E3 2008 has passed and now we have plenty of games to discuss about! I’ll just recap here what were the conferences about and linking some videos, for the full coverage i recommend you the official site.

Microsoft

Microsoft did exactly what everyone would expect from a videogame expo: showing off games. Not many new games announcements with Fallout 3, Gears of War 2 and Fable 2 but everyone of these titles had a great gameplay video and most of them are coming out this year.

The shock came with Square-Enix announcing Final Fantasy XIII for the Xbox360 with a glorious HD trailer way better than the one they showed last year. Armors, swords, chicks, badass bullies and ships in the sky like it’s always have been. Poor sony fanboys. I think they feel like Nintendo fanboys when the new Banjo & Kazooie was announced as well.

For their system, Microsoft though of a new dashboard, a bit complicated at first but really enjoyable, and a new (really?) network community, based on full-body avatars like Miis or the PSN that will allow users to share every media they have on their Xbox HDDs. FacebookLiveBunchofcommunities FTW!

Nintendo

From the Industry-leader since 1986 you’d expect tons of new games for their fans but it wasn’t quite what they prepared. I’m sure they have got big hits for the next year but for now we know they’re still targeting the family with their games (you can’t say the Famicom was a bad idea). First, they showed a snowboard game for the Wii Balance Board.

Following the guitar hero stream and aiming to the whole musical audience Miyamoto presented WiiMusic, a game that allows you to “create” your music, instead of just following the notes on coloured bars (a drummer performed solo with incredible precision. I can’t guess how he managed to use the nunchuck like that).

The next news was a WiiSports follow-up: WiiSports Resort. It’ll feature wiimote-based sports like his precursor but set on a tropic isle. What really changes the approach to the game is a new peripheral for the Wiimote that increases his accuracy in detecting rotation and target position. Many of us though that a “slice-for-real” Zelda is on the way because of this.

Another peripheral was announced: a microphone to be placed on top of the sensor bar to communicate worldwide while playing the new Animal Crossing: city folk. yes, voice chat is finally coming to the Wii but I don’t think it’s a good thing to let anybody hear your mother screaming “Dear, dinner’s ready! Your soup’s chilling!”. I want a headset. Period.

Sony

Sony just presented his lineup. Sony fanboys are the most certain about their future at the moment and at least they know what to save money for. A big bunch of games is coming for the three Sony platforms at the moment. Here’s a quick list with video links:

God of War 3, Killzone 2, Little Big Planet, Motorstorm: Pacific Rift, LocoRoco 2, Patapon 2, Resistance: Retribution, Super Stardust Portable, Fl0wer and Ratchet & Clank Future: Quest For Booty.

We don’t own systems but we know our business

Square

Square conference was unusual. Yoshinori Kitase and Shinji Hashimoto sat at a table and listened to the answers from the attendants about Final Fantasy XIII. I think this is also what a press conference is for

Final Fantasy XIII will be still developed for the PS3 first and then it’ll be ported to Xbox360. The game will require just one disk thanks to the blue-ray technology but we’re uncertain about Xbox360’s support at the moment. Currently there’s no footage but it’ll be available soon and the battle system will be and evolution of the classic ATB system.

Capcom

Lost Planet’s movie is on the way, featuring the producer of the first two Spiderman movies and the voice of Solid Snake. Capcom wants to continue its movie ports successes after the big hits Resident Evil and…. Street Fighter (yes, they actually said that).

Megaman 9 (with pixelated graphics) is going to be released for the XboxLive, WiiWare and PSN. Am I the only one excited about this? Well… I like pixels…

Konami

Konami did the same as Sony, it showed its lineup for the year and let the images speak for themselves. In 2008 you’ll get Silent Hill: Homecoming, many DanceDance games and a couple of Castlevania for the Wii: Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia and Castlevania: Judgment.

Sega

Another lineup list: Empire: Total War, Golden Axe: Beast Rider, Madworld, Samba de Amigo, Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood, Sonic Unleashed, Space Siege and Stormrise.

EA

New teasers, new demos and new games announced for EA: SimAnimals, Sims 3, Mirror’s Edge, Dragon Age: Origin and Left 4 Dead.

Out of time

Not mentioned during the E3 conferences or just before or after it we still have a couple of trailers that will make you wonder. Enjoy Wario Land: Shake It! and Mirror’s Edge animated story trailer. Sonic & the Black Knight and Pikmin 3 are also under development but we don’t have media at the moment.

A lot of things happened since august 15th but if we see it from an all different perspective we could also say that nothing special happened. Let’s go step by step.

Final Fantasy XIII got a japanese release date. It’s December 17th. It’s like any other date for me but not for japanese people. They’d better start saving money for corrupting the guys ahead of them in the queue.

Sega is working on a new 2D Sonic game in HD. They didn’t promise us that it won’t suck though. A couple of words for Sonic: “Stop hanging out with Tails & co and get the hell out of Nintendo games.”

Valve showed off more of L4D2 at Pax. New special infecteds and new campaigns with a working funfair. I don’t get why they didn’t do it all DLC. Oh, yeah, they like the moneys. Also, I’m working on an expo like pax: the GIX. It reads just like geeks, which is hilarious, see? People will come from the other side of earth just to spell it.

I renewed my hatred for macs. Nothing can justify €2000 for a low-profile laptop, not even DDR3 memory (NEDM, I’m sure it’s correct this way).

I bought Street Fighter 4. Zangief is still over-powered, Dhalsim is still a mummy and Cammy has still got buns. So fun with a friend next to you, so painful over the net. Small lag often prevents you from inputting combos and that’s not funny at all.

Ps3 slim: new console, same games. Hirai, what were you thinking about that day?

Final Fantasy Dissidia is out. Please, people, stop making fighting games with ultra-cool dudes compensating with their huge swords and sexy babes. Also, you’ll never defeat the colorful colors of Katamary Damacy, so focus a little more on style. Sad but true, Street Fighter 4 is the best fighting game you can stick to lately.

And, last but not least, Valve declared as “cheat” the external idler known as “steamstats”. I won’t discuss if this is correct or not, I’ll just say that adding frustration to frustration isn’t a good thing. Every player that used the idler had a little clean-up in his inventory and every player that didn’t use it got a limited-edition fake-halo hat called “cheater’s lament”, promptly modded as a real-fag hat by the community. Who got this hat? Uninterested, inactive and unaware players. They really deserve it after the hundreds of hats they dropped in 3 months. Seriously, Valve, make a “best player gets a hat” system and I’ll be back playing. Fuck your medals and exclusive status symbol hats, as for now TF2 has been replaced by Mass Effect on my HDD.

Also, new poll opened. You may request other options commenting here.

Remember that we got a steam group! Join if you feel like playing with us once in a while.

Time flies. It’s been almost a month after the last post already. I know I should have written this earlier but I had some exams to pass. I passed every one of them by the way and only three remain in October but I have the whole summer to work on those, between some Mario Galaxy and Metroid.

You may have read the latest news on game announcements at E3 but let’s recap, just to make sure what we’re going to buy and why.

Microsoft

Probably the most embarrassing conference I’ve seen, even worse than that Nintendo conference from 2009. Let’s face it, Kinect (Natal’s new name) is just an improved Eye toy and what they showed was a more multimedia box than a gaming console. Movies, Facebook integration and sport events aren’t that interactive when it comes to actually play. And about Skittles, I’m sure that the little girl enjoyed that part as much as we didn’t. You’ll see my comic on this later. There’s at least a really good news in the release of a new 360 model, with built-in wi-fi and larger HDD.

EA

Nice stuff, really. I’ve got a couple of friends overly excited about Battlefield Vietnam just for the lack of Carl Gustav and seeing Dead Space 2 in action with more quick time events was really a bang. I’ve been re-playing Dead Space lately after EA’s big sale on steam and I perfectly recall the adrenaline i felt the first time a drag tentacle grabbed me.

Crysis 2 is nearing completion and it has been optimized for slower machines while faster machines will star in Need for Speed: Hot pursuit featuring multiplayer police car chase.

Ubisoft

Ubisoft presented a handful of very interesting games, starting with Child of Eden, from Tetsuya Mizuguchi, and ending with Rayman Origins, passing by Assassin’s creed brotherhood. They also showed a new non-video-game with plastic guns and laser sensors that allows you to battle in your living room or set up checkpoint runs. I don’t know if you have ever seen this but in the 90’s there was a game called “Laser combat” sold with 2 guns and 2 chest sensors. It’s pretty much the same, even in the look.

The most interesting product is probably the UBIart Framework: a new in-house development engine. I hope they release it as free someday, like the Unreal Engine or Quake Engine.

Nintendo

Everyone that wasn’t expecting anything big after the leaks in the months before E3 got terribly shocked. Nintendo threw on screen a huge number of games for both DS, Wii and the new 3DS, finally unveiled. Goldeneye, Donkey Kong Country Returns, Kid Icarus Uprising, Zelda Skyward Sword, Kirby Epic Yarn, Golden Sun: Dark Dawn and many more. I really can’t figure out precisely how much I’m going to spend within the next year.

My bad, I couldn’t see the Nintendo 3DS in action as you don’t get the 3d effect from videos but from what I’ve read it works like a window on another world. The black border around the screen helps to isolate the 3d image from the rest and your brain reads it independently. It sounds awkward but it’s possible if your eyes aren’t too close or too far from the screen and not tilted. With the amount of games revealed and awaiting us within the end of Nintendo’s financial year (March 2011) there’s no doubt they owned the show this year.

Sony

Sony’s motion control, named Move, is finally priced at $49.99 and supported by good games and not only tech demos, like Sorcery and Tiger Woods PGA Tour 11. Media molecule’s Alex Evans unveiled a little more of Little Big Planet 2 and how it will be a platform for games and not just a platform game. I admire their intents but I feel that the LBP franchise would work way better on PC with external applications and a supportive community. Just look at how far Garry’s Mod made it.

The big bomb came with Gabe Newell, announcing that portal 2 will be released on PS3 too. I wonder what made him change his mind considering that coding forPS3 is actually time-consuming, despite his previous statements were jokes or not. Medal of Honor and Dead Space 2 went on the screens again with Dead Space Extraction as bonus playable with the PlayStation Move. The conference ended with a disturbing clown in an ambulance promoting a new Twisted Metal game.

The worst part was Kevin Butler, charging up the crowd  and mocking the products of other companies like Sony invented everything in gaming since the creation of PlayStation. That’s not something you do in front of people who probably owns every console on the market.

I’m sorry to inform you that from now on I won’t publish my comics regularly twice a week but they’ll be published when they’re ready. The main cause for this is that I’m starting to have some heavy work to do for the academy, including 4 different projects and university class to attend as long as I can before the classes start to overlap at the beginning of march. In this conditions drawing the comic has turned out to be a chore in hours when I would just launch any game to rest (I can rest even playing Doom or Team Fortress 2, so you know). It’s not that I don’t enjoy drawing anymore, but rather that I put so much effort in the comic that it isn’t relaxing any more. Before the next year I’ll probably change the domain name and turn this website in my personal portfolio with illustrations, videos and the comic. Don’t worry. I still have tons of ideas for future comics, although I like to think new jokes as soon as I finish drawing one.

Now that I took the aching tooth out, here’s a little glimpse on the ongoing story: I’ve chosen the names for the two undead that will lead our heroes into the depth of the Inn’s basement once again. You’ll get more info on them in the next comics, but for now I have a nice nickname for one of the two.

The fun part is that I wanted to give more character to him and his skeletal pal but every time I had to draw his face this was the only suitable expression. I mainly wanted to make him different from the average numb zombie but that face of his will be so awkward in the future that it’s a shame not to draw it.

There’s more. The story I’m drawing lately doesn’t have any particular reference to games because I didnt’ find any laughable game in the past two months. Yes, I’ve played Dead Space 2 but it’s so “serious” and well-conceived that it’s hard to find new jokes about it. Luckily, Kirby Epic Yarn, Bulletstorm, Brink, Portal 2 and many others are drawing really near.

You may also have heard that Sony revealed its next portable console, the New Generation Portable, or NGP. Although the games in the works are less than the respective 3ds titles, its graphics are really amazing for the small piece of technology that is. I hate to look at good graphics on small screens.

Last sad news: don’t hold up your hopes for Mirror’s Edge 2. DICE shifted almost all of its employee to the development of Battlefield 3. I leave comments about this to you. I’m tired to say the old things once again to sound just like an old geezer.

Another year, another E3. Instead of making a boring list of what happened and what you should look into I’ll just post the IGN E3 video page. You’ll find all the conferences and interviews to the developers in a handy day-by-day list.

Now, on to some impressions:

Konami

Not a proper conference but it’s still nice from them to have a large update on their projects. Kojima needs to make an off-the-wall game as soon as possible. Up to now, he’s been masking his comedian self behind the serious look of metal gear.

Microsoft

Kinect is the word. Lacking a new hardware reveal Microsoft presented a handful of games with Kinect support. I especially liked Mass Effect 3, where you can use voice commands to speed up the action and direct your teammates. Too bad this feature won’t be available for the PC version. After seeing the rest of the games under development I’m starting to think that Kinect should be art installation hardware only. The ways it has been hacked are a lot more interesting.

EA

Nothing special but a handful of gameplay videos of their franchises. Classy and functional. What I didn’t like was the football trio with fake sweat and Sims Social. That last one gave me the shivers as I wondered how low our society is falling.

Ubisoft

I loved Mr Caffeine as much as I hated Kevin Butler last year. That’s a good way to host a show, with the right amount of humor and familiarity with the crowd. Ubisoft’s conference has been really entertaining with retro-styled cutscenes before they presented a game and relating the people in the audience of these events to what they have always been: fans of the medium.

Sony

Their conference has been very humble compared to the previous years,  especially due to the PSN outage, but it still had the kick. Lots of games both for traditional controller and Move and the reveal of the PSVita with some developers demonstrating the capabilities of the new hardware. A very good conference indeed but it could have been better without montage videos of random games and their brand logos. Those just wasted time.

(Mind someone explain me why I can’t stop laughing when I see Yoshinori Ono? Is it his wardrobe?)

Nintendo

Of course they didn’t wait to celebrate Zelda’s 25 years with tons of bonuses and announcements for 3DS, Wii and your real life. That’s a given, I think. As expected we got a step-by-step presentation of all the 3DS games that are to come in the next year and were only rumored or shown in stills last year. Lastly, the reveal of the Wii U, was a little underwhelming with a short video showing new gameplay mechanics, a tech demo and clips of triple-A titles unfortunately captured from their 360, PS3 and PC counterparts. That’s comprehensible though, as the WiiU is still at least one year from launch and can still show what it’s capable of.

I’ll discuss of the PSVita and WiiU reveal later as they deserve their own article, together with some other impressions about upcoming games and recently played.

Now that I had some more time to think I am back to express some more concerns about the current state of the videogame industry.

The first thing I have to say to everyone working outside of it is “calm down”. I’ve seen too many bashing reviews, and light-hearted comments lately and I think it’s time to position myself in neutral ground to show both good and bad sides of a few topics.

PSVita

I like to call it DS 2.0 more for the two touch screens than Sony’s never-ending habit of copying what has already been successfully done by others. Graphics-wise it’s amazing that such a small device can hold that much computing power but the few demonstrations on stage didn’t show anything relevant that hasn’t been done with a DS so far. While touch screens will easily provide a faster control scheme for games like Little Big Planet it’s also true that they will be exposed to dust, scratches and finger grease more than ever. The DS had screen protectors and later version of the system didn’t need them any more because the stylus wasn’t able to scratch the screen any more but placing a layer of (deforming) plastic on the PSV’s screen or any type of dirt carried by your finger kind of misses the point of having awesome graphics. Unfortunately, Sony never provided a proper way to protect the screen without buying a case .

Regarding the touch screen on the back I’m eager to see how developers can interface the player with it, because honestly you can’t see where you’re putting your fingers. I was amused at Sony’s demo of a new Modnation Racers title where you could raise mountain in the track editor by pressing “behind” the PSV or excavate lakes by pressing on the front touch screen but that could have also been done with the front screen only and a raise/lower button. The back screen is kind of unintuitive and unnecessary compared to what the front screen can do alone (it’s not unnecessary per se) and removing it could help Sony to balance better on that $250 price tag.

Oh, you know that I’m italian but… I like the name. It has a good sound.

Wii U

Still on names, I understand that “Wii U : Wii = 3DS : DS” in terms of market and I can’t argue with that. Dolphin, Revolution and Café were just project names but before the announcement I heard the name Beem and I kind of liked it more than Wii U.

To the people that felt deluded watching the conference or attending it, and those who sold their Nintendo shares directly afterwards, I want to ask “what were you expecting?”. Were you expecting a system that runs Crysis Warhead at 300 fps for less than $100, a controller that cures cancer or allows teleportation through the Xen and beyond? Let’s be honest for a moment, if Nintendo revealed a “classic” console with a Gamecube-like controller only with more power maybe you would have felt important for a moment, knowing that Nintendo made a console just for you “gamer” (I would like to avoid this word but it helps you to understand what I mean), ignoring completely the other 80-90% of other Nintendo customers who would feel clumsy and inexperienced once again. Those people are also the “U” in Wii U. What Nintendo is trying to do with the new controller is to convince people that they can have on the big screen those good experiences they had with their DS, be them alone or with friends.

Despite the negative criticism and cold reception of the new controller I saw a lot of fan depictions of possible uses for the controller, from x-ray screen in Trauma Center to micro RTS management in Pikmin, all of which were very intriguing. If fans can figure out gameplay twists like those in half a day I can’t wait to see what developers with their hands on the development kits can do. Easy development and new possibilities are what made the Wii and DS so successful and I don’t see any reason the Wii U can’t be successful too, except the price tag maybe.

My last concern is the shape of the controller itself. While at first it seemed huge I’ve noticed that’s smaller than I thought and it’s lighter than an iPad. I’ve already tried the same type of thumb slide stick in the 3DS an it’s not uncomfortable as it seems. Now I just need to hold it to feel how it rests in my hands. Remember though, both the DS and Wii have been redesigned before and after their launch.

Duke Nukem Forever

Two words: fun shooter. There’s not much else that we should expect from a game inspired to the standards of the early ’90s.

DNF doesn’t have a deep story or new game mechanics but it sure knows how to entertain with any sort of distraction. It really looks that the developers put more time into the jokes and fun stuff you can do than the rest of the game which it’s not a bad thing on its own when you’re laughing.  Basically it’s making fun of every shooter out there and quoting video games here and there. Which other game allows you to microwave a rat, jump on hamburgers and throw turds around?If you don’t find fun running into your enemy’s ankle with an RC car i don’t know what’s wrong with you.

Portal 2

Totally worth playing, both single-player and multi-player mode can be completed in about two weeks without rushing but you know Valve, they always put free DLC and development kits in the mix. Portal 2 further explores the definitions of “in and out”, “forward and reverse” and, above all, “not so fast”. Don’t think that just because there are less white walls the puzzles will be easier to solve.

The Co-op campaign is well built, giving the players tools to see through each other’s eyes or point out elements in the maps, but remember, the best tool is still your microphone.

Brink

After playing for a while you really feel like shooting isn’t worth the trouble, at least not shooting randomly at people. While most players found this game boring after a while I think Splash Damage did a good job putting emphasis on helping the team and building better teamwork than most of the shooters out there, TF2 included. The parkour isn’t as relevant as it is in Mirror’s Edge but it really changes how you approach maps, especially the widest ones.

Like me, almost everyone of you predicted the inevitable price drop of the Nintendo 3DS, what we didn’t expect was the actual timing. On August 12 all 3DS on the market will be retailed at a $170, €170 and ￥15000. PSV will be launched in Japan at the end of 2011 and worldwide in early 2012 but I think Nintendo wants to build a faster userbase with this sudden price drop. To be honest, I’m relieved that Sony forced Nintendo to take this step that will probably accelerate the 3DS life cycle. If you remember, the DS had a similar development in its first months of life, selling badly, few games and mostly unknown to the masses. Look at it now. I admit that the 3DS is now tempting me but I’ll wait for at least a game I’m interested in: Mario Kart 7 or Super Mario 3D land, whichever comes first. Unless I find a retailer that plays dirty and lowers the price earlier, allowing me to benefit from the 20 free games reserved for early adopters.

Regarding the last comic, I have uploaded the high-res version of the pseudo-Picasso painting. You can try to look at it in 3D crossing your eyes but I warn you: it won’t work. It isn’t supposed to! I just wanted to apply cubist theories to 3D vision and I think it’s pretty convincing. Click it to view it full-size.