E3 2006
Posted by Stephen Waits Tue, 16 May 2006 17:56:00 GMT
So another E3’s come and gone. I didn’t quite break my record low enthusiasm mark this year. I was slightly more interested than the last few years. I did spend more than two hours on the floor this time around. That’s mostly because I got there before Ralf and HK and then resaw everything with them after they arrived.
My friend Tim managed to get us into the Gears of War playable room. I didn’t play, but both Ralf and HK did. I’m not sure about the gameplay, but I have to say after seeing the live demo, I’m convinced this can be the next Halo – the 360 pusher. Unfortunately, I’m not sure if all of the Halo-buying-mass-market-homos in the world will be able to open their eyes wide enough to see anything other than Halo 27: More of the Same Crap for Wal-Mart Shoppers Everywhere.
MotoGP on the 360 looks great. I think a lot of the next-gen graphics are a little crazy. Everything has incredibly high-contrast edges, so that what should be smooth fields of grass end up looking like a Photoshop experiment gone bad. Just because you can doesn’t mean you should do something everywhere! Producers and Designers please take note of this!
Otherwise it seemed to me that MS had the usual sort of decentralized unfocussed booth we’ve become accustomed to seeing from them.
PS3 had more playable games than I expected. I liked Warhawk and will definitely play it - though it clearly had some issues. Gran Turismo HD looked really good, even if it’s just a hi-res version of more of the same. The PS3 F1 game looked fantastic, but didn’t play so well. Madden looked like a bad joke.
Sony needs to seriously do some crowd/fluid dynamic simulations on their booth design. The relentless MGS trailer was always causing the entire PS3 area to be swamped. If you were interested in the PS3, but not MGS, you would find yourself in a mass of people staring up at a giant screen – all of them perfectly in your way of just getting close to one of the PS3 titles. You could wait in line to go upstairs, but nobody waits in lines do they?
Wii. As of now, non-existant for me. Nintendo, being highly fanboy-driven, has always had the most packed booth at E3. I think this always added to their hype-level, in a good way. This year they closed the booth down, and you had to stand in line to get in. No. I’m certain they’ll have 2 or 3 truly great games on the platform some day.
PSP had a decent showing; many more games than I’d expected. Some looked great. However, this show was about PS3 and Wii.
DS Lite looks cool. I’ve wanted one for awhile and it was nice to see it in the flesh. I still think touch and dual screens (and Wiimote) are completely gimmicky; however, I want to play Brain Whatever it’s called and Animal Crossing.
Kids. I saw kids at the show again. WTF. There’s already enough of us idiots who work in the industry but don’t really need to be there packed onto the floor.
As were were trying to escape the lunacy of the floor, heading toward the doors, Michael Madsen grabbed my arm and told me to take a picture of him with a fan. I didn’t realize who it was at the time, and thought to myself, fuck you. Then his son or whoever was with him said, “it’s ok, I’ll take it”. But MM reiterated, “no, I want him to take it”, pointing at me for no logical reason other than unbalanced brain chemistry. Ralf says, “it’s ok, he’s doing it”, talking about the kid, and we left. About 15 feet later we realized who he was. Whatever.
I really enjoyed hanging out with Tim, Ralf, and HK. We weren’t able to connect with Jeppe for some reason, but I’m sure I’ll see him soon enough.
Tim and I had scheduled a 40 or 50 mile bicycle ride for the Saturday after the show. I planned it all out. Of course that fucker flaked on me. I’ll see him this coming Friday where I can give him more shit about it, but he should consider this his public flogging!
Finally, I spent the 4:30 hours on Amtrak (about 2:15 each way) watching Long Way Round which I’d ripped onto my PSP the night before. Not many people know what this is.. but it rocks. It was a seven part TV series where Ewan McGregor and his best mate Charley rode their motorcycles from London to NYC – only they went the “Long Way Round”. It was fantastic. I got through 6 of the 7 episodes on the train and watched the last one at home. Highly recommended!
There you have it.. My E3 ‘06. Not sure there’s any reason for me to go to E3 any more, so this may have been my last – at least for awhile.