Google Keynote – E3 2012
Google's E3 2012 keynote began with Larry Page from Google taking the stage, along with one of the top executives from Samsung. Page took the podium and thanked everyone for coming to the show, then began talking about the Google Nexus. He showed off the new console, re-iterating some information that we already knew from the show earlier this year, which revealed the console's form factor. It's a smooth white box roughly the shape of a square, a bit longer than it is wide. It's a smaller console than the Sapphire and the Xbox 2, but is much more powerful than either of them, capable of playing most of its games in full 1080p, at 60 FPS. It will retail for $299, and will come packaged with an electronic device that looks much like the average smartphone. Called the Nexus Companion, it functions as the Nexus' controller and is essentially an Android device without phone capabilities, not quite as powerful as the Galaxy S3 but fairly powerful and capable of playing nearly every current Android game. The Companion will function as a second screen for most Nexus games, able to load into a special app that will allow it to sync with the Nexus itself. The Nexus will also come packaged with a grip for the Companion called the Nexus Grip that will essentially convert the Companion into a typical controller, complete with a D-pad, two clickable analog sticks, four face buttons, and four shoulder buttons. The Companion isn't the only device that can function as a Nexus controller... most current Android devices can with a special app that will become available on launch day. The Nexus Companion can be used to remote play Nexus games with a wi-fi or cellular connection, allowing any Nexus game to be played anywhere (as long as your internet signal is strong enough). The Nexus will also be capable of downloading and playing nearly all current Android games, since it's essentially using a proprietary version of Android. Page and the Samsung rep spent a few minutes showing off the console and its capabilities, and from what we can tell, the Nexus is essentially a fusion of a home gaming console with the versatility and convenience of the Android operating system. Finally, Page gave the release date for the Nexus: October 26, 2012, when it will be released with more than a dozen launch games, including
The Covenant 5, the announcement of which sent attendees into a loud frenzy of cheering. After the announcement of
The Covenant 5, Page then took the opportunity to introduce the president of Google's new gaming division, Eric Bright. Bright then took the stage, and looked quite excited (and a bit nervous) to be there. He's extremely young, the youngest person ever to head a major gaming division, but despite the nervousness he definitely seemed to be quite into the atmosphere of the presentation and quickly segued into a discussion of the Nexus' future. He said that while the Nexus itself is exciting new technology, even the best console is nothing without games. He then introduced a video to reveal the Nexus' upcoming lineup.
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(Authors' Note: This trailer uses the song "Radioactive" by Imagine Dragons, here's the song itself if you want to listen to it while reading:
)
Whoa, oh, oh
Whoa, oh, oh
Whoa, oh, oh
Whoaaaaa....
*As the first chords of Imagine Dragons' “Radioactive” begins to play, we see footage of scenes from several Nexus games, most of them large or open world type games, showing off panoramas of various landscapes. The trailer begins with an alien world from
The Covenant 5, followed by a panoroma of New York City in
Fallout 3, followed by scenes from
Valdoza, followed by an open world panorama of
Final Fantasy XIII, and a quick look at Paris in
Miraculous Ladybug as the titular heroine perches on the Eiffel Tower. We then see a scene of soldiers entering a house in
Call Of Duty: Nightfall, followed by a quick scene of Snake sneaking around in
Metal Gear Solid III: Heavens Fall.*
I'm waking up to ash and dust
*Another scene from
The Covenant 5, showing Master Chief stalking slowly. We then see a quick action scene from
Dead City Beat 2.*
I wipe my brow and I sweat my rust
*Batman is shown looking weary as he checks his computers in
Batman: Dark Legend. Then another scene of Master Chief polishing his gun in
The Covenant 5.*
I'm breathing in the chemicals
*A scene of zombies charging in
Zombi is shown, followed by a scene of chemical warfare from
Call Of Duty: Coalition. Then, we see Kirsten coming up from a hole in an icy lake in
Thrillseekers: Winter Challenge 2, gasping for breath.*
I'm breaking in, shaping up, then checking out on the prison bus
*A few scenes of combat from
Deus Ex: Oblivion are shown, then a scene of computer hacking from
Shadowrun Archaica, followed by a scene of prisoners being marched into a camp from the same game.*
This is it, the apocalypse
*Another
Shadowrun Archaica scene, followed by a scene of ghouls charging the player in
Fallout 3.*
Whoa
*Netizen X/Lucy is shown looking up at a computer monitor in
Cyberwar 4.*
I'm waking up, I feel it in my bones
*A scene of combat from
Sindolin, followed by a scene of cars racing in
Forza Horizon.*
Enough to make my systems blow
*A machine gun is shown firing in
The Covenant 5, followed by a soldier diving for cover in
Call Of Duty: Coalition.*
Welcome to the new age, to the new age
*A scene of Skell combat from
Final Fantasy XIII is shown, conclusively confirming the Nexus port of said game (the panorama didn't show enough of the game to identify it before).*
Welcome to the new age, to the new age
*A scene of drones fighting police in
Cyberwar 4 is shown, followed by a quick cutscene from
Wakfu and a scene of combat from
Road To Ode depicting a crossbow being used on some orcs.*
Whoa, oh, oh, oh, oh, whoa, oh, oh, oh, I'm radioactive, radioactive
Whoa, oh, oh, oh, oh, whoa, oh, oh, oh, I'm radioactive, radioactive
*A rapidfire montage of scenes from
Fallout 3,
Valdoza,
Call Of Duty: Nightfall,
Lethalball, and
Thrillseekers: Winter Challenge 2 are shown, mostly focusing on action.*
I raise my flags, don my clothes
It's a revolution, I suppose
*A scene of Netizen X gearing up in
Cyberwar 4 is shown
, along with her ducking under the bed as agents come to her house.*
We'll paint it red to fit right in
Whoa
*Marinette's transformation sequence into Ladybug from
Miraculous Ladybug is shown with much more detail and flair than the OTL television show.*
I'm breaking in, shaping up, then checking out on the prison bus
*Scenes from the upcoming
Madden and
NBA Elite games are shown before a quick scene from
Fated To Awaken is shown, depicting Fate gathering six different elements around himself.*
This is it, the apocalypse
Whoa
*Townspeople run in panic as a gate to Hell opens up in
Diablo III.*
I'm waking up, I feel it in my bones
*A beautiful panoramic flight scene is shown in a
Microsoft Flight Simulator-esque game called
Nexus Flight.*
Enough to make my systems blow
*A bomb bird is launched at a massive pig fort in
Angry Birds World, blowing it to smithereens.*
Welcome to the new age, to the new age
*A sneaking scene from
Assassin's Creed III is shown, followed by a few seconds of cutscene from the same game.*
Welcome to the new age, to the new age
*Racing scenes from
Forza Horizon and
International Rally are shown that demonstrate the graphical power of the new system.*
Whoa, oh, oh, oh, oh, whoa, oh, oh, oh, I'm radioactive, radioactive
Whoa, oh, oh, oh, oh, whoa, oh, oh, oh, I'm radioactive, radioactive
*A quick snippet of figure skating from
Thrillseekers: Winter Challenge 2 is shown, followed by a battle scene from
Wakfu, showing a
Valkyria Chronicles-esque combat system fusing tactical RPG gameplay with MMO-style combat. Then a scene from a massive epic battle is shown, teasing a
Song Of Ice And Fire game with Daenerys showing up at the end.*
All systems go, the sun hasn't died
*Another
Cyberwar 4 scene is shown, depicting online multiplayer, followed by an online battle from
Call Of Duty: Coalition and a quick scene from
The Covenant 5.*
Deep in my bones, straight from inside
*A scene from an unannounced
Witcher game is teased, with Geralt looking up at the camera.*
I'm waking up, I feel it in my bones
*A cutscene is shown of Lucy being grabbed from behind by a mysterious person in
Cyberwar 4.*
Enough to make my systems blow
*A rapid-fire combat montage is shown from
Batman: Dark Legend,
Miraculous Ladybug, and
Assassin's Creed III.*
Welcome to the new age, to the new age
*A montage of games utilizing the Nexus' controller screen is shown.*
Welcome to the new age, to the new age
*A tense, terrifying combat scene from
Zombi is shown, showing off both the game and the Nexus' next-gen graphics, along with the second screen functionality.*
Whoa, oh, oh, oh, oh, whoa, oh, oh, oh, I'm radioactive, radioactive
Whoa, oh, oh, oh, oh, whoa, oh, oh, oh, I'm radioactive, radioactive
*One more quick montage of games, including
Cyberwar 4,
Nexus Flight,
Wakfu, and another shooter game called
The Redacted is shown, followed by one final teaser scene from
The Covenant 5 of Master Chief blowing some enemies away and ducking an explosion, finishing with the explosion reflected in his helmet. The song ends, and the crowd applauds loudly.*
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After the video ended and the applause died down, Bright told the crowd that the games featured in the video represent only a small fraction of the Nexus' gaming library, which will feature not just new games from the current generation, but downloadable classics as well, from both PC and console, from a wide variety of third party companies. Bright confirmed that
Final Fantasy XIII will be coming to the Google Nexus, the first ever
Final Fantasy game to be released on a non-Nintendo console at launch. He also confirmed that Rockstar's upcoming
Grand Theft Auto III would be coming to the Nexus, and that previous games from both series would be appearing on the Nexus sometime after launch as well. Then, he segued into a segment introducing
The Covenant 5, which will be releasing with the Nexus at launch.
The Covenant 5 takes place sometime between the events of the third and fourth games in the series, which explains why the Covenant are still around (and in fact, are deadlier than ever in this game). Master Chief will be the only playable character, and the game seems to feature a more isolated Master Chief, exploring and battling the Covenant on his own without aid from his commanding army or any allies. The game has more of a focus on tight corridors and exploration, and seems to be almost similar to a
Metroid-style title in terms of the intimacy of its gameplay. The shooting has been revamped somewhat, with players given the opportunity to tap into Master Chief's new abilities to slow down time and even alter the type of projectiles that his guns fire. The Covenant themselves seem to be a rogue offshoot of the main forces, with a more hive-like mentality, and an emphasis on large, intimidating creatures rather than smaller infantry units (though there are still plenty of those as well). The scenes of gameplay shown really show off the Nexus' graphical capabilities, and Master Chief and the worlds he explores have never looked so good. Bright and the game's developers then discussed the revamped multiplayer mode, which would include both competitive deathmatch and survival modes in which players can team up to survive or engage in a sort of PvPvE-type mode in which players try to kill each other while everything else tries to kill them. After a quick cutscene trailer showing off the game's main themes (isolation, desperation), Bright then reiterated that the game would be a major launch exclusive for the Nexus.
The Covenant 5 seems to be on a smaller scale than the previous game of the series, but the graphical and gameplay polish look to make up for that in a lot of ways. Following this reveal, Bright then began talking about Ubisoft and their revolutionary new project. This was the beginning of a
Project Ladybug presentation, and he introduced Michel Ancel and Thomas Astruc on stage to discuss the game further. The two took the stage and announced that
Project Ladybug now had a definitive title:
Miraculous Ladybug, and that the game will be exclusive to the Nexus, something which drew a mix of cheers and shock from the crowd.
Miraculous Ladybug will be an open world superhero game taking place in a fictional version of Paris, and starring a young girl named Marinette, who one day acquires ladybug-themed superpowers after helping an old man. She is tasked with protecting the people of Paris from creatures known as akumas, who grant superpowers of their own to ordinary people and make them do bad things at the behest of a mysterious villain known as Hawkmoth. Ancel then showed off some of the gameplay, which sees Marinette as Ladybug in Paris attempting to stop one of these akumas. The game's combat is surprisingly deep, though it's also quite tame compared to the combat in other games of this nature: no one is seriously hurt, and many of Ladybug's attacks are designed to restrain or obstruct a villain, not to harm them. Despite the “gentle” nature of the game's combat, it still looks intense and will require a good amount of skill and intuition from players. The player actively earns experience points for protecting people from harm, and can protect people in all sorts of stylish and fun ways. Astruc noted that he dislikes the violence in a lot of games and wanted to incentivize actively helping people while also creating a fun combat system, and with the help of some very talented people at Ubisoft, he's been able to do just that. The player will also spend a lot of time as Ladybug's civilian alter ego, Marinette (in fact, Astruc noted that he expects for players to spend about 90 percent of the game as Marinette). Marinette will go around helping people and talking to them, and the game seems to have a LOT of similarities with the
Syrielle series with its split between a social game and an action game. The more Marinette helps people, the more her powers as Ladybug can grow, and it also gives her more social options later on. Ladybug also fights alongside a partner: Cat Noir, the superhero alter ego of Marinette's friend and crush, Adrien. It might even be possible to play as Cat Noir, but for now, Ancel says that Marinette will be the only playable character.
Miraculous Ladybug features a beautiful, stylized 3-D art style that's somewhere between comic-style cel shading and detailed 3-D, and looks gorgeous being played on the Nexus. The game also heavily utilizes the Nexus' second screen, with an interactive minimap and dialogue options that can be cycled through, and unique signals that deliver information to the player.
Miraculous Ladybug looks like a rich and unique experience, combining the epic scale of the
Beyond Good And Evil series with the charm and intimate social experience of a game like
Syrielle. It's still a ways away from being completed, and will launch on the Nexus in 2013.
The next game discussed was
Cyberwar 4, and despite the fact that it's not a Nexus exclusive, the Nexus will be the first next generation system to have the game, as it will join
The Covenant 5 as a Nexus launch title. We've already learned a lot about the game, and this presentation focused slightly more on plot than on gameplay. The game's second protagonist was finally revealed, and the rumors are confirmed: Tomas Alvarez will be returning from
Cyberwar 3, having escaped from the chamber he was trapped in at the end of that game, and now joining Lucy Brunstein, AKA Netizen X, in her fight against the Power Corps. While Lucy fights with her hacking skills, Alvarez fights with normal weapons (mostly guns), but can also hack when he needs to. The two both have their own separate missions, but will also be joining forces on certain missions. Social engineering plays a major role in the game, with both Lucy and Tomas seeking to manipulate their enemies' minds as much as they seek to physically stop them, and the game will present some RPG like gameplay to go along with all the shooting and hacking, though the game is still an FPS at its core.
Cyberwar 4 is clearly one of the year's most anticipated games, if not the most anticipated, and the Nexus version is likely to be the best version we'll have of the game until the launch of Nintendo and Apple's new systems. While it has yet to be seen if this game and
The Covenant 5 will cannibalize each other's sales, it's likely that a lot of Nexus owners will buy both, and Bright has announced a major deal: if you buy the Nexus,
The Covenant 5, and
Cyberwar 4 together, you'll get a coupon good toward one other Nexus title for the next six months. That's an incredible deal, and the crowd cheered loudly after the deal was announced. The next Nexus exclusive discussed by Bright was
Nexus Flight, a Microsoft Flight Simulator-esque title that allows players to pilot a variety of flying crafts over a huge variety of real world locales. It's even possible to simulate base jumping off of certain buildings and mountains. While
Nexus Flight seems more like a tech demo than anything, it does look like a very fun game, and it'll even allow players using the Nexus Companion to fly over wherever they are in real time, a nice use of the system's GPS features. Bright then introduced some developers from CD Projekt Red to the stage, and they introduced
The Witcher: Shrouded Silence, another Nexus exclusive scheduled for next year. Said to be a “side game” in the ongoing
Witcher series, and not the long anticipated third mainline
Witcher game, it has an emphasis on stealth, with Geralt forced to commit a series of assassinations, and the teaser trailer implies that he may be ordered to assassinate Yennefer. The game looks gorgeous, a beautiful open world title with plenty of different options for stealth, almost like a cross between the
Witcher series and the
Hitman series. The game is still early in development, but what we saw looked quite promising, and we can't wait to play it in 2013. The next game shown off was
Fated To Awaken, the third title in the adventure series previously exclusive to the Xbox line. The presentation started with a quick trailer, and then we got some gameplay snippets, introducing a new battle system for Fate based on elemental powers, and giving him some new companions, while potentially teasing the return of Fate's lost love Karina. Evincar returns as the game's main villain, and Fate seems eager for revenge as Evincar commands the forces of New Sanctia to impose his will throughout the multiverse.
Fated To Awaken looks like a big, beautiful, and epic adventure game, and fans will only have to wait another short year to play it. After this presentation, we got a quick look at some other Nexus titles, including launch titles
Road To Ode and
Lethalball. The former is an RPG/FPS hybrid with arcade-style gameplay that almost reminded us of a next generation
Crossed Swords (hopefully without the blistering difficulty).
Lethalball is an original sports title combining soccer/football-style gameplay with brutal combat, and while the game's concept looks a bit silly, we can't deny that it also looks like a whole lot of fun. After these rapid-fire teasers, Bright announced that one more trailer would be shown. The lights dimmed, and we got our first glimpse at a strange looking new title from Looking Glass, best known for the
Junction Point and
Memory Hole games. This trailer started out with a woman wearing contemporary clothes waking up in a strange, sterilized medical room. She tries to sit up, only to be forced back down by strangely dressed doctors. She escapes them and runs through the ship, seeing and hearing all sorts of terrifying and strange things. The ship itself appears to be from somewhere centuries ahead of our time, but even though everything looked clean and futuristic, the woman is horrified as she is pursued through the ship. She manages to get a phaser weapon off of someone, firing it and killing one of her pursuers, which terrifies her further. She manages to seal herself in a room and opens up a panel to reveal a window. It's revealed that she's on some kind of huge space station, with Earth in the distance, only Earth has been badly damaged, with a massive chunk taken out of the planet. The game's title is revealed as
Futureshock, and the trailer ends with lots of applause from the crowd. Bright tells the crowd to expect more information on this exciting new exclusive IP from Looking Glass Studios in a future presentation, thanks the crowd for coming, and then the keynote ends.
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The Google Nexus made a major impression on us after Google's keynote presentation from a few days before. I finally got the chance to play the system and some of its games on the show floor, and I came away impressed with a few things, and skeptical of a few others. My overall first impression was quite good, but I do think there are some things Google will need to address with their admittedly intriguing new console before it'll be able to stand on equal footing with Nintendo and Apple.
First things first: the Nexus is a legit next generation console. Produced by Samsung, the Nexus is far more powerful than the Nintendo Sapphire, and will likely be able to compete with Nintendo's new console and the Apple Virtua for multiplatform titles. Most games ran quite smoothly in full HD, with 60 FPS the rule of the day for all but the most crowded gameplay segments.
The Covenant 5 looks absolutely awesome, with some of the best shooting animations I've ever seen in a game (PC or console), and gorgeous looking landscapes, with a wide variety of enemies to fight. Individual Covenant soldiers have their own distinct physical and behavioral traits, something no previous
Covenant game was able to boast.
Miraculous Ladybug looks absolutely gorgeous, and could potentially revolutionize our expectations about action games, with a hero who focuses on helping people first and has violence way down on her list of priorities. The Nexus also brought a fresh coat of HD paint to games like
Valdoza and
Fallout 3, which are being ported to it for its launch and both of which look better than they've ever looked before. The Nexus' unique selling point will certainly be its controller, which is essentially any Android device you might already own. The Nexus does come packaged with a fairly powerful Android device of its own, the Nexus Companion, which is about as powerful as an upper middle-range Android device and can play its own unique library of games (which means that not only is Google competing against Nintendo and Apple in the console wars, they've sort of entered the handheld race as well). While it's not REQUIRED that one use the Nexus Grip to play games, you're going to want to use it, since you'll be relying on touch controls otherwise. The Nexus Grip comes packaged with the Nexus as well (I imagine Google will be taking a bath on this thing at $299, but will end up profiting from software and accessory sales), but it's a “basic” model, with the basic buttons and rumble capabilities, but that's about it. If you want something with a bit more heft, or you have a weird shaped phone that you want to use, you'll need to buy another model of Grip, and there will be several available. With the phone inside the Grip, it functions like a regular controller (albeit one with a big honkin' screen in the middle), but still feels a bit awkward to use. It won't interfere with gameplay, but it might take some time to get used to. Regardless, it opens up some interesting second screen possibilities for the Nexus, and several of the games I played, including
The Covenant 5,
Cyberwar 4, and the surprisingly addictive
Lethalball, put that second screen to great use. It can function as a scope in
The Covenant 5 (making the game a sort of FPS/3PS hybrid), a remote control for your drones in
Cyberwar 4 (among many other functions), or a real-time stat program in
Lethalball. It also works in games like
Miraculous Ladybug, where it can be used to read Marinette's social media messages. While not all games will make use of the Nexus' second screen, it seems like most of the best exclusives will, and it might just make gaming on the Nexus one of the most unique experiences around.
I did have a few issues with the Nexus itself, though the nitpicks are rather minor when compared with the system's positives. The Nexus' interface is a bit clunky, as if Google tried to port the Android's functionality to a television screen. It looks somewhat basic and not as smooth as the UI for the Sapphire and iTwin, almost making the Nexus feel rather cheap. The promised remote play capabilities of the Nexus also showed quite a few early hiccups, with lag and freezing even using the strong wi-fi available at E3. Whether it was traffic or early bugs, it's something Google will need to iron out if they're going to use remote play as a selling point. Finally, the Nexus' exclusive lineup itself seems a bit lackluster when compared to Nintendo and Apple's offerings. Many former Xbox exclusives, such as
Cyberwar, will be showing up on Google's competitor consoles, and if Google wants to avoid the same problems with the Nexus that plagued the Xbox 2, they'll need to reel in more big ticket games, perhaps cultivating their own development studio like Apple has done.
Miraculous Ladybug looks great, as does
Futureshock, which was teased at the end of the presentation, but Google will need more than those to take down its rivals. Google needs to forge an identity, and fast, if it wants to avoid throwing good money after bad in the upcoming eighth generation console clash.
-Alex Stansfield, from an article written for
Games Over Matter on June 8, 2012
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The launch of Google's Nexus home console could be a major renaissance for Android game development, which has lagged somewhat behind iOS despite being a more open platform. Google is actively courting Android game developers to develop games that will be exclusive to the company's digital software platforms, and promises digital exclusives for both the Nexus and the Android platform that will create new opportunities for large developers and small studios alike.
Games such as
Alien Creatures, in which players can create their own miniature monsters and then raise them in an interactive adventure on their phones, are being developed as Android exclusives at the behest of Google, which plans to promote the games on its Nexus platform. The most promising titles are those that will have “dual functionality”, playing on both Nexus and Android with different gameplay modes depending on what platform it's played on. That's the story for
Wilderness Survival Simulator, which will include a full open world 3-D adventure experience on the Nexus, while featuring a full-fledged simulation title on the Android in which players can raise up numerous people in a “clan” that can then be sent out into the main game itself. Will Wright has announced that he's looking to revive
Streets Of SimCity in some form, to allow players to build a city on their Android phones and then explore it on the Nexus. The Android game development scene may be the key to helping Google cultivate a lineup of exclusives that can help it compete with its rivals and attract buyers to the Nexus console.
“There's never been a better time to develop for Android,” said Ken Wong, in an interview on the floor of this year's E3. He was showing off his own studio's title on the floor, an adventure game for Android that he says might receive a sequel on the Nexus if sales of the original are good and if the Nexus shows more promise. “With the launch of the Nexus, the first Android-based home gaming console, it's given us a brand new market to push games to, and it's also sparked a lot of creativity amongst my fellow game designers. Before the Nexus was announced, I thought that I'd be focusing most heavily on mobile games, but now, I'm coming up with ideas to bring to console. The Nexus has opened a lot of doors for Android game development, I think they'll lead somewhere special.”
-from an article on Android Central, posted on June 9, 2012
