July 14, 2008

E3 Part 1- Microsoft

Yes, Im doing a commentary on the major spotlights of E3. Yes, everything I say is true.

Fallout 3-
Looks pretty cool. Like the storyline and humor. But..uh..wait. You can pause the action, decide where you want the enemy to get hit, and watch the cutscene of the guy getting shot..? Wheres the skill?! I don't understand..

Resident Evil 5-
This game is looking great. Love the graphics, and online 2 player Coop? Amazing addition if you ask me. We got a release date too, March 13th 2009. Its a friday. Very clever guys, release the evil zombie game on friday the 13th.

Fable 2-
Another great game if you ask me. Beautiful graphics, an intriguing teaser. And semi MMO qualities. Your friends appear as orbs, and you can invite them into your world? I like. 10 points for Fable 2.

Gears of War 2-
What everyone expected I guess. Most of what was seen they've already slipped on, so nothing super great. Release date of November 17th this year. I'm not too thrilled, but I suppose I can see why some are.

Microsoft NPD data- Look! Xbox 360 is winning by a lil bit in sales! Of course..this is North American sales..and the other two companies are Japanese companies..but we arent gonna include their data. That would make it obvious how bad we're actually doing compared to the Wii.

Xbox Menu Update-
Fail. Mega fail. Lets screw over our excellent overlay interface by changing it to a horrible attempt at impersonating the Wii! While we're at it, lets jack Miis and..well..try to be more like Nintendo. Wii=games for everyone. Xbox=games for gamers who like fps shooty gore. GET IT RIGHT! Sorry Xbox 360 owners, your convenient easy to use menus are gonna get discarded for a clunky annoying interface this fall. Sorry!

Xbox Arcade Games- Im sorry guys, but you're putting WAY too much emphasis on 10 dollar rehashes of arcade games. Im sure they're cool and all, but we aren't as excited as you are about this stuff. With the exception of..

Portal: Still Alive-
New portal levels for Xbox owners?? Nothing is not great about this.. Of course, they kinda made it seem as if its a Xbox exclusive but I have my doubts thats gonna happen. Last I checked, Valve loves PC owners. MASSIVE Team Fortress 2 updates were given only to the PC crowd, so I think we'll all get our hands on these new portal levels somehow.

Netflix-
Alright, its kinda cool how you can rent movies off your xbox. But wait.. can't we do that on tv already with on demand? Wait.. is this really that much better then actual Netflix? Maybe..but probably not. And you and your friends can watch a movie you rent from your own homes on your own xboxes with the "brilliant" new party interface..Wow you guys are losers. Like, seriously! Can you really not afford the gas money to convene at one persons house and actually reassure yourself you have friends? No further comment.

Banjo Kazooie: Nuts and Bolts-
Looks beautiful, like genuinely fun gameplay and such. Not sure about the focus on vehicle building, doesnt really have a place in the BK universe but I suppose thats ok. One problem. Does the Xbox 360 really have an audience for this kinda game? Like..honestly. I know Microsoft wanted to get Rare away from Nintendo but..Microsoft attracts the wrong kind of audience for this sort of game. Not sure how well its honestly gonna do. Semi-fail.

Viva Pinata 2-
Like the first, but with a 2 in the title.

You're in the Movies-
Looks incredibly lame. Maybe about as much fun as..I don't know, tic tac toe? Noones gonna buy this..

Guitar Hero: World Tour-
Oh great, another guitar hero. Its like the rest but..oh wait, we ripped off the Rock Band drum set. Wow guys...wow. Thats old news by the way, so what are you doing at E3 again? Telling us how this game lets you make and share music "for the first time". Even though Jam with the Band did it in Japan already..and hundreds of online applications already have done it..epic fail. Learn your facts before you speak, good sir. Oh, wait, I almost forgot. More overpriced downloadable songs. Woohoo! I love paying out the butt for songs! Apparently saying you can download Metallica makes it all better.. I don't see the appeal personally.

Lips-
Like Karaoke Revolution for the PS2, but..wait..no, its like Karaoke Revolution. Its cool that you can plug your Zune in (Yep, pretty sure you need a Zune) and sing along to your own music, but not sure you really need a game to do that. You know, this would be better if combined with Guitar Hero World Tour! Wait..then it would be Rock Band. Seeing a trend here? Also, please get Duffy off the screen. She's disgusting me, and I don't really care if she can sing her own song on Lips.. Its obvious that this is less of a game demo and more of a fan service.

Rock Band 2-
There we go! Finally something we care about! And it comes out in September on the 360, looks like the other systems are getting released later. Wonder how much Microsoft had to pay for that. A bit too early in my opinion, they could have waited a year or so. 84 songs, all original recordings..Its like Guitar Hero but you don't have to pay for half of them! Don't you love when games make sense? A few great songs included, never before seen in a music game. You know..why does guitar hero still exist? Its kinda failing in comparison. Heck, RB2 got Metallica too..so why is GHWT bragging about it..? You have to pay extra to download Metallica for GH too O.o. In RB2 you can import ALL the downloaded and included songs from Rock Band 1, meaning no disc swapping and a reason to buy the sequal. Wow..they're really being smart about this. Over 500 total songs available by the end of this year? Bravo Rockband, bravo.

Square Enix-
I can't understand a word this man is saying. I know he's the president of SE and all, but they couldn't get a translator like they did with the RE5 guy? Looks like 3 SE games are being announced. None of them are particularly exciting, as they don't have "Final Fantasy" OR "Kingdom Hearts" in the titles. We got Star Ocean, The Last Remnant, and..er..something else. The teaser for The Last Remnant looked pretty cool, but kinda like every other rpg ever made. Nothing too incredible. Its coming out on the PC though, which is odd for SE. We'd better see some Kingdom hearts from you guys tomorrow, with the Nintendo and Sony briefings. Oh wait, one more suprise trailer! Except Microsoft made all the media people film it from a super zoomed out view of the whole theater so I can't tell for the life of me whats really going on. But its Final Fantasy XIII, so I guess that makes it ok. Yes, thats right, FFXIII has been announced, and its gonna come out on the 360 too this time. I guess the PS3 really is sucking if they lost exclusivity on yet another title.


Final notes: Somewhat impressive, a few cool tidbits. But their main speaker...well, he SUCKED. Most scripted thing I've ever heard.. wow. RE5 wins, Fable 2 wins, Portal wins, Rock Band 2 wins. Netflix Fails, Gutar Hero: World Tour fails, Lips fails, and..well...the new Xbox menu is horrible. Mega fail.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

When I saw the Fallout 3 trailer, my first thoughts were, "This looks freaking awesome." Started playing the demo and eehhh... not so much. I think its cool that its based in DC but the actual fighting really doesn't seem to involve any skill. =/ In other words, I completely agree with you.

Fable 2=stunning

Menu update annoyed me TO NO END.

But honestly, when I heard GlaDos voice on my tv, I freaked out. Matt's buying it. He may not know it yet, but he is.

On Lips, the guy said you could, and I quote, hook up your Zune OR iPod to play the songs... I'm not even going to say it.

The president of SE still made me smile, despite how little I could understand. =D

Yes. Main speaker. Mega fail.

Brad said...

Nice commentary!


you need to send this in to the Blade
I want to see the war is starts :)


pull pin, throw....

Brad and Kristy Albert said...

How sad is it that even though I don't know half of what your talking about, I really enjoyed reading it!! ha-ha

Can't wait for part two!