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• How Deep Are You Into Fandom?

  Being an introvert, mildly clausterphobic and mostly useless, I do not participate in conventions very often. But every year I schlep down to Otakon in Baltimore and enjoy myself with many good friends, only half of which are imaginary. I eat sushi, I indulge in anime and manga and I talk to Peter Beagle, the bestest author in the whole wide world (for the non-book snobs among us, he wrote The Last Unicorn). E3 is more of a press-related event now, but during its heydey it could definitely be considered the king of gamers' conventions. E for All and Penny Arcade's PAX are even more accessible than E3 ever was, bringing nerd culture to the west coast for a couple of intense weekends. Conventions are truly unique experiences: they bring together food, friends and gobs of people who share similar interests. Conventions stir up emotions you'll never experience elsewhere and they usually stir up unique diseases as well. I remember at E3 2006 I caught a horrific case of laryngitis, an affliction I've never dealt with before. It was a lot of fun because I was working a part-time retail job at the time and my voice horrified customers and I got sent home. Read More... Posted Aug 05 2008, 03:29 PM by Nadia Oxford with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: penny arcade, e3, fans, e for all, otakon, pax, conventions, fandom

• Dark Room Sex Game: Big Ideas, Creepy as Hell

  I’m not one-hundred percent sure what the curriculum looks like over at the IT University of Copenhagen, but I’ve got to say that it’s yielding interesting results. I was casually browsing 1UP’s Best of E3 list when I noticed a little game in their Best PC game runners-up list called Dark Room Sex Game. There was no preview, no image, just the title. Naturally, I Googled the living hell out of it immediately. Turns out I shouldn’t have been surprised by the lack of screenshot accompanying Dark Room; the “erotic rhythm game” is graphic free, relying only on sound for play. Unless, of course, you’re playing with a Wii remote. Yeah, bet you think I’m making a joke there. Guess again. Read More... Posted Jul 28 2008, 06:30 PM by John Constantine with | with no comments Filed under: john constantine, e3, porn, Dark room sex game, GLaDOS, leisure suit larry

• Ender’s Games: Where Are the Fictional Games?

  After the past two weeks, it’s a wonder that the entire internet didn’t up and die from media poisoning. The combined onslaught of E3 and the San Diego Comic Con have flooded the digital world with write-ups, trailers, screenshots, tie-ins, celebrity voice actors, and a billion other pieces of useless but tantalizing information. Both events were admittedly short on surprises but they both demonstrated that the future is a veritable smorgasbord of interactive entertainment. Strange then that a comic book adaptation of a novel was what got me thinking about the possibilities for videogames more than actual games. Orson Scott Card was at Comic Con to discuss the graphic adaptation of his novel Ender’s Game. If you’re curious about the plot, I recommend reading the book. Why Ender’s Game got me thinking about videogames as a medium is that it’s one of a number of fictional works that prominently feature imaginary videogames as a central part of their narrative. There are actually two, a spaceship battle simulator – it’s ultimately revealed that the game isn’t a simulator at all, but a digital interface for war – and a second that is more amorphous, a sort of digital storybook that reflects the user’s subconscious. The characters in Ender’s Game play another game, though this one is a physical sport called the Battle Room. Chair Entertainment is currently working on a videogame adaptation of the Battle Room for Xbox Live Arcade. But no one is making real life videogames of the fictional videogames from Ender’s Game. Read More... Posted Jul 28 2008, 05:30 PM by John Constantine with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, xbox live, e3, tron, Ender’s game

• E3 Opinion: Because It's Cool To Complain...

  Totally Possible Things The Big Three Could Have Done To Make Me Happy With Their E3 Conferences: Sony: Without a doubt, the one PS3 game that people are most excited about is LittleBigPlanet, and its use for a fiscal presentation in Sony's Conference was charming and delightful. Wouldn't it have been great if they'd done just a little more? Picture this: The lights go down on stage, and up on screen we see a recreation of the stage built out of popsicle sticks and yarn. Sackboy, in Jack's choice of Boston Celtics garb, walks in, lip-syncing perfectly with Tretton's voice (via PlaystationEye, which they've announced will be a feature of the game) and welcoming other Sackboys dressed as if from Resistance 2, Ratchet & Clank, and DC Universe Online, each lip-synched to their own guest as the cardboard frame behind them cycles through string-suspended images of each of those games. Read More... Posted Jul 23 2008, 11:30 AM by Derrick Sanskrit with | with no comments Filed under: boom blox, little big planet, nintendo, derrick sanskrit, microsoft, sony, e3, lips, rhythm tengoku

• So I hear folks are upset with Nintendo...

  E3 came and went with a whimper this year. None of the big three had a strong showing but since I'm a Nintendo fan, most of the whining I listen to is from other Nintendo fans. I have heard the wailing, the accusations, the proclamations of swearing off Nintendo forever more, and I can only wonder if anyone pays attention to industry history. I've been around long enough to have seen this all before. Read More... Posted Jul 23 2008, 11:00 AM by Amber Ahlborn with | with 9 comment(s) Filed under: nintendo, wii, high voltage software, the conduit, amber ahlborn, e3

• Where is Joe Madureira?

  If you read mainstream American comics in the 1990s, odds are you have an opinion on Joe Madureira. Controversially named by Wizard magazine as one of the ten most influential comic artists of all time (others on the list included Jack Kirby, Osamu Tezuka and Will Eisner), Joe's work on Marvel's Uncanny X-Men and his creator-owned Battle Chasers single-handedly launched the American manga craze that is still being felt today. He abruptly quit comics in 2001 to follow his dream of working in the video game industry. Not a whole lot has been seen of him since. Joe contributed to the all-around meh Playstation brawler Gekido, then worked on Tri-Lunar's Dragonkind, which vanished when the company went out of business. After several years of delays, Joe finally saw the release of a game with his direct influence in the 2007 PC MMORPG Dungeon Runners. Ever heard of any of those games? No, I didn't think so. Read More... Posted Jul 18 2008, 07:30 PM by Derrick Sanskrit with | with no comments Filed under: derrick sanskrit, legend of zelda, where is, gears of war, x-men, thq, e3, comics, darksiders, joe madureira

• E3 Day 4: No Blades, No Bows. Leave Your Weapons Here.

  Much as I’d like to say things are winding down for E3, they’re really not. You have to wind up before you can wind down, after all. The announcements are over, the plans are in place, and 2008’s heavy hitters have finally been played. There isn’t too much more to say about E3 08’s broad implications for gaming as a medium and today didn’t yield any revelations that would necessitate any further waxing philosophical (though the Wii did finally surpass Xbox 360’s install base in North America. Surprise, surprise, surprise.) That said, while it’s still too early to call it a trend, two of E3’s more intriguing titles share a unique quirk: Ubisoft’s just announced I Am Alive, teased only with a CGI trailer, and EA’s freshly playable Mirror’s Edge are both blockbuster positioned games that de-emphasize violence. Read More... Posted Jul 17 2008, 08:00 PM by John Constantine with | with no comments Filed under: john constantine, nintendo, mirror's edge, ea, xbox 360, wii, ubisoft, e3, i am alive

• Duke Nukem Trilogy Trailer Sums Up E3 in 4 Minutes

  You've got to hand it to the guys at Apogee. At least they have a sense of humor. While the rest of the blogosphere gets its manties in a wad about how there's no game footage here, I'll enjoy the obvious satire. Four minutes of scrolling and zooming logos, a shredding metal solo, cheesy sound effects, and phoned-in concept art. Be sure to stick around for the crotch shot towards the end. Genius.   Interestingly, the promotional video tells us little less than the average big-budget cutscene-filled trailer. I'd like to think that this bare video was not a result of not having any footage to present, but a sly commentary on the state of E3 today: marketing masturbation. Though, with their track record, it's probably a little of both.  Related Links: Penny Arcade Sums Up E3 E3 Day 3: No Alarms and No Surprises  Do We Need E3? Posted Jul 17 2008, 05:00 PM by Cole Stryker with | with 3 comment(s) Filed under: cole stryker, e3, duke nukem

• Ready? Okay! Wii've Got Spirit, Yes Wii Do...

  There was one male cheerleader in my high school, and every time I saw him in routines at one of the mandatory pep rallies all I could think was "I could do that so much better than him!" I wasn't scared of being a cheerleader either, I just couldn't stand that being a cheerleader would require me to A) attend sporting events and B) display school spirit. Well, Namco Bandai's We Cheer may just be the game to earn me my long overdue varsity letter. These three gameplay videos from E3 make the Wii cheerleader sim look a lot like a cross between Polly Pocket at Elite Beat Agents. Read More... Posted Jul 17 2008, 03:00 PM by Derrick Sanskrit with | with 3 comment(s) Filed under: the go team, derrick sanskrit, wii, rock band, elite beat agents, e3, namco bandai, ouendan, we cheer

• E3 Day 3: No Alarms and No Surprises

  With the Big Three’s press conferences out of the way, E3 has settled into immersion mode, the vast majority of the press and publishers getting into a groove of demoing games, showing off videos, and hosting meeting after meeting after meeting. Publishers Take-Two, Konami, Ubisoft, and Capcom have all held press conferences and the extent of big news was the Capcom’s making a movie out of their sci-fi shooter Lost Planet and Ubisoft is making a game called I Am Alive, in which the player tries to survive natural disasters. Exciting stuff, eh? Not to beat a dead horse — 61 Frames Per Second prides itself on beating only a select number of dead horses — but what, exactly, is the point of this year’s E3? It certainly seems to be running more smoothly than 2007’s air-hangar-showroom debacle, but it’s become clear that everyone in the business of making games is not using the event as a venue for announcing new titles. The obvious implication is that, with the expansion of the gaming audience and the broadening of mass market releases throughout the year, publishers no longer need a centralized event to show North America what’s on the horizon. There is, however, a more subtle implication. Read More... Posted Jul 16 2008, 02:00 PM by John Constantine with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, capcom, konami, ubisoft, take-two, e3, i am alive, lost planet

• Do You Hold Any Hope For Sonic Unleashed?

  Well? The E3 Trailer is a mixed bag in my opinion. The first half is pretty awesome. It does look like Sonic Unleashed will lack the complexity of its 16-bit predecessors (oh God, what a thing to say). It's impossible to tell from a video alone, but it seems as if there's little exploration and more of the "push right on the control pad and let us do the work" sort of gameplay that the 3D Sonic games have long been criticised over. Still, I can't deny that I'm excited about the pretty pretty graphics. Sonic grinding down a rail that's suspended over miles and miles of suburbs? Yes pls. I can deal with that. I also like the dragon-themed loop-de-loop. It reminds me of Snake Road from the Dragon Ball Z series. (Yeah, I just defended Sonic and made a reference to DBZ. May as well take me out back and put a bullet through my head.) I'm pretty skeptical about the werewolf--er, werehog gameplay, though. It looks like Mr Hedgehog zips through cityscapes whereas Mr Shaggypants must grind to a halt and pound things with his fists a la the Hulk. It's generally not a good idea to stop the music in the middle of--well, I'll leave you to make up your own clever sex metaphor. Read More... Posted Jul 16 2008, 12:00 PM by Nadia Oxford with | with 5 comment(s) Filed under: sega, sonic the hedgehog, retro, sonic unleashed, e3, 3d games, werehog, trailer

• Penny Arcade Sums Up E3

  Penny Arcade is pretty good at expressing its game-related displeasure without resorting to millions of words. Abracadabra: Gabe and Tycho have done it once again, summing up this year's impotent E3 in a manner that made me laugh out loud in a very quiet library (it's air-conditioned in here, unlike my apartment). Applause all around. How are you doing with this year's E3, anyway? I can't say I've met too many people who are thrilled with what's being offered; the Chosen Ones for the Big Three are mostly going up on stage to talk about sales and statistics. Big titles? Shocking drama? Aside from the news about Square-Enix jumping from the deck of the S.S. Sony Exclusive, 2008's E3 has been a lullaby. On the other hand, we knew E3 had become the bloated whore of a digital Babylon by the time it finally deflated in 2006. E3 is no longer about glitz and thumping music and booth babes in spaghetti-strap Ubisoft tops. It is supposed to be about statistics and numbers and other dry matters. Just because Nintendo didn't reveal anything particularly interesting this year doesn't mean we'll be waiting another year for something worthwhile; there's no reason for companies to save their big announcements for E3 anymore. It'll take some getting used to, but eventually we'll all be comfortable with that fact. Read More... Posted Jul 16 2008, 10:00 AM by Nadia Oxford with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: nintendo, penny arcade, webcomics, e3, reggie fils aime, gabe, tycho, statistics

• E3 Day Two: Spin, Malaise, Sony’s New Clothes, and Nintendo’s True Disruption

  Despite their show-ending bombshell announcement, Microsoft’s E3 press conference was something of a non-event. The house of X showed off titles that had already been seen or leaked, announced a handful of downloadable titles that weren’t exactly setting folks’ brains on fire, and revealed an embarrassing attempt to cash-in on the Mii phenomenon with Xbox Live Avatars. It’s embarrassing enough that the Avatars look so similar to Nintendo’s Miis, but it’s even worse that they were designed by Rare, the less-than-profitable appendage Microsoft cut away from Nintendo in the first place. It wouldn’t have been difficult for Sony and Nintendo to one-up Microsoft’s event, but neither of the console makers did, both of them focusing more on sales data and business strategies than on software. Read More... Posted Jul 15 2008, 02:00 PM by John Constantine with | with 3 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, playstation 3, nintendo, nintendo ds, microsoft, rare, xbox 360, wii, sony, animal crossing, e3, mii, avatars, satoru iwata, wii music, wii sports, wii motionplus

• Trailer Review: Tecmo Bowl – Kickoff

  E3 2008’s been running for just under forty-eight hours at this point, if you count yesterday’s early festivities with Microsoft and EA, and the internet is awash with flashy exciting trailers. The first gameplay footage from Ubisoft’s Prince of Persia proves that the new adventure is even more deliciously gorgeous and detailed than its already beautiful screenshots, the Mirror’s Edge gameplay demonstration delivers on the promise of that game’s unique take on first-person gaming, and iD’s Rage is exhibiting all the gloss and zombie-ness of a classic John-Carmack-Tech-Showcase. But who cares about those? Every trailer, every look at fresh gameplay from cutting edge titles, every CGI tease pales in comparison to these sixty seconds of Tecmo Bowl: Kickoff. Read More... Posted Jul 15 2008, 01:00 PM by John Constantine with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, mirror's edge, ea, trailer review, prince of persia, e3, rage, id, tecmo bowl

• Square-Enix's Coup Brings Back Memories

  It was generally accepted that this year's subdued E3 wouldn't have much to offer in comparison to the big shiny blitzes that used to make game journalists hang themselves with laptop power cords. Goes to show what we know: things got exciting right off the bat with Square-Enix's announcement that Final Fantasy XIII will be coming to both the Playstation 3 and the Xbox 360. Oh, you youngsters understandably have ants in your pants over Square-Enix's sudden shift, but I've been down this road before. Yes sir, I remember when I was riding high on the thrill of Final Fantasy VI and Chrono Trigger. Nintendo finally claimed supremacy in the sixteen-bit console wars thanks in part to their great RPGs, and we automatically assumed Square would develop for the N64--- Zzzzzz... Zzzzz-- ! Ah! Huh? Oh, sorry. If I sit in the sun for too long, I doze off like an old dog. Read More... Posted Jul 14 2008, 07:56 PM by Nadia Oxford with | with 3 comment(s) Filed under: playstation 3, microsoft, xbox 360, sony, square-enix, e3, final fantasy 13, exclusive, final fantasy xiii

• E3 Day One: Microsoft, Sony, Final Fantasy, and For Whom the Bell Tolls

  There was a very brief period of crossover time, between 2002 and 2006, when E3 was still a gargantuan, money-wasting event and high-speed internet access was ubiquitous. During these years, gamers across the English speaking world regularly crashed websites following videocasts and liveblogs of press conferences as the biggest game announcements of the year hit the public. In the wake of the old E3’s dissolution and 2007’s lackluster event, the press cycle for the games industry seemingly changed forever; game announcements, platform holder initiatives, and publisher events have been spread out over the last eighteen months, no longer restricted to only a handful of days in the summer leading up to the usual holiday deluge of high-profile releases. The days of “breaking the internet” appeared to be over. Then Microsoft announced that Final Fantasy XIII would be coming out for the Xbox 360 and it was the good ol’ days all over again. Read More... Posted Jul 14 2008, 07:00 PM by John Constantine with | with no comments Filed under: john constantine, playstation 3, nintendo, microsoft, xbox 360, wii, final fantasy, sony, gran turismo, monster hunter, dragon quest, god of war, e3

• Wii MotionPlus - Say what, Nintendo?

  Nintendo's E3 conference is still a day away, but it looks like they wanted to make a preemptive strike against the rumored motion control announcements from their console competitors. Today, Nintendo announced Wii MotionPlus, an add-on for the "revolutionary" Wii remote that promises more accurate motion controls. How accurate? "Every slight movement players make with their wrist or arm is rendered identically in real time on the screen, providing a true 1:1 response in their game play." Well, that's nice, but isn't that what we were all expecting from the original Wii remote two years ago? Read More... Posted Jul 14 2008, 01:00 PM by Derrick Sanskrit with | with no comments Filed under: nintendo, derrick sanskrit, wii, call of duty, the conduit, metroid prime, e3, red steel, motionplus, cooking mama

• Where is Wii's Disaster: Day of Crisis?

  The hardcore, the core gamer, the fanboy. Whatever you want to call them, it’s hard to ignore their bitterness toward Nintendo these days. I’m the first to admit that I’m one of them, but my frustration with the current king of the console hill doesn’t stem from their burgeoning commitment to the soccer mom set. It’s not even the lackluster treatment some of their core franchises (read: Zelda) have seen in the past two years. I’m angry at Nintendo because, when they first revealed the Wii and its initial line-up of games at E3 2006, they showed off two brand spanking new games, games devoid of Mario, Wario, Link, or any of the three thousand Pokemon, and neither of them have seen the light of day since. Project H.A.M.M.E.R., a fairly silly looking brawler, was actually playable at the time, but Nintendo announced that it was “on hold” as of summer 2007. Their other new IP, developed by fan-favorite studio Monolith Soft, was Disaster: Day of Crisis. Read More... Posted Jul 09 2008, 02:00 PM by John Constantine with | with no comments Filed under: john constantine, nintendo, wii, where is, pokemon, mario, e3, link, disaster day of crisis, project hammer, wario

• Do We Need E3?

  Back in '95, E3 was an opportunity for developers to connect with the press and the public, showcasing the upcoming year's product offering. Today, with streaming trailer downloads and up to the minute blog coverage, do we need conventions like E3 to tell us what's up? No. The official E3 website has partnered with GameTrailers. Why even hold a convention when you can just stream the content directly to the public? The only purpose that a convention like E3 could serve is to grant exposure to indie developers. A glance at the exhibitors list for 2008's show reveals that only the major names will attend. Developer roundtables, interviews, and Q&A's could and are easily distributed via podcast. Trailers are obviously streamed on developer websites, social networks and gaming sites. Let's be real here: It's an excuse for Reggie Fils Aime to pound his chest and for Cliffy B to assert his heterosexuality. Boooring. E3 and other trade shows like this are completely superfluous. They are artifacts of a bygone pre-internet age. Of course, as long as you keep clicking ads, the coverage will continue. Way to go, retrogressive consumer! Posted Jul 09 2008, 12:00 PM by Cole Stryker with | with no comments Filed under: cole stryker, cliffy b, game trailers, e3, reggie fils aime