Tuesday, June 15, 2010

Sony E3 2010 Presser Recap

Sony was once again the last of the big three press conferences and it was a solid showing of what is to come for the upcoming year for them. Obviously, the big focuses were 3D and Playstation Move, but also the most traditional conference of the three with information and montages. Let's run it down shall we...



They started off with their FPS banger, Killzone 3, also in 3D as you had to have 3D glasses on to see the full experience. As expected, Killzone 3 looks amazing with or without 3D and the shooting seems to be what to expect from the franchise. New this time around is the jetpacks, which seem cool as there is more potential for crazy setpieces. Killzone 3 will be out on February 11, 2011 3D ready and with Move support. A montage of games supporting 3D followed.

Then they moved on with well Playstation Move, their motion controller, with demos like Tiger Woods PGA Tour 11, which is pretty much self-explanatory with the Move controller as the golf club, but one of the better demos was next...



Sorcery seems like a cool game for those who like wizardry with full Move control with the wand. I still feel like the Move controller is still Lady Gaga's disco stick when it lights up in different colors. This is also out next year.



Heroes on the Move stars Ratchet, Clank, Jak, Daxter, Sly Cooper (also the Sly Collection coming in 3D), and Bentley and the footage seems early, which is also out next year.



It would not have been this year's Sony presser without an appearance by Kevin Butler with an inspirational and funny speech being one of the better moments of E3. This guy is pretty much Sony's mascot at this point and man he delivers on the charisma. After Butler's moment was done, they announced launch dates and prices for the Playstation Move, which is out on September 19 with the Move controller being 50 bucks, the secondary controller being 30, a Move bundle with Sports Champions for 100, and a PS3 with the Move bundle for 400. Not that bad of a deal considering Microsoft Kinect's current price alone is 150 bucks. Another montage of games with Move support then followed.



The PSP finally gets mentioned with no PSP2 announcement (oh well), but a new advertising campaign is being pushed starring Marcus. This is a similar approach to Kevin Butler is doing with the PS3 as this is going Genesis-Super NES territory here with the ads. It has worked for the PS3, so we'll see with the PSP in the upcoming months as they got some hardcore games out like Squenix's new games (Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep and The 3rd Birthday) and the recently released Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker. There's also some camera thingy announced with some game too as well a teaser for God of War: Ghost of Sparta, also out next year.





LittleBigPlanet 2 then gets demoed and this game is filled with creativity being that you can create any game you want to now, which is too crazy for my mind to consume. The Play, Create, and Share formula gets expanded once again and with LBP2, there is like no limits. This is out this fall and I want to see awesome stuff out of the gate.



The Playstation Plus announcement came off a little bit iffy for me being the long awaited subscription plan for online. You still get to play games free for online, but this extended offering seems like just more goodies and first access to games and betas in the future. People will be suckered to getting this, but I don't see myself going Plus for now even though it would nice to have.



EA shows up now as a major third party partner to Sony giving the PS3 exclusive content for the future. Medal of Honor is one start with a limited edition featuring Medal of Honor: Frontline HDed up as a bonus, which is cool. Dead Space 2 then followed with a crazy demo of chaos and then their limited edition announcement of having Dead Space Extraction with Move support as a bonus, also cool! Sony has finally gotten around nailing exclusives from third party games, which has been Microsoft's thing for a while, but now they have Call of Duty timed exclusivity as Sony one-upped them with more support from other third parties.





In another surprising moment of the conference as one of the good moments, Gabe Newell from Valve shows up announcing Portal 2 for the PS3, out next year. Gabe has been a hater of the console scene, but he has seem to come around and good for Sony to make this happen since The Orange Box on PS3 was a disappointment. Portal 2 on the PS3 is the lead version as Gabe premiered the trailer here, craziness abound again as Glados does miss us wishing our return.



A new trailer for Final Fantasy XIV is next as it is still a MMORPG like XI. Nothing else to say for this one as its FF, so yeah.



One of my favorite trailers of this press conference is this multiplayer clip for Assassins Creed: Brotherhood just by the music alone. Ubisoft always nails awesome Euro-like music for their AC trailers as this one is no exception. The PS3 version gets exclusive content like more missions and a multiplayer beta soon. Another montage of PS3 games then follows...



Gran Turismo 5 will be out on November 2nd!!! Finally after this long wait as another amazing trailer with awesome music is above. I love the new additions like the Top Gear test track (because that show is still dope - New Series on June 27!!!) complete with the camera angles from the show and other stuff like Nascar and Rally. This game is just too big and also playable in 3D. Its definitely in my eye for best racing game of the year.



Infamous gets the sequel treatment with Infamous 2. Cole gets a new look and somewhat a new voice along with new ice powers. I enjoyed the first game a lot and expect nothing but good things for this one too.



Sony's last bombshell of their presser is the long awaited of Twisted Metal! This car combat franchise gets rebooted on PS3 as the original team, led by David Jaffe, is behind the project. Sweet Tooth finally makes his return to the gaming world as well as other characters from the franchise. Multiplayer is clearly a big focus with deathmatch modes as well as the new Nuke game. The Twisted Metal reboot is out next year and I'm excited for it glad it has returned since the car combat genre has been on decline.

That's it for the Sony presser as it is solid stuff with the 3D initiative and Playstation Move stuff. They had nothing but games and games for both casual and hardcore audiences, which is a good balance of what is shown compared to Microsoft's approach. It is clear that Sony still matters to the core and it definitely showed at this year's E3. Some things were missing like The Last Guardian, but all in all, a solid show by Sony with a great lineup for the upcoming year for the PS3.

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