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DPad @ E3 2006 » inpheaux’s Overall Recap, Predictions and Awards

Final Overall Recap

So, it's been a week. What were my overall impressions of the showings from the Big Three at E3 2006?

Nintendo - How could I start anywhere but Nintendo? Nintendo showed again that they really are committed to being a big player in the next generation. They had the only exhibit compelling enough that it was the must-see item of the event, such a must-see that every day there were people willing to throw away an entire day worth of the show to stand in line JUST to see the Wii. Having actually had a chance to see it and play the games, I can say that it was completely worth the hype, worth the lines, and worth the time spent.

Nintendo's latest slogan being pushed by Reggie is "Playing=Believing", and it really fits everything they're offering right now. On the Wii side of things, people generally have a lot of doubts about the Wii. Does it really control well? Is it accurate? Is it too strange? Are the games good? Are third parties going to be on board? What does Nintendo have about HD? Does Nintendo still care about me, the gamer nerd who's been with them from the start, or are they purely catering to casual gamers? All these questions melt away once you've got the console in front of you and the controller in hand. It's going to take awhile for the public to warm up to the Wii, but I can really see it happening.

Over in the DS camp, it was almost the same story. The lines weren't quite as long, but there were still a lot of questions. Is the DS Lite really a worthwhile upgrade? Does the touchscreen work as a primary input for such classics as Starfox and Zelda? What the hell is this Elite Beat Agents crap? Does the world need another Kirby game? Can Nintendo possibly make a worthy sequel to Yoshi's Island? Again, it's the same thing, once you get your hands on any of them it all makes sense and Nintendo wins again.

Nintendo only let me down in three ways:

• No Wii Release Date / Price - It's a letdown, but I'm cool with it. They say it'll be out this fall / winter, and that's fine by me. As for price, now that we know where Sony stands, Nintendo could really charge just about anything and get away with it. And again, I don't care. It just would've been nice to know how much I need to stash away.
• No Earthbound / Mother Info - Come on, guys. Seriously. Come on. Good news would be great, bad news would have kicked the unofficial translation crew into high gear, but no news is just mean.
• The Line - While I appreciated the fact that the line meant once you got inside the Wii exhibit it wasn't incredibly crowded, and you didn't feel as squished as - say - the Sony booth, and while I fully understand that the line wasn't necessarily their fault, it still sucked.

Overall, though, Nintendo really got me excited. The letdowns were entirely outweighed by all the amazing stuff we did get. I seriously look forward to giving Nintendo several hundred of my hard-earned dollars between now and the end of the year.

On to Sony. Sony, in general, felt confused, messy, unfocused, poorly designed, unimpressive and disappointing. In all ways possible. For their main event, the PS3, it looks like they've got some serious rushing ahead of them from both ends. On the hardware end, I didn't see any PS3 games running on final or near-final hardware. Everything was up on racks of super-chunky Dev units. If they don't have the hardware finalized to the point that they can churn out some demo units for E3, then they've got some serious work to put in between now and November. On the software end, nothing they had on display was something so amazing that it was an exclusive must-have launch title that would make me want to cough up $600. This may have been slightly different if I was a super-big Gran Turismo fanboy, but I'm not. Plus there's the issue that one of their featured games - the Gundam game - was the worst game I saw at the show.

Their PSP offerings were, well, PSP games. It's great that they've got innovative stuff like the downloadable PSX emulation coming, but in my opinion the PSP is on life support. Must-have games are drying up, and Sony is having to resort to emulation, but it's unfortunately not the emulation people want on the PSP. The UMD format is all but dead for movies, and the never-ending struggle between Sony and the mod/homebrew scene rages on. And on top of all that, the problems like horrific load times, short battery life and high price tag still haven't been addressed.

In a good but somewhat confusing move, Sony's continued support of the PS2 was really the one thing I was happy to see at the Sony booth. There's still a ton of great new PS2 games on the horizon, Guitar Hero 2, God of War 2, Disgaea 2, Final Fantasy 12 and Okami are just a couple of them. Sure, that's a lot of sequels, but they're all sequels that are good, or will at least be good for some people, as I'm not a huge fan of God of War 2 and I'm very cautious about FF12. And Sony claims this is far from the end for the PS2. High-quality games for it won't be drying up and blowing away once the PS3 is out like what has happened to the original Xbox, the Gamecube and the GameBoy Advance. I'm purely guessing here, but I think this is going to be due to the fact that the PS3 is fully backwards compatible, the PS3 isn't expected to get a huge initial install-base, and the PS2 already has an unbelievably huge install-base.

Right, back to the sloppiness and poor design. I'm sorry, but I pay attention to design stuff. Layout, flow, organization. Not to say that I'm an organized guy, but I know bad design when I see it. The Sony booth was horribly organized. Lets take the main entrance. Big empty corner leading to a tiny little choke point entrance, and the entrance is split down the middle, further ruining entrance flow. Once you got to the other side of this main entrance, there's an open area with rows of double-sided displays of PS3 games. Here's the problem, though: everyone would walk in, get three feet into the center area and just STOP. The only reason I could think was that there was a large projected display showing some prerendered stuff, and in other booths you could just stop like an idiot and it would be ok, but in the Sony booth doing this resulted in people like me getting pissed off.

So there's a big choke point full of idiots just standing around. That's problem #1. Problem #2 is that there was no logical flow. You could enter the booth from many different locations, and there was no logical flow from one area to the other. Sure, there was a coherent center area full of PS3 stuff, with one wing of PS2 stuff and another wing of PSP stuff, but there was no logical flow from one area to the other, and that's even if you discount all the ridiculous chokepoints. The other of the big-three booths were open. Nintendo's even showed you can have huge lines and not have a crowded booth. But Sony's was just . . bad.

As for Microsoft, their booth gave off a distinct feeling of emptiness. I'm not sure if it was the sheer size of their booth or the small spread-out clusters of games they had, but it just felt sparse. What they had to show was an assortment of what Microsoft is known for, the best option of multi-format ports (like the new Sonic game), PC ports (like Prey and Shadowrun), stuff no one quite understands (like Viva Piñata and Rockstar's Table Tennis) and stand-out exclusives which - of course - weren't on public display (like Halo 3 and Gears of War. GoW was on display, just not out on the actual floor with the rest of their stuff, though).

While I wasn't incredibly impressed by everything Microsoft had to show, they did have some stand out games, like the aforementioned Gears of War. With games like that, the announcement of the PS3 running $600, constantly increasing Live Arcade games worth playing, and the announcement that Grand Theft Auto 4 will be coming to the 360 and the PS3 in October 2007, I'm having to seriously reconsider my next-gen console purchasing choices. I'll be keeping my eye on the 360, and may just have to pick one up when the price drops or some of these outstanding games start rolling out.

But still, overall, Microsoft was showing more of the same. A lot of filler, a few prizes left in the mix, and promises of amazing things still left unseen.

So with the big three wrapped up, what about the comedy-fourth-option of PC gaming. PC games come in waves. I think these waves are spaced out perfectly so that just when people get around to saying "OH WOW GUYS PC GAMING IS TOTALLY DEAD", a small army of amazing things come out. We're on the cusp of the start of another set of banner years in PC gaming, 06/07 could very easily be like 97/98 or 02/03 were.

On the traditional multiplayer FPS front we've got UT 2007 coming. For squad-based FPS's you've got your pick of settings, be it the Quake universe with Enemy Territory: Quake Wars, [GENERIC FUTURE] with Battlefield 2142, or the magical future of Shadowrun. Single Player FPS's aren't dead either, with games like Prey coming down the pipe after 8 billion years waiting for it, plus we've got things coming out over Steam like the SiN Episodes and the Half-Life 2 expansions.

If first person games aren't your bag, there's plenty of alternatives. The RTS genre will be getting a massive shot in the arm when Supreme Commander rolls out. And if you're in to MMOs, there's no less than 800 MMO-somethings coming out over the next year or so, be it the WoW expansion, Huxley, Tabula Rasa, or any number of the Korean MMO's companies have planned to bring over here. Standard RPG's are also far from dead, since we've got Neverwinter Nights 2, Hellgate: London, and seriously-not-dead,-honest Fallout 3 coming out.

And of course, there's the ever-looming wonder of Spore. Mmmm. . . Spore.

But that's just the software side. Over on the hardware side, PCI-e has stabilized as the proper standard it should be. Ati and Nvidia have both finished their transitions to PCI-e lines. Both Intel and AMD are still screwing around with a huge assortment of socket standards, but that seems to be settling down now too. If you've been holding off on an upgrade, now's the time to start thinking about getting it done.

In short, we're at a point right now where an unimaginable amount of games are right around the corner, no matter what platform you've got or are planning on getting, no matter what genre you prefer, stuff is coming out from all over the place. So sit back and find yourself a sizable disposable income, you'll be needing it.

Predictions

I'm not generally big on predictions, but here's how I see things playing out in the console scene for the rest of the transition into the next generation.
Microsoft (they're already out, they get first dibs)

• In the previous generation, the go-to platform for multi-format games was the PS2 or Xbox. I think the 360 could easily be the new standard for the next gen.
• Barring anything super-weird happening with the Wii, I see the 360 getting the largest install base, largely due to being first to market and a relatively cheap price compared to the PS3.
• Microsoft will still have the most compelling online service, that won't change.
• Microsoft will still only have a short list of really stand-out amazing titles, but the few they do get will be record-breaking sellers.

Nintendo

• Nintendo has made a big gamble with the Wii. There's a lot of stuff for people to get over, but I think if they can get people to just play the thing before worrying about if it's good or not, it could take off big.
• We didn't get a price at E3, but expect it to be relatively cheap. More expensive than the current gen, more expensive than the current handhelds, but cheaper than both the cheapest 360 and PS3. And if it wasn't currently shaping up to be cheaper Nintendo will make it fit. That said, I'd expect to see $250-$300. Less than the 360, less than half of the PS3.
• Nintendo also conveniently has - barring any delays or slippages - the most compelling set of launch titles I have EVER seen for any console ever. If all those games don't move consoles I don't know what will.
• They've still got quite a ways to go, considering that it has just come out that the Wii demo units still weren't finalized hardware, but at least all the games worked. Nintendo still has a very good chance of beating Sony to market, and I feel they'll pull it off, especially since they waited to get a deadline from Sony before announcing their own release plans.
• Unparalleled domination in the handheld market will continue. This is really a no-brainer, though. Not really fair to call it a prediction, but, whatever.

Sony

• Sony's got problems.
• They seem to still be operating on the belief that their market share is invincible and will not change at all between the PS2 and the PS3. This is a grave mistake.
• While I don't want to say PS3's won't sell out - because all modern console releases have had shortages at launch - their sales will be nowhere near as epic as the PS2.
• Price Tag and Lack of compelling launch titles will be the main contributing factors, but mostly price tag. You have to remember that many people are having a hard time paying for gas right now. Sony can try and leverage the "OMG BUT IT HAS BLU-RAY!" angle all they want, but I still think they're going to have problems.
• Sony could easily see themselves in third place when everything shakes out. Having the most powerful tech is irrelevant if you don't have exclusive games, and Sony has been losing exclusive games left and right, most recently with Square porting FFXI to the 360 and Rockstar announcing simultaneous releases of GTA4 on PS3 and 360.

Not an amazing list of predictions, but I'm no high-paid industry analyst. I'm just extrapolating based on what I saw. Right. Time for some awards.

Awards!

E3 awards are often boring ordered lists of what people think the "best" of E3 was, but there's always something missing. And stuff like that is always horribly subjective, so screw it. I'm handing out my own kind of awards.

MOST OBVIOUS OVERCOMPENSATION - The Webzen Booth - Webzen is a company I bet most of you have never even heard of. They're a Korean company responsible for publishing / developing a bunch of MMO's, the only notable of which is Huxley. Despite this, the Webzen booth was huge, and had a constant all-singing all-dancing stage show going on, full of people yelling about something completely irrelevant to gaming. They also had some of the most annoying and prevalent swag of the show, in the form of an annoying blinking KITT-esque necklace and a big dumb inflatable . . kickboard . . thing. Everyone had these. EVERYONE. Do I know who Webzen is now? Sure. Do I care whatsoever about any of their games now? Not at all. It was a textbook case of trying to substitute marketing fluff and shiny things in place of actual worthwhile products. Congratulations, Webzen! Runner up: NCSoft. They were almost exactly the same as Webzen, just replace schwag with "being unbelievably loud".

BEST ENGRISH - Mobile Suit Gundam - PS3 - ROCK ON!

MOST OUT-OF-PLACE CELEBRITY - Adam West - Adam West was supposedly having a signing relating to his involvement with the Family Guy game . . but was the Family Guy game on display? Has anyone even heard anything about the Family Guy game since it was announced? No? Ok, so why was he there? That's right: no one knows. Runner up: Paris Hilton. At least she had a game on display co-branded with her name, even if she couldn't remember what it was called.

BEST IMPROMPTU ORGANIZATION - Nvidia SLi Button Hoarders - Nvidia was running an SLi promo where they handed out buttons that asked "Are you my match?" and had a number. Find someone with a matching button and both of you got to spin for seriously good prizes, like a free Western Digital hard drive or Nvidia gift certificates. Since there was no limit on how many buttons you could take, some people hoarded them and set up shop on the wall alongside the Nvidia booth, with large nicely tabulated lists of what button numbers they had. I even noticed some guy had business card-sized lists printed up at Kinkos or whatever, which he left along with his cell number at the line. This was some top-notch nerd ingenuity, and deserves recognition.

WORST LINE - The Namco Arcade Booth - There were a lot of lines at E3, and I waited through most of them. In my opinion, the worst was for any of the coin-op games at the Namco Arcade booth, due to their deceptive shortness. Namco was pimping out mobile phone ports of classics like Ms Pacman and Galaga, and did so by having lines of alternating mobile and arcade versions of said games. But the arcade games were on infinite play, and were the godless updates, so they had CONTINUES enabled. You could show up and find one dude playing Galaga, since it's one guy, sure, you'd wait a bit to see if you can get in on some of that hot hot free Galaga action. But because continues were set, it was NOT uncommon to see some jerk sitting there playing to level 47 or whatever, and constantly jamming on the "YES I WANT TO CONTINUE" button for all eight or nine times he'd die per level. So even though it was just one guy, the wait to play fucking Galaga could be an hour or more.

MOST EFFECTIVELY HIDDEN DEMO KIOSK - Hellgate: London at the Games for Windows booth - Such a great game, but this demo kiosk was not visible from the show floor, was hidden in the corner, and was hidden in the corner of the Games for Windows booth which itself was hidden in the corner of the Microsoft booth. Plus there was no one attending it to tell you all about Hellgate: London, so you had to know what you were doing, what you were looking at, etc. This can be either good or bad, for me it was good because it meant no line.

WORST TEASE - Fallout 3 Poster - Bethesda had a couple posters around the perimeter of their booth that effectively just said "Hey guys, Fallout 3". . . and that was it. Nothing else. It's great that you guys are making Fallout 3, but having nothing to show but a poster is weak.

BEST INSANE RANTING FROM A DEVELOPER - Some Guy from Left Behind Games - I've retold this story three times now, but it never gets old. Hearing this guy going on about how and why their clichéd good-vs-evil RTS was relevant, and how rock music is evil, and how the game is balanced even though it strongly favors good was quite possibly one of the high points of the show for me. Runner up: Some guy from Saber Interactive, the developer responsible for TimeShift. He spent the Q&A portion of his demo arguing with some guy from the audience about half-baked quantum mechanics and time travel just magically works in TimeShift, and how the guy asking the questions was a horrible nerd and should shut up. Not that I didn't agree that the guy in the audience was a nerd and should shut up, but hearing it from a developer was hilarious.

In Conclusion

E3 2006 was a wonderful experience. I am very very glad I was able to finally attend, after so many years of having to play the Home Game. I hope you all enjoyed DirectionalPad's E3 2006 coverage, and hope you all stick around through next year for our E3 2007 coverage.