The First Post

Note from the Editor: Welcome our first new author, DarkPC! This doesn't mean I'll be doing any less; rather, it means that there will be more content for you! DarkPC will be focusing on Microsoft and the Xbox 360. Occasionally he might do posts on other topics, and I'll still be doing posts on 360 things, especially on the games themselves.

Hello Readers, I am Christian Canales AKA DarkPC on the internet.

I will be blogging with Aldowyn on video games. Specifically I’ll be blogging on Xbox 360 and other Microsoft video game musings which includes reviews and news. Also you can contact me via Twitter, @DarkPCTV, and on Xbox Live, GamerTag: e345., or shoot me an e-mail to darkpc2@gmail.com Now that the introduction is out of the way let’s talk Microsoft!

Update: New Avatar items coming to the Marketplace on 6/24. I will check them out and tweet later on.

Now, first things first, we have to talk about Kinect and its reveal at E3. Kinect is Xbox’s venture into the so called Motion Control “hype.” I for one believe the hype and actively embrace the motion control gaming “hype.” Kinect in my opinion is the best motion control gaming device with the Wii coming in close second. (Author’s Note: Before all the PS3 Fan boys call for my head, hear me out. I have not tried the Move YET! I’m only listing the motion controls that either I have seen been demoed or I have actually tried. So calm down I will get to the Move Eventually, once I get to either see it being demoed or actually demoed it myself.)

Also a new Xbox 360 Model was revealed at E3. It has a 250GB built-in HDD and built-in 802.11n Wi-Fi. Also it is supposedly slimmer than the current model 360 Elite. No major re-designs on the controller or any other peripheral. I have also heard on the internet via kotaku.com that this 360 doesn’t Red Ring but that was quickly shot as Microsoft said that the ring of light are ONLY green the power sign will be red to signify any errors. Would I get a new 360 slim? No, unless something catastrophic would happen to my 360 elite.

Among some of the games that are coming to the 360 in the next 6-9 months are all the Kinect Games including Dance Central, Kinect Joyride, Kinectmals, etc. The retail games that were announced were, Gears 3, Halo Reach, MGS: Rising, CoD: Black Ops, Fable III (finally!), Crackdown 2, and for anyone loves Sports, ESPN is coming to Live!

That is it for now! I’ll be posting more as more Xbox/Microsoft News comes out!

Thanks for Reading and comeback for more if you can!

-DarkPC

Picture Snippet from news.cnet.com

Sony and Big 3 wrap-up

Don't forget to read my summary of Nintendo's conference, which I just posted, and with no furthur ado:

Sony

Sony was also last at E3 2009, and they had to push the PS Move through as "new", despite the fact that Microsoft had just finished announcing their motion control. That wasn't an issue this year, as both of them had their motion controls, and we knew that, so Sony wasn't at such a disadvantage this time.

Sony opened with a bit of a speech, saying that this year would be the year Sony "brought 3D to games". They quickly followed it up with Killzone 3(D). Which has jetpacks... and aliens... and all those other things that make Killzone Killzone. You'll be able to get your hands on it in February 2011.
Sony also announced that several other games will be coming out in 3D, such as the long awaited Gran Turismo 5 and MLB: The Show.

Then... more speeches. This time about their new motion control, Playstation Move. A fairly big deal was made about the fact that it actually has buttons.
They then informed us that SOCOM 4 will be using motion controls. Yay! I guess...

One of the most unique games I saw this entire E3 was a Move-centric game called Sorcery. As is obvious, you'll be playing a wizard, and you'll use move to aim your spells, draw glyphs on the screen to cast different spells, and all sorts of awesome stuff like that. It actually looks like it works pretty well, as the guy demoing it was able to hit the enemies reliably.

Then they demoed PGA Tour 11. Fairly standard, but it uses Move, which really does make the difference. It seemed remarkably close to 1:1-and the golfer made the hole within par. If you like golfing (or your dad does), this might be a good game to have.

Next came Heroes on the Move, starring such Sony heroes as Ratchet & Clank, Jak & Dexter, and a couple others. Okay, it's a platformer (I think all the heroes are from platformers, or at least pseudo-platformers) where you play as all the different characters, simple enough.

Sony then gave a release date and some prices. It comes out September 19, and the original controller will be $50, the sub-controller will be $30, there's a bundle with both and Sports Champions for $100, and that with the PS3 for $400.

After that came several games with pretty much no information provided, those being Eyepet, The Shoot, and Echochrome ii.

Kevin Butler came on stage and announced a new advertising campaign for the PSP, starring one Marcus Rivers, and a slogan of "Step your game up!" Basically, it's the PS3 commercials with Marcus instead of KB and a different slogan.

Then, predictably, came several games for the PSP. Among these are Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker, Invizimals, and God of War: Ghost of Sparta... and a stat. That stat is 70+, yes seventy plus PSP games by December of this year, and there's quite a few that look pretty good.

Finished with the PSP, we move on to one amazing looking game. That game is LittleBigPlanet2. The first one was pretty amazing, but this one steps its game up. (See what I did there? Too bad it's not on the PSP) The first one focused mainly on platformers, but you can make anything in LBP2. Some talented individual made an RTS. Yes, a real-time strategy game. You know, like Starcraft? They added so many new features, they decided they weren't even going to talk about them and just showed a montage of awesome games made by players of the first game who were invited to see what they could do with the new game.

Then came an unusual announcement that I've oddly heard next to nothing about: Playstation Plus. It's a subscription based upgrade to PSN that lets you get all sorts of cool stuff-supposedly worth hundreds of dollars, including discounts and free PSN games. We weren't provided with many details, but we did get a price. $50 for a yearly subscription which is the same as Xbox Live.

Sony then declared war on Microsoft. Well, in the FPS arena, anyway. Here comes the reboot of Medal of Honor, and guess what? Goodbye, WWII. We had a good run, but I think it's time to move on. Mostly because CoD did, and look what happened! Moving on, they announced a new character, Deuce, and showed off a map, located in Afghanistan, called Diwagal Camp. Also, a new HD version of Medal of Honor: Frontline will come with it.

Continuing from the EA conference the night before, we saw more on Dead Space 2. Which looks incredible. The dark, lonely, creepy atmosphere from the original is still very much in force. There will also be a limited (to PS3) edition, including Dead Space: Extraction (originally a Wii exclusive) with Move support.

Then Valve gave us their "surprise". Portal 2, via the most awesome medium ever-GLaDOS. From the trailer we saw, it will be much more complicated, and we know its going to be longer. Valve also announced that the PS3 version will be the best console (important distinction. Don't forget about the PC!) version of Portal 2, due to the inclusion of... Steamworks. This means that Valve will be able to conduct their signature after-launch support much more easily.

We next saw a pretty cool looking, but not incredible, trailer for Final Fantasy XIV, the new MMO coming from Square Enix. Not much else to say, just go watch the trailer if you want.

Then came Mafia 2, and an announcement that there will be PS3 exclusive content

After that came more Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood (it was shown at the Ubisoft press conference the night before), along with an announcement that there will be a PS3 exclusive multiplayer beta/demo.

Also shown was Metal Gear Solid: Rising, and a really cool trailer showing Raiden as the protagonist slicing up bad guys with the sword--which you are precisely controlling with Move. The trailer ended with an impressive display of control: A watermelon being sliced into wedges. Very clean wedges, too.

And then montage time of new games that apparently didn't rate much time-- despite the fact that there were some pretty cool games in it. Included were Tron: Evolution, DC Universe Online, True Crime, Marvel Vs. Capcom 3, Mortal Kombat 2, and Castlevania Lords of Shadow.

Nearing the end, we saw a trailer for the long-awaited Gran Turismo 5. Graphics amazing as always-- that's pretty much all you can see in a racing game like that. It's main hook, as far as I can tell, is the ridiculous number of cars in the game. Hundreds of cars, about 100 of them with fully detailed interiors. What's the point of detailing the interior?
After that we saw the sequel to Infamous, one of the most promising PS3 exclusives to come out in recent years. You'll be seeing Cole, with new ice powers to supplement his lightning powers from the previous game, in Infamous 2 sometime in 2011.

Finally, we got proof that David Jaffe is a liar. Twisted Metal and Sweet Tooth are coming back to the Playstation. Twisted Metal is the longest-running series on Playstation, but it hasn't had an installment on the PS3. In case you don't know, Twisted Metal is a car combat game. As opposed to Mario Kart or Blur, where you're racing and getting ahead using weapons, defeating enemies is the goal in Twisted Metal.
It was a particularly spectacular reveal, complete with an ice cream truck and a guy dressed as Sweet Tooth. (Proof that clowns are scary.) Includes new Nuke mode, which happens to be one of the most complicated ones I've seen. You have to capture the enemy leader (two sides, the clowns and dolls), take him back to your missile launcher, keep it there for a while, and then hit the enemy's flagship thing with the missile. Do this 3 times before the other team and you win.
In short, it looks to provide what nothing else can, and well at that!



So, this year was a pretty good year, as far as I'm concerned. None of the conferences were complete flops, and there seems to be dozens of games coming in the next year or so. The motion controls appear to have some potential, but more traditional games are far from being neglected- in fact, Nintendo, known for its focus on casual gamers, had a remarkable line-up of almost retro, hardcore games.
Personally, Kinect looks like it has more potential to be incredible, but PS Move looks like what potential it has is being used. I'm definitely glad that Nintendo is getting back to its classic franchises.
I give the win of this year's E3 to Nintendo. Admittedly, Sony's conference was definitely the most fun (Kevin Butler is awesome!), but it was full of montages and claims that Move and 3D are the wave of the future and completely revolutionary, even when it's obvious that Move is just a more accurate, even stupider looking version of the Wii's controls. Microsoft, despite quite a few big games coming out this year, didn't do anything unexpected, so it takes last place for me.

Tell me in the comments what you guys think!


P.S. Considering adding new writers to the blog. I'd still do more writing, but I think it would expand what we can cover, and have the end result of more information for you guys. Besides, it'd be kind of cool to be a senior editor of my own site! If you actually know me, or have a particularly interesting topic you know about and want to write on, feel free to ask!

E3: Big 3 Intro, & Microsoft

In case you've been living under a rock in the gaming world, this week was E3- short for Electronic Entertainment Expo, held annually in June, usually in LA. (Its history is a little spotty, but nevermind that, it doesn't matter.) E3 is THE conference of the year, where developers and publishers announce their games and provide demos for the press-- all in the name of publicity.

What's really cool about E3 is you get to see the future of video games happen- and most of that happens during the big 3 press conferences. (Nintendo, Microsoft, and Sony.) This is when and where they announce new consoles, new features, sometimes big new exclusive games, and just generally brag about how awesome this next year is going to be for this console and why YOU should get it. So I'm going to do a summary and short analysis of the big 3 conferences, each one with its own post and with a tie-in analysis after the last one (Sony) about where the industry seems to be heading, according to the tone of the conferences.

Considering doing a highlights of E3 post, but I probably won't because I didn't take notes for enough of the coverage... shame on me. I guess I'll just have to find a way to go next year, huh? :D


P.S. With a lot of these my knowledge from outside the conferences is going to be mixed with actual stuff from the conferences, especially with Microsoft. I'll try to keep to the most salient points of the games, but if you just want to know what games were announced instead of reading all of it, just look for the bolded and italicized (boldicized) words. Also, if there's something written about it, it probably had a trailer, and if it doesn't it was probably just in a list of stuff thrown out there.

P.P.S. If there's a particular game that you'd like me to take a look at and muse upon, put it in the comments! I really want to make this as informative for you guys as I can, as well as getting all this stuff in my head onto paper. (figuratively)

MICROSOFT

Microsoft started their conference with Call of Duty: Black Ops. While it's being made by Treyarch, the studio behind World at War, instead of Infinity Ward, who made the hugely popular Modern Warfare series, lots of people don't know that, and Treyarch isn't bad anyway, so this was a pretty good way to start.

Black Ops is going to be a FPS based throughout the Cold War period (Say 60's to 80's) in several different locales, as several different characters. (obviously. This isn't Metal Gear, where the protagonist remains the protagonist even when he's old and crippled--literally.) So there's going to be parts in Vietnam (I believe they showed this in particular), Russia, and a whole bunch of other places in SE Asia, Eastern Europe, Etc. It is logical to assume it will cover the story of all the secret stuff we did during the Cold War that we really weren't supposed to be doing.

Anyways, they showed a trailer, and it looked awesome. Graphically, I mean. The gameplay didn't seem like anything special, despite a cool-looking helicopter sequence, but the graphics... wow.

Following the trailer, Microsoft announced an unprecedented arrangement: All DLC, map packs, etc. for the Call of Duty franchise will come to the Xbox 360 FIRST before any other console, for the next 3 years. (Technically through 2012, I believe.) Obviously a good deal for Microsoft, and I imagine Activision (the CoD publisher) is getting quite a bit out of it too. In other words- get CoD on the 360 or be prepared to wait for after launch content.

Next came a 4-player co-op demonstration of Gears of War 3, with Epic's own Cliff Bleszinski (hey I spelled it right first time!) doing all the necessary on stage stuff. In this trailer, you fought all these mutated Locusts, called Lambents, which can do some really freaky stuff, and at the end you fight this giant... monster... thing. Not sure what it is.
ANYWAYS, Epic also announced a new Beast mode, where you play as some of these creepy beasties and try to kill the COG soldiers. From what I've heard, it sounds pretty deep and fun. Don't worry, everyone's favorite Horde mode will be returning as well.

Then came Peter Molyneux from Lionhead Studios to talk about Fable III and show a trailer. More blah blah blah stuff. So, Fable III is basically divided into 2 parts, the first part you are trying to overthrow the tyrant king, and in the second part you ARE the tyrant king-- or you can be. Well, you're the king. So you can be a tyrant if you want. So Peter Molyneux being typically ambitious, if not as much as some other times. (Remember Milo?)

Next came my personal favorite of the Microsoft conference, largely because I actually have played the earlier games in the series, Halo: Reach. (Notice all of these are later in a series. Interesting, no?)
Halo: Reach is Bungie's last hurrah with the Bungie universe, and it sure looks like its going to live up to the lofty expectations that are inevitably being placed on the last game in such an iconic franchise. The graphics are better, the physics are better, there's new weapons, the equipment of Halo 3 has been replaced with some cool looking "armor abilities", and it just looks all around awesome. What they actually showed at the conference was a trailer (it looked like gameplay, but it may have been scripted gameplay that was recorded for the sake of the trailer, thus making it a tiny bit suspect) for the campaign. It shows Noble Team (The protagonists. Halo: Reach is squad based, folks!) fighting through some Elites (who, btw, are MUCH bigger and stronger than the Spartans-even in multiplayer.), and eventually culminating in a space battle. Yes, playable space battles in Halo. Awesome, yes?

So that was basically the first part of the conference, and the part that you all are probably more interested in-- despite being unimportant, overall, to the game industry. So the second part of the conference is about that one big thing that's coming to the 360... Oh yeah. Motion Controls. Newly named Kinect, after ditching the code name, Project Natal. (They should have called it Kinetic. More accurate, and pretty much the same.)

First off, they talked about how it's going to revolutionize your dashboard experience. Yes, all I ever wanted my Xbox to let me do is to swipe with my hand to select what I'm going to do, even though it probably takes MORE effort than using a controller! Ok, seriously, it does sound like it could be pretty handy. Apart from the obvious camera, Kinect comes with a microphone, so you can control videos and the like with your voice. Example: "Xbox: Stop" stops the movie. Simple! You can also do video chats, and all sorts of other neat stuff that really has nothing to do with games. You can go watch the conference if you want, just pick a gaming site, it'll probably be there.
Oh, I almost forgot. This one's actually kind of cool: Microsoft has made a deal with ESPN to stream games straight to your Xbox, at no additional charge. Of course not even all major sports are represented, most notably (at least to me) the NFL. So no, you can't watch the Super Bowl on your 360 next February. Sorry.

Then they got down to the actual games, of which there were... six? launch titles specifically shown at the conference. A lot of them just seem to be Wii knockoffs, most namely Kinect Sports, which I'm not going to even talk about because it's Wii Sports with different sports (didn't write them down, sorry) and a different controller. Then there was Kinectimals, which had an admittedly adorable demo of this little girl playing with her pet tiger, names Skittles. Yes, a pet tiger named Skittles. Obviously not going for realism in that one. Kinect JoyRide is fairly self explanatory, though the controls seem to have been dumbed down to accommodate Kinect. Brakes seem kind of important to me, but it's their call. I guess. Kinect Adventures is a game where you raft around, striking poses to collect the coins. Interesting, I guess. Not really. I believe all these were developed in house at Microsoft, unlike these next two.
Your Shape: Fitness Evolved is a superior (yes, I said it) version of Wii Fit being developed by Ubisoft. It's a lot easier to tell what you're doing with a CAMERA than with a glorified scale.
Dance Central is the one game that actually seems fairly innovative, and above all- well implemented. The premise is simple- do whatever's on the screen, almost Rock Band/Guitar Hero style. There's 2 different modes, one which takes you through the moves of the dance one by one and teaches them to you, and one which, guess what, goes through the actual dance. The interesting thing about this game is that apparently, it's not beyond imagining for it to actually teach you how to dance. Pretty impressive, actually.

Microsoft also showed a really impressive, tech demo I guess it'd be, for a 2011 Kinect Star Wars game. Kind of like TFU, but not. For one thing, you are actually swinging the lightsaber. SOLD. Except, as I recall, it looked more like the cartoon than TFU. Not good.
Also shown was a demo for Forza Motorsport... whatever. Didn't actually get named. Forza Motorsport: Kinect (working title)... Back on track! Also coming out in 2011, they showed a guy... using Kinect to "walk" around the car and point out features of the car like the brakes and the engine, and then he "entered" the car and looked around. Amazingly detailed, but that's not the point. Of course I do believe you'll actually be driving with Kinect--- Hopefully with brakes. Buttons are important, guys!

And then the big shocker! Microsoft announced a NEW XBOX! Wait, sorry, not the next gen. This is the Xbox version of PS3 Slim. It IS significantly smaller, if not to the extent of the PS3 slim, and it's also quieter, comes with a wi-fi adapter, 250GB HD, and should be more reliable than the other 360s. Oh, and it can't RROD. Literally, it CAN'T. As in they took out the red lights. Instead, the green lights are going to flash. Umm, I sense confusion.
And then the REALLY big shocker-- Microsoft gave, gave, one of the new edition Xbox 360's to every person at the conference. I'm not kidding, they did.

So, the Microsoft conference essentially had two sides- the serious, normal, hardcore games (3 of 4 were shooters. Something's wrong with that. At least only one of them was the modern, realistic kind), and the new, family-friendly, Wii ripoff games, along with a few that actually show some promise, and even fewer that actually show promise for hardcore gamers. Overall, not bad. Definitely not a complete failure, fairly good organization, but not a stand-out performance either. Obviously trending towards motion controls, but that really started last year so it doesn't count this year.