple's upcoming lineup of games, including Commander Keen: Billy's Brave Odyssey. In a year that mostly showed off mature, hardcore games, Billy's Brave Odyssey was a beautiful adventure game that the whole family could play together, and proved to be one of the most impressive games of the show, with a range of diverse environments, throwbacks to classic Sega titles, and Reynard, perhaps the most popular new character of 2008. The Apple iTwin was the best selling console of the seventh generation as of the spring of 2008, and though it was still early in the race, the impressive lineup of games coming out of Apple proved that the iTwin might just have what it took to stay ahead of Nintendo and beat them in a console generation for the first time in a quarter of a century. The iTwin even showed it was still a great console for older gamers with announcements that included a terrifying new Three Mile Island game and the sexy hack and slasher Bayonetta. Apple's presentation also focused on the handheld side of things, and though the iPod Play had a few impressive games announced, it had become clear that the iPhone was Apple's handheld future, with more than a dozen new games announced for the device, including many based on Sega's classic properties. Steve Jobs excitedly tried to convince gamers that they should run out and buy a $600 phone, and as difficult as that pitch was, the buzz in the assembled crowd suggested that he may have succeeded.
Meanwhile, if any of the three major companies needed to have a big show, it was Microsoft, and they revealed one of the most impressive lineups in E3 history. Without a handheld, Microsoft's focus was entirely on the Xbox 2, and even though The Covenant wasn't even mentioned during the presentation (probably a smart thing, considering that the bad taste still lingering in the mouths of many from The Covenant 3 was probably still there), Microsoft had plenty of games on display from most of its exclusive franchises, including Cyberwar, Deep Black, The Transporter, For God And Country, and most notably, Techno Angel, which closed out the presentation with what was largely agreed to be one of the best video game trailers ever shown at an E3. The Xbox 2's future is looking bright with all the games due to come out over the next 18 months, though it has yet to be seen whether those games will translate into sales for Microsoft's beleaguered box.
Most of the Best of Show awards went to either Gran Turismo 4 or Techno Angel: Immortal, though SimSociety likely would've swept the show had it been eligible (having won most of the major awards already in 2007). EA's massive SimSociety booth was probably the most crowded area of E3, with reporters waiting for hours to play it, and even some VIP celebrities having trouble getting a chance to play. While SimSociety looks like the front runner for 2008's Game of the Year, 2009's award looks wide open, and at E3 2008, we saw some of the big contenders flex their muscles for the first time. Will it be Killer Instinct 4? Gran Turismo 4? Techno Angel: Immortal? Predator? Bayonetta? Final Fantasy XII? Thrillseekers 2? Nemo Propheta? Or will a dark horse emerge that we haven't even seen before? While the console wars will no doubt rage on next year as they always have, it looks like we're getting ready to close out the decade with some of the best games we've ever seen.
-from IGN's summary of E3 2008
Don Mattrick was once again heading up the Microsoft keynote address, and after a very quick intro speech, he launched right into a new trailer for Michael Bay's upcoming stealth shooter Gray Zone. The game looks much more polished than it did last year, and seems to take place mostly in a Middle Eastern city, with some levels taking place in the desert and one taking place at a massive oil refinery. The explosive trailer concluded with the reveal of a release date for the game: November 18, 2008, several months earlier than expected. The crowd cheered wildly at this, and after the trailer, Michael Bay once again took the stage to show off the game. The entire Gray Zone presentation lasted about 15 minutes, with about half of it focused on the game's multiplayer mode. The multiplayer mode showed mostly deathmatch gameplay, but has some intriguing twists, with cooperative stealth playing a major role. Though Gray Zone is ostensibly a stealth game, it looks like there will be plenty of opportunities for massive firefighters and big flashy set pieces, and Bay is clearly bringing the sensibilities of his big budget action movies to the Xbox 2 with this game. It's the first game to get this kind of Hollywood hype since Manticore, which was somewhat of a disappointment, but Gray Zone looks like the real deal, with a lot more action and a better shooting system than The Covenant 3, better graphics, and more addictive multiplayer. Gray Zone could revivify the third person action shooter on the Xbox 2 if Bay is able to pull it off, and with every big moment in the presentation, the crowd seemed to be quite into it, cheering every explosion and every new reveal of a cool gameplay system. The controls are incredibly intuitive, and Bay says that they will adjust based on a player's preferred style, so if a player isn't quite so good at mechanically aiming, the system will compensate, adjusting the aiming difficulty but subtly reducing other stats to maintain fairness and balance. This system only applies to single player mode, so in multiplayer, you'll still need to be good at aiming. After the Gray Zone presentation that concluded with one more quick trailer and a plot twist reveal that one of the three main characters is a mole working for a terrorist, Bay left the stage, and Mattrick began discussing a few other games, including the new Transporter title (which features Zhang Ziyi's character Lai as a playable character and adds a new multiplayer mode in which players can build their reputation as a transporter just like Frank Martin). After that, we saw some footage from Deep Black 4, the popular FPS franchise's first Xbox 2 outing. The game features improved shooting and a new “alliance” mode, in which players can form a battlefield truce with certain enemies in exchange for resources or information. The Xbox 2's HD graphics look like a major boon for Deep Black 4, making everything look really slick and lifelike, and the cutscene animation is top notch, rivaling anything else the Xbox 2 has to offer. Up next, more footage from The Pact 2, the Xbox-exclusive sequel to 2005's FPS. While The Pact was a critical and commercial disappointment, it sold well enough to justify a sequel, which is co-published by EA and Microsoft and exclusive to the Xbox 2. We've been hearing a bit about the game over the past year, and the EA presentation, which was about a minute, showed off a bit more gameplay and storyline information. The storyline has nothing to do with the previous game but retains the weapon system and also the previous game's level of mission discretion. It looks great, but here's hoping it's better than the first, which was a fairly bad game. We then saw a brief release date announcement trailer for Beneath A Steel Sky, a remake of the classic 1994 point and click title, fully revamped for 3-D. It's a digital download exclusive and is one of the more hyped games for the Microsoft Store's digital marketplace, taking all the familiar story beats of the original game and adapting them into a fully fleshed out, HD adventure. It'll be out in July.
Next up, a brief three minute featurette for Psygnosis' brand new Wipeout game, Wipeout: Run And Gun. Combining futuristic racing elements with vehicular combat, this game looks incredible and will definitely rival F-Zero on the Sapphire as the year's best futuristic racing title. While a bit slower than F-Zero, the new weapons and customizable vehicles add an adventurous element that Nintendo's more straightforward racing game lacks, while distinguishing itself from other titles in its genre. We can look forward to playing the next Wipeout game in the fall. Then, we got a preview of one of the Xbox 2's big games of the show: Predator, based on the classic films and an offshoot of the current Alien game series. Developed exclusively for the Xbox 2, this game features dual storylines: in one, you play as the leader of a squad of humans stranded and trying to survive while the Predator hunts them down. In the other, you play as the titular Predator himself, hunting down a human while also experiencing some of the Predators' elite training rituals. This game is structured like a horror title despite ostensibly being a third person shooter, and looks VERY similar to Metal Gear Solid II: Children Of The Patriots, particularly the Naked Snake flashback segments. Stealth is a major part of the game, and all but one mission is said to take place out in the wilderness, with camoflage being a major factor. Online multiplayer has also been promised, allowing players to be either the humans or a Predator, with a variety of modes including Human vs. Predator mode and a Predator deathmatch mode in which 16 Predators hunt each other down until none remains. This could be one of the best games of 2009, and the crowd was buzzing the entire time it was being shown. Following this, we got a quick look at Spawn: Bloodlust, also coming next year. It's a hack and slash featuring Tod McFarlane's classic comic book antihero, and looks really great with the HD power of the Xbox 2 behind it. The next game we got a look at was For God And Country: Confessed, the sequel to 2005's massive hit FPS title. The game's graphics still have a black and white, faded look to them, but with incredible detail, very cinematic and movielike. John Hagen, the protagonist from the original game, returns and has most of his old tricks and plenty of new ones, and the presentation for this game ended with a one minute trailer of Hagen confessing his sins to a priest, while interspersed cutscenes show Hagen torturing more bad guys and telling the priest that he has no choice but to kill again. It was a dark, gritty, and impressive trailer, and if the previous game is any indication, Confessed will prove to be another major 2009 hit for the Xbox. After the Confessed preview, we were shown a very brief teaser trailer for a game coming in 2010: a platformer starring a fat mouse character with big ears who steals cheese from a band of strange looking aliens. The new game is called Say Cheese!, and it's being pushed as the return of family style platformers to the Xbox. The teaser was quite amusing, but unfortunately, no playable footage of the game was available at the show. Then, we got a presentation a lot of people have been waiting for, a look at Cyberwar 3. Don Mattrick invited Psygnosis' development team up to the stage, and the Cyberwar 3 presentation was mostly five minutes of a thrilling multiplayer deathmatch showing off a lot of the new arenas and weapons, while also showing how much the game's graphics have improved since the original two titles. We've already learned about the campaign's plot from magazine articles and previews, so this presentation was all about the multiplayer action, and there was plenty to go around. As the Xbox 2's pre-eminent FPS title of this year, a lot is being expected of Cyberwar 3, and Microsoft will be counting on the game to deliver if the Xbox 2 is to catch up with the iTwin and maintain its lead over the Sapphire.
The next few trailers were for multiplayer titles, and were shown in fairly rapid-fire fashion. We got more footage from Encounter: Time Wars, which was covered extensively in EA's keynote already. Next up was THQ's Rise A Knight III, an RPG coming to all three current gen consoles and the PC. The world looks huge and the graphics look incredible, and Vermillion Software seems to be going for a more realistic game with this one, as opposed to some of the more fantastical elements seen in series like Elder Scrolls. Rise A Knight III is coming in August, and is one of the more anticipated games of the year. Then, we saw some killer footage from Dead Or Alive, and it looks like the series is headed back to its “sexy” roots, at least from the looks of this trailer footage, with plenty of scantily clad female fighters duking it out in beautiful HD. Next was Activision's Prince Of Persia 3. The company already showed off plenty from this game in their keynote, so most of the footage we've already seen, but we did get to see the Prince solving a puzzle with telekinesis, and Shana running someone through with a sword, which are original to this trailer. Prince Of Persia 3 is coming in December, just in time for Christmas. The last game to be shown in this rapid-fire trailer was Fallout: The Boneyard, and we got to see a neat segment where a demented game show host (voiced by former Family Feud host Ray Combs to hilarious effect) is forcing the protagonist through some insane challenges to save some villagers being held hostage. This segment was followed up by another teaser for what looks to be a 2010 or 2011 release, showing a tall man in a trenchcoat and sunglasses wielding a shotgun and walking through a crime infested city. He walked right into a building full of criminals, walked right up to a man who appeared to be the boss of those criminals, and shot him in the head while surrounded by dozens of that man's subordinates. Then, he walked out of the building, his facial expression daring anyone to try and stop him. We got some very brief gameplay footage of the man using his shotgun and racking up combos, then kicking an enemy down and shotgunning him in the face. The game itself is called Shotty, and the trailer got a cautiously enthusiastic reaction.
Don Mattrick: As you can see from today's amazing presentations, the Xbox 2 remains the number one destination for the biggest exclusives, and the place to play the best games from today's best software publishers. We hope you've enjoyed the show, and we'd like to show you one last thing before we our presentation today.
*The screen fades to black, then opens on a deserted landscape with scrap metal strewn all about. A male voice, full of regret, can be heard speaking.*
Voice: She never came back.
*Sad piano music plays as a woman in an exoskeleton battles against a horde of enemies, showing fierce determination. It's Adriana in the Omniscient, and she's getting numerous System Criticals as she screams in determination.*
Voice: They never found it... the Omniscient. So... there's hope.
*A younger man approaches the speaker, who turns out to be Samuel in military decoration. The man places his hand on Samuel's shoulder, looking sad.*
Younger Man: You know she's gone. She would have come back to you.
Samuel: Yeah... but... she would have kept hoping.
*The sad music continues as we see what's become of the world over the last ten years. War, destruction, rioting, hunger... nuclear fire.*
Samuel: Without Adriana, the world... just fell apart. Zehler tried her best to keep the peace, but...
*A news report shows Zehler speaking at a podium, when suddenly, a sniper's bullet pierces her skull. Secret Service agents rush the stage, only for an explosion to overtake the screen, and then... static.*
*Troops ride out in exoskeletons much like the Omniscient to do battle with a massive invasion of heavy artillery. Explosions rock both sides of the conflict.*
Samuel: We are doing the best we can, Adriana... I promise you.
*Samuel, in a command center, looks stone faced as he contemplates some kind of major military decision. We can see a tear running down his face. Taped to the corner of one of the screens nearby is a small picture of him and Adriana, looking happy together.*
*The music stops. On a deserted battlefield, a young girl, about 11 years old, with short black hair and light brown skin, finds something. It's the headpiece of the Omniscient. She looks and finds some more scrap parts.*
Girl: What's this...?
*She picks up the headpiece. It doesn't fit her perfectly, but she looks at it longingly, and at some of the other scrapped parts.*
Girl: I can make this work...
*We see the girl in some kind of shoddy looking basement, doing all sorts of work and repairs on the parts. She constructs an exoskeleton for herself, with a helmet, a visor, attachments for her chest, arms, and legs, and a couple of multipurpose guns. She does some exercise moves and her body seems to move in superhuman fashion.*
Girl: Whoa...!
*The girl does a few more action moves, even trying out the guns outside on some makeshift targets. We see her in the basement again, and her father calls to her frantically.*
Girl's Father: Sabine, outside, hurry! They are coming!
*The girl looks up with a frightened expression. The village is being attacked by raiders, wielding exoskeletons of their own. Sabine rushes out of the house with her family, but sees that the village is already under siege. She breaks away from her father and runs back toward the house.
Girl's Father: What the hell are you doing?
*The next scene shows the girl in her exoskeleton jumping hundreds of feet into the air, firing missiles down at some hostile soldiers. They fire back at her and she rolls out of the way in midair, landing behind them and sweeping them to the side with her arm before she fires a machine gun at another.*
Sabine: *she lands in the middle of a crowd of hostiles, looking around with a determined expression on her face* I won't let you hurt the people I love any more!
*A rapid-fire cutscene montage showing various scenes from the game, including action scenes featuring Sabine, more political scenes, Samuel angsting but also at times fighting, and the world in pure chaos are shown. Then, we see Sabine sitting in a jail cell, looking pissed off. A man approaches the door and opens it.*
Samuel: Do you know what we called the first one...?
Sabine: *glares up at him, not saying a word*
Samuel: Descending from the skies, a miracle of technology to save the people from above...
Sabine: Just tell me when I get my suit back. It's mine.
Samuel: ...an angel.
Sabine: *flips him the bird* Do I look like an angel to you?
TECHNO ANGEL: IMMORTAL
2009
*As the crowd cheers, Mattrick begins to speak.*
Mattrick: We have a fully playable Techno Angel: Immortal build at the Microsoft booth all week, so you can experience the incredible next chapter of the Techno Angel saga for yourself! Thank you and enjoy the rest of E3!
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Activision Keynote Summary
Activision spent about half of their keynote hyping the next Call Of Duty game, Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. It picks up where the previous game left off, with a full blown war between India and Pakistan and various countries taking sides, including the United States, which is running covert missions for India and hoping to end the war quickly. The game will combine fierce military action with intense political intrigue, but of course the multiplayer looks to be at the center of the show. In addition to appearing on the current gen consoles, it'll also show up on the Nintendo Wave and the two handhelds in a somewhat reduced format. Also on Activision's schedule is Guitar Hero: Meet The Band, which we got to see some special guests play on stage. As the name of the game implies, it will involve not just the guitar, but a microphone, bass, and drums, allowing four people to play together at once. With 90 songs at launch and DLC promised every week for the next six months after the game's release, players will have plenty of songs to jam out to. We also saw footage from Guitar Hero: Family Edition, which will be coming later in the summer and will feature family friendly songs that will be compatible with the Meet The Band instruments once those are released. In addition to its 2008 slate of games, Activision has plenty on tap for 2009, including a new G.I. Joe game, a new heist game called The Corporate Job (the latest in the Casino Job series), and most notably, Thrillseekers 2, a sequel to 2004's female-driven extreme sports game. While we saw only a bit of gameplay footage (which introduces a newly revamped control scheme very reminiscent of the game Skate), which includes 14 different extreme sports including four never before seen in the series, we also learned some details about the game's plot: it'll take place in Japan and feature a worldwide competition betweeen the Thrillseekers, representing the United States, and 19 other nations. Activision teased that over 150 different characters (!!!!!) would be fully playable in the game's freeplay mode, and teased a seventh girl being added to the Thrillseekers' main squad. While the game isn't due until next summer, we're sure to get plenty more details before next year's E3.
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Ubisoft Keynote Summary
Ubisoft... actually didn't have too much to show this time around. Beyond Good And Evil 3, which was expected to at least be teased at this year's show, was a complete no-show, leading to rumors that the game might not be released until 2010. However, we did get some other fun games shown off, including a Watchmen game to tie in with next year's movie, and more footage from Gestation, an exciting new horror/shooter IP about soldiers battling hatchling aliens amidst a destroyed city. Gestation, which has been in development since 2005, is one of the more hyped games of the latter part of the year and could give the upcoming Call Of Duty a run for its money. Ubisoft also teased Assassin's Creed II, due to be released late next year, and announced a portable spinoff of the series for the Supernova and iPod Play. Speaking of portable games, we also got a new iPhone Rayman announcement and the announcement of a The Darkest Night port to the Supernova, just in time for the game's 10th anniversary. No news about a new Darkest console game, but we're keeping our fingers crossed. There also wasn't any news about a new Blackheart game, though Villainous has just been released and so it's likely that we won't see a new game in the series until 2010. All in all, Ubisoft's keynote was a bit underwhelming, but with so many major IPs under its belt, we know that the company is likely to come back stronger than ever in the near future.
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We finally have a release date for SimSociety, Will Wright's incredible new simulation game that's generated more hype than any PC game in recent memory. October 7, 2008 will see the game launch on PC and Macintosh, and EA's booth at E3 was crowded with people gathered to play the latest build of the game, which Wright claims is 95% complete. What we saw of the game when we got our opportunity to play was incredible: a fully interactive cityscape populated with Sims whose actions could be directed but who also had minds of their own and would react realistically to the rules and events that we created. SimSociety allows players to create simulated nations across a vast landscape, a landscape big enough for “at least” 20 individual cities. While these cities can't be built in quite the detail of a Sims house or a SimCity town, they can be micromanaged in fairly minute detail, and individual cities will have their own laws and culture. For example, you can have a highly religious society with one rebellious atheistic city sprouting up in it, and you, as “ruler” of your society, can choose how best to handle it: let the city thrive on its own, challenging your rule, or crush it with military force or even natural disasters that can be attributed to divine wrath from the heavens. SimSociety is more than fun enough on its own, and is fully playable offline, capable of keeping a single player entertained for years. However, it's online that the game truly shines, as players can engage in international relations with other players' societies, or even roam another player's city at a person's eye level, participating in activities within that city. A player can choose not to build their own society at all, but simply live in another player's society in a sort of Second Life-lite kind of social networking experience. In fact, Will Wright says that he expects SimSociety to become the next major social network, with players able to interact with one another on an incredibly personal level. It remains to be seen whether the game can live up to the absolutely incredible amount of hype that's being generated toward it, but every time we get another good look at the game, it seems to get better and better.
-from an article on Gamesovermatter.com, posted on May 29, 2008
Adam Sessler: And, I've got to say, two major genres of games this year that are just stealing the show at this year's E3 are PC simulators and racing games. I mean, of course there's SimSociety, which won a slew of awards last year and looks even more amazing this year. We all know that game's going to be awesome, but then there's Empire: Total War, which looks like the best military simulator game I've ever played.
Chloe Maritzen: Yeah, I couldn't get enough of Empire, it plays so realistically and the competitive games can get so fierce, it's truly a battle of wits and not just mechanical skill. You have to think on such an in-depth level, and it takes this series to the next level.
Sessler: And then there's a new one coming either next year or the year after called Nemo Propheta In Patria.
Morgan Webb: That's a real mouthful.
Sessler: It's a weird name for a game, but it's basically a religion simulator. You have to take a region and sort of craft up their religious beliefs.
Maritzen: Okay, so first we get to actually play as God in Divine Wrath 4 and now we get to play God in this game? There's a lot of religious games coming out this year!
Webb: Don't forget that Lilith in Final Fantasy XII wants to literally drag God out of heaven and smite him upon the Earth.
Maritzen: I want to play that game so much.
Sessler: This Nemo Propheta game, it was in a fairly early build but it was still a lot of fun, you're crafting this nation based on its religion and then you get to actually see that choice play out in a simulated world, like Civilization in a way. So, for example, if they're worshipping kind of a peaceful god, then they'll be a bunch of hippies, spreading peace and stuff, but if you've got them worshipping the god of war, they'll start going out and conquering people.
Ted Crosley: That does sound like a really amazing game. And yeah, I did notice the rise of some really advanced and deep simulators on PC. It's one of the few kinds of experiences you can't really get on a console. It's not the graphical power of these games, because these games aren't very graphically intensive, but it's the level of detail and the number of inputs that would be so clunky on a game controller, you need that keyboard and that mouse to really have the precision to play these deep simulation games.
Webb: Can I just say that I'm looking forward to playing SimSociety more than any other game maybe ever?
Sessler: I don't think it can live up to the hype. I think it's so hyped right now...
Webb: Don't say that!
Sessler: It's true. Has any game that's been called the greatest game ever before its release ever come out and actually been that?
Maritzen: Super Mario Dimensions.
Crosley: Temple Of Time.
Sessler: Has any game in the last ten years?
Crosley: Necrocracy.
Sessler: Yeah, okay, I see your point. Okay, while we're talking about massively hyped games, let's segue into our next big genre that's getting a lot of love here at E3, and that's racing games. This was maybe the best E3 for racing games ever. Not only Gran Turismo 4 was announced, but also games like Wipeout: Run And Gun, F-Zero...
Maritzen: Can we talk about Party Karts, for just a second? It looks really cute and really fun, and I love all the different kinds of weapons and how they went completely over the top with them.
Webb: In the absence of a Mario Kart game being announced, I do think Party Karts is going to get a lot of traction.
Crosley: And the game really does go out of its way to not just be another Mario Kart, I think it actually reminds me a bit more of that Cel Damage game from a few years back, with a real emphasis on weapons and destructive driving.
Sessler: I'm not too interested in Party Karts but I did love the F-Zero footage we got to see, a real hardcore racing game with some wicked fast driving and insane tracks.
Crosley: I'm having trouble deciding which game is a better showcase for the Sapphire, F-Zero or Gran Turismo 4.
Maritzen: Gran Turismo pushes the system a lot more, but F-Zero moves so fast and has a lot of really cool environments. It's hard to say which game I was more impressed with but I'm just glad that finally, FINALLY we're getting another Gran Turismo game!
Webb: No doubt, it sells like hotcakes.
Sessler: Yeah, still one year away though.
Crosley: In the meantime, challenge you guys to another game of Sega Rally?
Maritzen: Oh, it's on!
-from G4's E3 2008 coverage on May 30, 2008
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Game Critics Awards E3 2008
Best Of Show: Gran Turismo 4
Best Original Game: Selene
Best Console Game: Gran Turismo 4
Best PC Game: Empire: Total War
Best Handheld Game: Justicar
Best Peripheral/Hardware: Innervision
Best Action Game: Predator
Best Action/Adventure Game: Commander Keen: Billy's Brave Oddysey
Best Role Playing Game: Chrono Break
Best Racing Game: Gran Turismo 4
Best Sports Game: Total Tournament Tennis
Best Fighting Game: Killer Instinct 4
Best Shooter: Cold War: Enlisted Man
Best Party Game: Party Karts
Best Online Multiplayer: Champions
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E3 2008 was the first E3 since the last of the seventh generation consoles, the Nintendo Sapphire, was launched. While a few intriguing new peripherals were on display, including the new band setup for Guitar Hero and Innervision, a sort of early VR system for PC games that allowed players to experience augmented reality for compatible games, E3 2008 was more about the software than the hardware, and all the big companies had plenty on display.
Nintendo was eager to flex the Sapphire's muscle with the latest installments of some of their biggest franchises, and did just that, with beautiful looking games like Gran Turismo 4, Killer Instinct 4, and The Legend Of Zelda: Spirit Of The Woods. Most of Nintendo's announced games looked great, but most of them also had a big problem: they weren't coming out until at least 2009. Nintendo's 2008 lineup looked a bit spartan by comparison, and though games like Big Bad Hero 2, Chrono Break, and a brand new F-Zero were impressive and won some awards, they didn't awe the crowd like previous years' Nintendo lineups did. Still, E3 2008 proved that the Sapphire had a very bright future, and that early adopters had made a sound investment.
More impressive, at least for 2008, was Apple's upcoming lineup of games, including Commander Keen: Billy's Brave Odyssey. In a year that mostly showed off mature, hardcore games, Billy's Brave Odyssey was a beautiful adventure game that the whole family could play together, and proved to be one of the most impressive games of the show, with a range of diverse environments, throwbacks to classic Sega titles, and Reynard, perhaps the most popular new character of 2008. The Apple iTwin was the best selling console of the seventh generation as of the spring of 2008, and though it was still early in the race, the impressive lineup of games coming out of Apple proved that the iTwin might just have what it took to stay ahead of Nintendo and beat them in a console generation for the first time in a quarter of a century. The iTwin even showed it was still a great console for older gamers with announcements that included a terrifying new Three Mile Island game and the sexy hack and slasher Bayonetta. Apple's presentation also focused on the handheld side of things, and though the iPod Play had a few impressive games announced, it had become clear that the iPhone was Apple's handheld future, with more than a dozen new games announced for the device, including many based on Sega's classic properties. Steve Jobs excitedly tried to convince gamers that they should run out and buy a $600 phone, and as difficult as that pitch was, the buzz in the assembled crowd suggested that he may have succeeded.
Meanwhile, if any of the three major companies needed to have a big show, it was Microsoft, and they revealed one of the most impressive lineups in E3 history. Without a handheld, Microsoft's focus was entirely on the Xbox 2, and even though The Covenant wasn't even mentioned during the presentation (probably a smart thing, considering that the bad taste still lingering in the mouths of many from The Covenant 3 was probably still there), Microsoft had plenty of games on display from most of its exclusive franchises, including Cyberwar, Deep Black, The Transporter, For God And Country, and most notably, Techno Angel, which closed out the presentation with what was largely agreed to be one of the best video game trailers ever shown at an E3. The Xbox 2's future is looking bright with all the games due to come out over the next 18 months, though it has yet to be seen whether those games will translate into sales for Microsoft's beleaguered box.
Most of the Best of Show awards went to either Gran Turismo 4 or Techno Angel: Immortal, though SimSociety likely would've swept the show had it been eligible (having won most of the major awards already in 2007). EA's massive SimSociety booth was probably the most crowded area of E3, with reporters waiting for hours to play it, and even some VIP celebrities having trouble getting a chance to play. While SimSociety looks like the front runner for 2008's Game of the Year, 2009's award looks wide open, and at E3 2008, we saw some of the big contenders flex their muscles for the first time. Will it be Killer Instinct 4? Gran Turismo 4? Techno Angel: Immortal? Predator? Bayonetta? Final Fantasy XII? Thrillseekers 2? Nemo Propheta? Or will a dark horse emerge that we haven't even seen before? While the console wars will no doubt rage on next year as they always have, it looks like we're getting ready to close out the decade with some of the best games we've ever seen.
-from IGN's summary of E3 2008
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