Well I have been on the show floor for the past 2 days and this place is crazier than ever. More people, more games and the hype for the Xbox 360 and PS3 is amazing. Microsoft has always had a huge presence on the show floor but if they spent less than 10 million dollars on floor space, manpower and the materials to create the massive booth itself, I will be amazed.
Now don’t get me wrong, this is trade show for vendors to pitch their products to be sure, but it seems as though Sony and MS are taking things up a notch in order to drown out the real competition: each other. And frankly, even with the large amount of E3 floor space Nintendo is taking up, they need to include either some kick butt technology in the flesh or at the very least lots of information on the soon to be released technology among their usual trade show trappings.
The President of Nintendo, Satoru Iwata says they will not be releasing specs on the console until near the end of the year. This includes info on the controller, the price and even how games will be played on it. He claims this is done on purpose so as not to “tip his hand” to rivals MS and Sony, who apparently are not afraid to tip their hands to anyone as witnessed by their press conferences earlier this week. The cynic in me says that if Nintendo had the actual specs, they would release them. From what little we know of the Phantom, I like the idea of the downloadable game library and the multiplayer capabilities are good but it makes me wonder if it’s not too little too late.
The GameBoy Advance Micro is on the floor and granted it is cute, but I do not have that burning desire to go out and get one RIGHT NOW like I did the first time I held a PSP. As a friend of mine pointed out, “Sure it’s small enough to slip into your pocket, but what is going to keep the screen from getting scratched up when I do?”. The fact that you can skin the little guy (the GBA Micro, not my friend) is also neat, but again, does nothing to generate extra excitement for me to buy one.
The game play movie for the new Zelda game was impressive. That was running constantly on a big screen and I am looking forward to playing that one this Christmas. Lots of new GameBoy Advance titles littered the floor including several Harvest Moon titles. I did not have time to stop and give them a spin but fans of the series should have plenty to keep themselves busy.
Anyway, I’m tired. More later.
-Moesha