E3 2011 – Sony Press Conference

We all know that Sony had a lot to make up for this year with the system hack causing outrage to millions around the globe, this major corporation really needed to impress to ensure that they maintain a strong fan base. A lot of people seemed to be questioning how Sony will tackle the issue of the hack in this year’s E3. Will they bring it up right at the start? Will they wait until the end and mention it? Will they ignore it altogether? What they ended up doing was most likely the best way to approach the situation, which was to get it out of the way right at the start. A formal and mature apology was made along with the guarantee that nothing of this sort will happen again. Once that was out of the way it was on with the show, and what a show it was!

Sony opened their show with a fantastic montage of music, game trailers and footage of the Playstation hardware itself. This was a fun and exciting way to start the show with the only problem being that much of the footage was in 3D, so really only those in the room could benefit from that. Of course this opening was very similar to last year’s Sony opening, but when you’re on to a good thing then why change it? Sony opened with only exclusive titles and continued to preview completely exclusive content for at least the first 50 minutes of the show, and then for much of the rest of the time as well. This type of emphasis on exclusives is what I have come to expect from E3 and Sony really didn’t disappoint.

The Uncharted 3: Drakes Deception demo was of very high standard which is of course what we have come to expect from Naughty Dog. The dynamic environment of the cruise ship in the demo was really breathtaking and only heightened my anticipation for the November release. Resistance 3 was next and looking good, followed by some information on the HD release of ICO and Shadow of the Colossus, two games which I am personally greatly looking forward to playing on the PS3. Sony then started really pressing the ‘Move’ for the rest of the show. The NBA 2k12 demonstration was slow and felt awkward as the whole crowd waited for the celebrity sportsman to score a point using the move controller. Medieval Moves: Deadmund's Quest was up next which seemed to be for the younger gamers. The demonstration here wasn’t very impressive, the move functionality seemed a bit shaky and the gameplay itself looked quite slow and not very challenging.

In the same way that Microsoft was really pushing the kinect this year Sony had a real strong emphasis on 3D throughout this show. I have a feeling this is because the 3D capabilities of the PS3 haven’t really been popular so far with most people not owning or being able to afford a 3DTV. They tried to tackle this with an interesting 3DTV bundle which could be good but it still seems pretty expensive for a 24” TV. This was followed by several announcement of exclusive PS3 content for many big games such as Bioshock Infinite and Battlefield 3 which are great selling points for the console, especially with such big titles.

After all of this you could tell that the whole crowd was just building with anticipation for the new Sony NGP. They finally got around to this part of the show and unveiled the stunning new Sony Vita. This really was a highlight for me as the idea of being able to carry around real PS3-style graphics on a hand-held console is thrilling. Also with titles such as an all new Uncharted title, Little Big Planet, Mod Nation Racers and Street Fighter X Tekken it sounds like they are on to a sure fire winner. I also didn’t expect there to be so much connectivity between the PS3 and the Vita which was an exciting announcement.

Overall I was very impressed with Sony this year. The sheer amount of exclusive games and content was even more than I ever expected. My highlights were the new Uncharted 3 footage and demo as well as the Playstation Vita. They could have had less emphasis on the 3D aspect as I really don’t think many people are interested in 3D gaming yet, no matter how hard they push the idea. In the end it was a great conference that went out with style with the addition of a group of traditional drummers on stage to wrap things up. 

E3 2011 – Microsoft Press Conference

My overall feeling from Microsoft’s conference this year was unfortunately resounding disappointment. It did have a few impressive and exciting moments, but the lack of anything unexpected and no real surprises made for quite a dull hour and a half. I was actually getting bored towards the end of this and kept checking the time which is not what I wanted during the most exciting games conferences of the year.

Before I go on about what let me down in Microsoft’s performance this year I’m starting with what impressed me in this year’s offerings. The show opened with two breathtaking and action-packed demos full of previously unseen gameplay. Both Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 and Tomb Raider kicked off the day’s events with a bang that unfortunately turned into a low sizzle by the end. Interestingly enough these two games which appeared to almost be Microsoft’s biggest selling points for the day are both non-exclusives. Anyone with a PS3 or a PC will be able to have a great time with these and since there appears to be no kinect functionality for either of them it’s hard to see why there was such an emphasis on them in a show about the Xbox 360.

The rest of the show, and in fact most of the show was based on the kinect which Microsoft seem to be pushing more than most people expected. It seems like Microsoft are now aiming kinect at families and trying to take over from the Wii as being the next “all ages gaming” console. This basically included a whole new array of kinect games for kids and a sort of ‘kinect sports’ which looked eerily similar to the opposing Wii Sports. Some of the new kid’s games did look great for the younger gamers out there, but the lengthy demonstration with the two children on stage playing Kinect Disneyland was awkward to watch.

Putting aside the array of children and family orientated games, the area in which kinect really shone for me was in Fable: The Journey, Ryse and Kinect Star Wars. These are the types of games I would be expecting from the 360 and also the type where the kinect can really be utilized to its full potential. Fable was especially impressive as the man on stage demonstrated how to cast spells using only your body. Another aspect of kinect that this conference was really pushing was in-game voice recognition. This was demonstrated live through Mass Effect 3 gameplay. While the gameplay itself looked great I can’t see myself ever really taking to this voice recognition. I don’t mind speaking while playing games if I am communicating with other people in multiplayer, but the thought of just sitting alone in my lounge room and talking out-loud to a single player campaign is just too strange for me. Not to mention the fact that in the ME series the voice recognition is used to make decisions, which are actually much faster just to click on rather than read out loud so in the end this feature makes things longer for you.

The voice recognition was impressive during the demo for Tom Clancy’s Future Soldier as it utilized a very intricate gun customization system. Again though I wouldn’t really feel comfortable speaking out loud to a TV on my own, or even with friends around… and I did notice that aiming the gun while using kinect seemed very shaky compared to say a controller or a mouse. Then of course we have the big title exclusives which are Halo 4 and Gears of War 3. The Gears presentation was very impressive but the Halo teaser didn’t really have much to it. 

Overall this year’s Microsoft press conference was a letdown with basically no surprises at all. The highlights for me were the Tomb Raider gameplay and Fable for Kinect but it felt like they were spending too much time focusing on kinect and didn’t have much else to offer. The amount of Wii-replica games to try and break into the casual and family gaming markets also felt like a bit of a cop-out. I hope the rest of the press conferences this year offer me a bit more than what Microsoft did.

-Sophie