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2010 Sony E3 Stream of Consciousness

And now the finale of the E3 conferences, Sony.

Pre-Conference Thoughts

Sony’s press conference is an enigma this year. You may remember that last year’s Sony conference featured the best content of the three conferences, but was ultimately disappointing because almost all of Sony’s big reveals (like The Last Guardian and PSP Go) had been leaked in the days preceding E3. Things are different this year. There weren’t any huge leaks; on the contrary, Sony themselves released information on a large number of what one would expect to be their big titles (things like Little Big Planet 2, Infamous 2, and Killzone 3) on their own official blog last week. There is much question as to what this all means. The pessimistic theory is that we can expect another boring conference. The optimistic theory is that Sony has such big announcements to make that they needed to clear space in the conference to cover them. Now even if this latter theory is true, there is still a lot of uncertainty over whether this is a good thing. It’s pretty much a given that Sony will be showing off Move, their motion controller, but 360’s Kinect and Nintendo’s dismal Zelda demo have left me devoid of much hope for motion controls. It could also be that Sony spends a lot of time talking about 3D gaming, given their recent release of 3D patches for Wipeout, Motorstorm, and Pain. If I didn’t make it clear in the Nintendo post, I’m not exactly super enthusiastic about 3D; I am sensitive to flicker, and have always found 3D to cause me eye strain. Perhaps the darkest of all would be the introduction of a premium subscription-based PSN membership plan, as has been rumored. One of the best aspects of the PS3 is that its network functionality is all free, unlike the 360 which saves all of its desirable new features for those willing to pay for a Gold subscription. A slightly more positive reveal would be PSP2, though given the track records I’m much more excited about a DS successor than the next PSP.

On the games front, it’s a little tougher to guess what Sony will try to wow us with, considering the most obvious candidates have already been outed. Of course the biggest game for me is still The Last Guardian, and word on that at least has been quiet so far. Perhaps we will see a little more of the perpetually-not-ready Final Fantasy Versus XIII, which still appears to be an exclusive after its no-show at Microsoft’s conference.

What I’m hoping for

I have a big wishlist:

  • The announcement of new firmware features, including support of MKV video files.
  • Downloadable PS2 games.
  • The Last Guardian releasing this year.
  • The rumored Team ICO Collection (ICO and Shadow of the Colossus) with HD graphics
  • Final Fantasy Versus XIII releasing this year.
  • Something impressive on PSN
  • Persona 5 (I can dream) or at least some new RPG

What will be mocked

The fact that PS Move looks like a sex toy for robots.

And the Conference begins!

The opening montage clearly shows 3D glasses and (mystifyingly) the PS2. They’re not still planning on dedicating a full segment to PS2, are they.

Jack Tretton is on stage. He always seems somewhat nervous in his presentations in a vaguely endearing way. I do kind of miss Phil Harrison, though. Tretton is quickly passing things over to Kaz Hirai who is going to talk about 3D (boo). “What Playstation did for Blu-Ray, we plan to do for 3D.” He probably doesn’t mean a protracted battle to convince consumers to care that takes several years to develop. 20 new native 3D titles are coming in the next 9 months. I have to wonder whether Sony really grasps that not everyone buys a high-end HDTV every year. Hell, I just bought one, and can tell you that only the most expensive sets are offering 3D right now. Anyway, they are now demoing Killzone 3, in 3D. The people in the audience have 3D glasses, and those of us at home are out of luck. They at least seem to have a normal 2D video stream for the cameras. The game looks pretty enough, but this demo is going on for like 5+ minutes. I guess this blows the theory about the game being talked about on the blog to free up time. Game is not out until early next year. Will be fully compatible with Playstation Move (I cannot imagine how or why).

Motorstorm, Gran Turismo, Crysis 2, Mortal Kombat will be in 3D. Really? Mortal Kombat?

Uh oh, and the youtube video stream appears to be down. Trying to find a new one…

OK, something happened that had a lot of applause, but I have no idea what it was. Something something 3D.

Alright, we’re moving on to Playstation Move now. I saw a demo of Move on the Engadget Show a few months ago, and the tech demos looked pretty neat, but there’s obviously a pretty big gap between demos and actual games. “For the first time in motion gaming, core gamers will have something challenging and rewarding”. The Move controller still looks like something you’d be embarrassed to have someone see in your house if they didn’t know what it was. Lengthy video of developers praising Move follows. Sony now explaining the value of a controller “having buttons”. Sony promises that with the capacity of Blu-Ray, they can put the PS Move version and the normal controller version on the same disc. Very interesting. But are developers going to be willing to create multiple versions?

Now on to brand new games. First up, Sorcery. The guy is demoing the controller’s motion, but doing it in a room with an extremely loud and annoying monkey. Oh good, he killed it. I’ll give it this, the game has better graphics than any Wii game, though it is basically a very generic Harry Potter-esque setting. Unlike the Zelda demo, everything the presenter is trying to do works on the first attempt.

The next demo is Tiger Woods golf. There’s definitely a fair big of lag (like ~1 second) between the movement of the controller and the movement of the club, which I think many are going to find difficult. Move functionality will be a downloadable add-on to the game after it releases. Interesting concept.

Last title is ‘Heroes on the Move’, featuring characters from Jak, Ratchet, and Sly Cooper. Not exactly clear what the game is. The demo was over before I finished typing that first sentence. OK…there will be a cross marketing agreement between PS Move and Coca-Cola. Extended cheering from the audience that I hope is sarcastic, but probably isn’t.

Playstation commercial personality ‘Kevin Butler’ has now appeared to make some light-hearted jabs at Microsoft’s bizarre elephant-infused Kinect event. “Gaming is about having a huge TV in a tiny one-bedroom apartment”. “Gaming is about pretending to work while watching E3 press conferences at your desk”. Butler is on a roll. Crowd is loving this. Butler now making a dramatic Independence Day-esque speech urging casual and hardcore gamers to come together. Big points to the writers of this conference. Move will be available in September. $99 for Move controller, PS Eye camera, and their Wii Sports knockoff. Seems like a reasonable price if you’re into it. There will be a software update for several existing games to support Move, including Heavy Rain, a game that could probably really use it. Montage of unimpressive looking games set to Real to Reel’s I Like to Move It.

OK so now we’re 50 minutes into the conference and we have gotten the 3D and motion control stuff out of the way. PSP is next. New advertising campaign featuring that awesome kid from Human Giant. Is advertising really what the PSP needs? It’s a little weird to be pimping out a new advertising campaign as part of the press conference. “PSP will be going strong for years to come”. New PSP God of War teaser shown. 70 new games coming to PSP by December. The Third Birthday, new Patapon, Valkyria Chronicles, Persona 3 Portable. Nothing really unannounced. Looks like no PSP2.

Now, Playstation Network. Sony has completely replicated their E3 booth in Playstation Home (hmm, too bad I’ve never bothered to install Home). Now we have Little Big Planet 2 being demoed. Really makes you wonder why they announced this stuff on the blog in advance if they were going to show it at the conference. LBP was a game that really didn’t deliver on its original promise. Well, I should say that it delivered the features originally advertised, but no one I know who owns the game particularly likes it. LBP2 has a mini-game factory that lets you create competitive puzzle/party games. The toolset definitely looks much more flexible than the first game, but I will take a wait & see approach.

Now here comes the PSN subscription package, Playstation Plus (boo!). Preferred early demos (boo!!!!), early access to betas, discounts on PSN software. Cost: $49.99/yr. Same price 360 Gold launched at, but it’s easy to find it discounted to $35/yr.

EA is on stage to unveil 2 new PS3 games. First up, Medal of Honor. This is the game where the soldier on the cover has a ridiculous beard. Producer is on stage to demo game and also has a ridiculous beard. Anyway, Medal of Honor is EA’s attempt to provide a competitor to Activiation’s Call of Duty. Not too much to glean from the demo video. This guy really has a lot of beard going on. Producer has just announced that game will have “unlockable beards”. Second game is Dead Space 2. I didn’t play the original, but Jim seemed to like it a lot. Nice looking video. Will support PS Move.

Well, this is a surprise. Valve’s Gabe Newell is now on stage. Newell has said some very negative things about the PS3 in the past. Valve will be bringing Portal 2 to PS2 with Steam (!), including Steam Cloud (!). We’re now getting the first look at Portal 2. This is a real surprise since Valve officially canceled their Portal 2 booth. Demo was short, but showed navigation through an outdoor environment, which I’m glad to see as I really like the exploration aspect of Portal’s last level but less thrilled with the sterile clinical test environments.

Now we have video of Final Fantasy IV. The fact that this game is an MMO (and some of the things I’ve hear about FFXI) means that I really have no anticipation for this title. Now we have a premier of the new Assassin’s Creed 3. Multiplayer beta exclusive to PS3. Something something Mafia 2 exclusive.

By the way, this conference is a lot longer than the previous two.

OK, next is Gran Turismo 5. Hard to believe that this game still isn’t out yet, right? Well, it’s coming in November. Of this year.

Infamous 2. Ice powers.You know, if you want to know more, you can read the Playstation Blog. From last week.

“One last surprise for you”. It’s a new Twisted Metal game! Excellent, one of my favorite Playstation series. They actually have an ice cream truck driving on stage with a scary man dressed as Sweet Tooth. David Jaffe is now on stage. Jaffe, you lied to us about not making a new Twisted Metal game as recently as 2 weeks ago! Game looks fun.

Conference now over after nearly two hours. Half an hour longer than the Microsoft and Nintendo conferences.

Closing Thoughts

It was a long conference so I’ll try to keep this brief. The conference had some good elements, but ultimately I’m disappointed that not a single thing on my wishlist showed up. Where is The Last Guardian?

I’m not happy about the strong emphasis on 3D. Part of this is selfish; I just bought a large television that does not support 3D. But consider this: if I had wanted to bump up to a higher model in the same TV line that supported 3D I would have had to pay an additional $1500. More than twice as much as I paid. And even if you spent $5000 on your TV in 2009, you wouldn’t have 3D. And let’s not even get into the extra cost of a 3D-capable receiver and 3D glasses.

The point I’m getting at is that I see this less as a boon for Playstation owners and more of a strategy of Sony’s entire electronics department to try to force people to spend huge amounts of money on their products, and you really have to question the wisdom of this strategy when they took so much heat for selling a console for $600.

Anyway, it was still a much better conference than Microsoft. It’s always tough to compare the Nintendo conference to the other two, but I would say that if you are someone who feels a lot of Nintendo franchise nostalgia, then the Nintendo conference was probably the best. If you prefer to lust over future technologies, you’d probably prefer Sony’s. It would be fair to say that Nintendo exceeded my expectations whereas both Microsoft and Sony fell short.

collapse Michael Says:

Let me say, categorically and prematurely, that I will never own a 3D television. What percentage of Americans own an HDTV, do you think? 50%? More? How many of them are really willing to upgrade, expensively, just so they can watch some content in 3D while wearing goofy glasses?

One other question: what does 3D look like on a television? Do objects seem to be coming out from the television, falling into it, or both? What about on a movie screen?

 

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