Well the E3 of old is back and back with a bang. The lights and glitz and glamour has hit LA and Microsoft opened the show with a style we expect from E3.
I sat to watch the E3 coverage with trepidation, an event that has so much hype could easily fail to deliver. We’ve seen it happen before, but just looking at Microsoft’s stage which looked to be designed inside of a cocktail glass, We were in for a show.
Starting the show with Rock Band Beatles was a great choice, listening to everyone singing along created an atmosphere that told us we were in for a treat. The game is looking good and the promise of great DLC shows that this game will please Beatles fans and music fans in general. Moving into the show full swing, Out walked Tony Hawks to show “Ride” I was very disappointed with this, Tony didn’t play it on stage and showed a video of people playing it. Bit dull.
The show carried on through, Splinter Cell, Halo ODST and the new Halo: Reach. Microsoft set the bar extremely high, EPIC announced their new arcade game for XBLA and arcade was also supported by Joy Ride, an avatar racing game that will ship for free and you will pay for cars and tracks. This had me stoked because the one game that XBLA needed was a cart racer game.
The expected games were there, being Splinter Cell, Modern Warfare 2 and Forza 3. Each of these games were amazing on stage and shown in nice detail. Splinter cells departure from original style reminds me of 24. Sam Fisher has gone Jack Bauer and for the better. Onto Modern Warfare 2, seeing this game being played was outstanding. Little was shown but the graphics have stepped up from Modern Warfare and the atmosphere is tense to the nth degree.
Each game that was shown blew me away, Halo ODST is shaping up nicely and has some great concepts. A shame we didn’t see more of Halo: Reach but it’s looking like the prequel that most Halo fans want. The games built up to the biggest news of the conference, Natal the motion control camera.
Natal blew my mind, from the minority report style movement through menus to Milo the interactive child who was freaky in his display. Natal is looking like it will change the world as we know it. It seems obvious to say that these were shown with a lot of help from Devs and are probably a fair way from completion. However if Natal delivers what has been promised we’re in for an interesting future in gaming.
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