E3 2005: Glenn's E3 Blog

Written by Glenn Wigmore  on May 19, 2005

Blog: Bloggin' from E3 with Glenn.

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Thursday, May 19, 2005 @ 11:22 PM PT
Hello againЕ more ravings from the show.

Ugh, tired right now. Wednesday was rough because we were at the conference for a while (which was great), but then we went to Jay Leno, and then to a 3:30am showing of Star Wars III. Regardless to say, sleep has been at a premium and focusing has been tough, but good thing the games have been plentiful at E3.

Xbox 360 has been playable, albeit in limited fashion, and is certainly looking good. Condemned looks really good, with the graphics rivalling that of Half Life 2 (which is playable at the show for the current-gen Xbox). Condemned has the moody feel of Doom 3, but sports character models that are somewhat like Half Life 2 and they provide some eerie confrontations when duelling in back alleys and run-down houses. Full Auto for the 360 also looks quite spectacular, with the time-warping effects, weapons, explosions, and white-knuckled racing looking particularly sharp. It's great to see bullet holes in the fender of a fire truck as you fire away and blow past it Ц great detail. Top Spin 2 was also playable on the show floor, and even though it was in an early state, it did show some amazingly accurate player models, and some reasonably well detailed courts and backgrounds. The gameplay was fairly similar to the first game, but this is mainly a good thing.

It was also great to finally hold the 360 controller, and the feel was pretty natural. I liked the guide button and the functions it has, plus the shoulder buttons worked well with the triggers. I also like how the D-Pad is movable in the socket so that you don't get the imprecise feel that the current-gen Xbox featured for that. Overall, I really dug the feel of the Xbox 360 controller.

Another great sight today was the booth demo of Ghost Recon 3Е wow. This game is easily going to be a system seller and killer app -- trust me. Not only does the game look and sound fantastic (amazingly fantastic), it also looks to play just as well with amazing tactical displays, great camera work, and weapons and combat with plenty of impact Ц just great stuff, here.

Dead Rising on 360Е hundreds of zombies on screen at onceЕ yeah!

Played some more Conker today, too, and it seems to be coming along fairly well. The action does get fairly random and unskilled, but I'm sure those who were fans of the original will dig it, plus the multiplayer has to be reasonably good with its design choices.

Also checked out Shadow the Hedgehog, Spartan: Total War, Battlefield 2, RS: Lockdown, Final Fight, NHL 2K6 and NBA 2K6 Ц all of these games are either decent or good, and they are ones to look out for, especially if you're a fan of the game type.

Anywho, keep it tuned to GT for some booth tours and impressions on various games, hardware, and everything else at the show. Later.



Tuesday, May 17, 2005 @ 7:07 PM PT
UghЕ no post for Monday as the Internet situation in the hotel went kind of haywire. On top of that, we had issues getting into both press conferences that day (Sony and Microsoft). The end result was some beer drinkingЕ either way, things were somewhat frustrating on the first day of the week. Although, in other pertinent news, I did have a HUGE tuna sandwich at the airportЕ well, it was more like HUGE as in size, and not really HUGE in qualityЕ so yeah, not much good on Monday.

Tuesday started much better, as we had the Nintendo press conference first thing in the morning. What a zoo. It wasn't an absolutely overwhelming number of people but the organization on the outside was pretty shoddy and anyone could've walked in. Orange juice and bagels were occasionally seen, but go searching for some and you were likely to find none. One of us got a bagel, I thinkЕ

The conference itself was ridiculously packed when we got into the auditorium at the Hollywood Highlands. There was almost no room immediately, so we all had to scatter for separate seats. The other guys were able to find seats near the back (apart), but I was left strandedЕ until I realized that the photographer area at the front wasn't really formed, so I managed to get a front-row seat to the action and was able to score some good pictures/movies/etc.

The actual substance of the conference was occasionally interesting, but mostly pedestrian in nature. The Zelda trailer was obviously great Ц and showed some very original design choices Ц but much of the rest of what was said and shown seemed all too УNintendo.Ф Yes, true Уbackwards compatibilityФ on the Revolution is interesting, with old games serving as a DLC-type service for the system, and the slimmed down Gameboy was a wise move, but nothing else was all that groundbreaking.

NintendogsЕ what? Did anyone else feel entirely creeped out when watching that demo (which was riddled with problems, by the way)? Just bizarre Ц but it will sell lots of copiesЕ trust me.

I must say, and I've always thought this, Nintendo does not have very good orators. I mean, yeah Reggie has a bit of attitude, and people like Iwata and Miyamoto have history, but they really need to get people who actually know how to speak to a large gaming-enthusiast crowd and how to promote. Part of the reason for this is that Nintendo doesn't exactly have a killer-app at the moment, and the Revolution can only be talked about so much. George Harrison narrating the short game trailers with things that you do in the game was a perfect example of what I'm talking about.

Really, though, people wanted to see a Zelda trailer and boy they got a good one. Link is not only more mature, but apparently some sort of shape-shifting werewolfЕ wacky idea, but it might work quite well. Either way, the game looked great and I'm excited for its release.

Wanted more Revolution, thoughЕ

More tomorrow.