Today I had the pleasure of chatting with Craig Flannagan from Microsoft Canada about some of the E3 Microsoft goodness for this year. It certainly looks to be an exciting year for the jolly green giant; a new way of playing and some fabulous exclusives topped the list of things that my piqued interest. Let’s let the interview speak for itself…
Today Jamie and I played a few upcoming videogames from Nintendo for the Wii, DS, and the DSi. Among the titles we tested out was Wii Sports Resort. The game will out July 26, packed with the Wii MotionPlus accessory, and from the looks of things, will be a hot seller.
I must admit that when the game was first announced it didn’t look too compelling. Fencing, Frisbee tossing, water skiing, and archery games do not a full game make. But since its announcement more games have snuck into the suite, and among the ones we played today was a hilarious multiplayer table tennis game. The 1:1 motion controls were spot on, and worked well for the most part until it was revealed that Jamie wasn’t actually that good at table tennis. I don’t mean to pick on the poor guy, but I easily whooped his butt three games to none.
Surprisingly, bowling makes a return appearance in Resort, but we didn’t play it long enough to discern any noticeable difference between it and the one we all already have. Still, it’s one of about 12 games, so that’s acceptable.
By far my favourite of the new games is the archery one. Here, players hold the Wii Remote vertically to emulate holding the front of a bow while holding the nunchuck in the other hand to emulate pulling back on the arrow. By holding down the A button on the remote and the Z button on the nunchuck, the targeting mechanism is triggered. Pulling back on the nunchuck to give the arrow potential energy feels natural, and with an arm outstretched to hold the “bow” in place, the sensitivity of the Wii MotionPlus is very noticeable. Every minor tremor your arm makes will be picked up by the game, which in turn really helps the feel of having aiming an actual bow – with a real bow the force built up by pulling the arrow back also causes the front of the bow to wobble.
Interestingly enough, I’ve gone from someone who had no interest in this title to someone who will pick it up on launch day, just from spending a little time with it. This must be how so many Wii adopters felt when playing the system at a friend’s house for the first time.
Muramasa is a painfully beautiful game – as in “so pretty it makes me hurt.” If the game were alive, I’d likely pace the floors for several hours before finally working up the courage to ask it to dance. Getting a date with the game at E3 was equally difficult, with the Wii-motes at the Ignition booth rarely left idle for long. I stole time to loiter near those screens whenever possibly during the week, watching streams of people become caught in the web of visual charm. Everyone seems to agree that the game is exquisite.
One of my many treats last week was that the Ubisoft Press Conference took place at the absolutely magnificent Los Angeles Theater – on occasion architecture is my bag. The fact that I had to squeeze past crowds only to receive my press badge and then have to squeeze back outside to wait seemed a fair trade if it meant spending time within those walls. As I said before, it was a true Blade Runner moment.
At first it seemed terribly exciting that James Cameron walked onto the stage to discuss his joint venture with Ubisoft, the film and game combination that is Avatar. The consensus since has been that it was rather boring. It isn’t that the project didn’t sound interesting enough, but that the audience was listening to what was essentially a pitch from Cameron. During his lengthy explanation, we were left staring at a screen that only ever showed a still shot of the project title, while he was left trying to visualize the narrative and environments for us. I left the theater assuming that there was nothing more to learn about the game for now, only to find that I’d be given the opportunity to sit in on a showing for the work in progress later in the week.
Time spent with Bayonetta leads to more of a seduction rather than an impression. She called to me like a Siren at E3, causing me to crash into the Sega booth several times throughout the week. This isn’t the first time you’ve heard me praise the title, and it certainly won’t be the last. But let me offer you an anecdote taken directly from the show floor.
I enjoy watching other people play videogames at events like E3 nearly as much as playing them myself. It’s challenging to really feel a personal connection to the games on display with all the commotion surrounding every available screen as well. As I was watching a group of steady customers take turns at Bayonetta, I inadvertently eavesdropped on a conversation occurring behind me. Two people were obviously impressed by the game, and I turned around as they started discussing the more technical aspects on display to find that one was from Infinity Ward and the other was from Sony Santa Monica. Surely I thought that had to be noteworthy.
Despite being a complete throwback to the timeless gameplay of the original Mario Bros., New Super Mario Bros. on the DS ultimately left me feeling unsatisfied. The game was very good, sure, but it didn’t introduce enough interesting new elements to make me forget that I’ve been playing the exact same thing for almost 20 years. So, when New Super Mario Bros. Wii was first announced I was definitely interested yet decided to hold out on being fully excited until I got some hands on time with the game – which is exactly what I got each day during E3.
I’ll explain why I wanted to go back and wait in line to play this game every day after the cut.
Upon finding out that a movie called G-Force was about to be released, my first instinct was to shudder; I couldn’t handle the thought that yet another favourite childhood cartoon was going to be turned into a Summer Blockbuster with no regard for the source material. Imagine my relief when I discovered this G-Force has nothing to do with Battle of the Planets.
Instead, the upcoming 3D flick from producer Jerry “Gratuitous Explosions” Bruckheimer is a kid-friendly movie about a team of very special guinea pigs that discover that they alone can save the world from technology gone awry.
You didn’t think I forgot did you? No game, no matter how shiny, could distract me from a long overdue expansion to WipEout HD. It occupied a lonely corner of the PSN section at E3, and I promptly gave it the loving attention it deserved. The game is as gorgeous as ever, and the focus on the more aggressive aspects of the series made me salivate to be honest. There is no greater pleasure you can have with a controller beyond destroying another player in WipEout – except possibly flipping around to destroy the ones behind you. There’s a button for the action now, but I can remember a time when doing it manually caused people to scream about me cheating.
The add-on brings 8 new tracks and 13 new ships – which is an incredible amount of content. But more importantly, the Eliminator mode has finally returned, once again allowing players to focus on destroying one another for points rather than worrying about lap-times. It’s the most addictive feature the series has ever introduced – I’ve burned out several PSOnes playing it in Wipeout 3.
Fury also brings Zone Battle, which sets automatic acceleration as players pass over pads to fill the zone bar – choosing whether to boost speed toward the target zone or recovering lost energy. An additional Detonator mode brings a new ship to WipEout, and challenges players to destroy mines along the course to score points. But your primary mission remains clear – meet me in the Eliminator as soon as this releases.
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I spent most of the Nintendo Press Conference slurping a coffee, given how early Nintendo had insisted on getting us all out of our comfy borrowed beds. The immediate emphasis afterward was on blogging about the many splendidly inappropriate things one could do with the Wii Vitality Sensor. But what’s remained sharp on my mind is the approach to capturing, or capitalizing on new gaming markets, not by what was said, but by what was insinuated by the software announced. Nintendo’s overarching approach is in offering a more accessible means to games, period. But what I firmly believe is lost in this equation is that people have a habit of responding to content that respects their intelligence. While Wii Sports Resort will undoubtedly bring more gamers into the medium, murder mystery novels on the DS leave me feeling awkward.
Perhaps there’s a level of adult oriented entertainment we shouldn’t expect Nintendo to ever offer. Did we ever have an assurance that they would both raise us as a generation of gamers and then sustain us into our maturing years? And I’m not talking about a simple matter of blood and gore, but that level of adult oriented entertainment that keeps people tuning into their favorite late night dramas and mysteries every week.
Watching a demonstration of Sony’s Heavy Rain, I believe the game potentially offers the ability to approach a wider audience by different means, linked via the use of mature content to exactly what people are watching late at night while the Wii rests up for weekend visits from friends.
My memory is a little foggy these days, but prior to the launch of the Wii, we didn’t talk a whole lot about casual markets and new gamers. Instead there was the belief that Wii controls would allow gamers to experience familiar titles and content in a profound new way. If that idea has lost traction along the way and against the profit found in new audiences, Sin and Punishment 2 is the most precious gift imaginable to those who have long supported the evolution of this industry before a new wave of potentially fickle consumers entered the scene.
