This is the Wii Remote and will be the primary controller.

Motion sensing features include:

• knows the distance from the screen
• knows exactly where the remote is pointing to on the screen
• knows it’s own position in 3D space
• knows it’s speed and direction when it’s being moved

The buttons are:

• power button (turns the Wii on and off)
• digital direction pad
• large A button
• B trigger on the back
• home button
• plus and minus buttons (I don’t know what these are for)
• 1 and 2 buttons
• built in speaker
• 4 numbered lights to show what player you are

The simplest games such as Wii Sports and Orchestra will use the motion alone and none of the buttons you see here. Slightly more complicated games will make use of the A button which your thumb lays over and the B trigger positioned under your index finger.

The Nunchuck

For more complicated games, you attach the nunchuck.

It’s simply an analog direction pad with two triggers on the back. It also knows it’s tilt, speed and direction.

The Classic Controller

Then there’s the classic controller for playing old NES, SNES, Nintendo 64, Genesis and Turbografix 16 games. Keep in mind that Gamecube controllers will also work with Wii.

The Wii Light Gun

A very cool surprise is the return of the light gun, witch the Wiimote plugs right into. It wasn’t out for play, but it looked pretty cool. And yes, duck hunt was there.

All in all, I don’t think we’ve seen an array of 1st party controllers like this since the 80s. Add a Rob the robot and a PowerPad and we’re really talking.

Gears of War Q4 2006
Mass Effect Q4 2006/2007
bioshock 2007

The Unveiling: Take 1

Over a year ago, Sony unveiled the controller for their upcoming PlayStation 3 and everyone cringed. The PS2 Dual-Shock controller was well refined and much loved, so why was shaping it like a boomerang making it something better?

Sony took note and quietly retreated to the labs to work on something new.

The Unveiling: Take 2

While Microsoft refined their already good S controller and Nintendo sought to reinvent the controller, Sony gave us the following.

A wireless version of what we already know, minus the rumble and with a lame motion sensor that can only do a fraction of what Nintendo’s controller can. Not only is it underwhelming, but the loss of rumble is simply disappointing.

With the rumble gone, the controller felt too light in my hands and cheap as a result. The joysticks also seemed far too sensitive, an issue that I assume will be worked out before final production kicks in.

There was an opportunity here to do something impressive and Sony missed it. It’s unfortunate.

I did however find myself interested in checking out Lord of the Rings Online. It looked great and I spent a good hour playing the Weathertop scenario they had set up. I also spent about thirty minutes talking with one of the developers and asked him this question:

How is this game different from World of Warcraft?

What I learned made a reasonable amount of sense:

• It’s based on the books, not the movies (I checked and The Prancing Pony is in there.)
• The game play is similar to WoW, but is more skill based
• It’s designed around groups of 4-6 which are referred to as fellowships

The main difference seemed to be that by focusing on small parties, you could design for very different experiences. Is this difference plus a virtualized Middle Earth enough to pull an audience from WoW? We’ll see.

Here’s a quick video look at the graphics.

• A Nintendo DS Lite case (which smartly will not fit a regular sized DS)
• A beta invite for Lord of the Rings Online (which I immediately handed off to my cousin because there’s no way I’d find the time)
• A DS Touch Generations Notebook
• A sweet Joystiq t-shirt (on American Apparel no less) as modeled here by Miyamoto
• a Commodore keychain

And the rest:

• About 20 magazines
• PlayStation 3 Lanyards (because every conference attendee got handed their badge with a Nintendo Lanyard already attached)
• Lots of little PacMan toys
• a Marvel-themed deck of cards
• a Quake 4 t-shirt
• Bawls Mints (and you thought Wii was a bad product name)

It’s the first time I’ve gotten my hands on one and the design of this thing is great. Small, bright screen and very iPod in style. It fixes all the deficits of the current DS model and does so with aplomb. Cabel has some great pics up as well as a video review. It’ll be available on June 11th for $130.

The Games

A lot of great DS games were announced, although I wasn’t able to find them all out on the show floor.

DS Games I Played

New Super Mario Bros

The first traditional Super Mario Bros. game in 15 years. It played like a dream and had all sorts of new gameplay to boot. It’s out now.

Chibi Robo Park Patrol

I haven’t played the Gamecube original, but it got great reviews. As for this DS version, I would have rather visited the dentist. Maybe the game was just early, but I couldn’t squeeze an ounce of joy out of this title.

Final Fantasy 3

The Final Fantasy that didn’t make it to US shores back in the day looked fantastic on the DS.

Tony Hawk’s Downhill Jam

Played decent, although I fell quite a bit. Supposedly this will have head to head online play with voice support.

Mega Man ZX

It’s been ages since I played Mega Man, but I loved it back in the day. This felt really familiar. One to look forward to.

DS Games I Watched

Starfox DS

Starfox looks great and in 3D even. I was always suspect of the DS’ 3D abilities, but watching this game put that fear to rest.

The Legend of Zelda Phantom Hourglass

This looked good, although it’s tough to tell if the touch integration will feel good or gimmicky.

Children of Mana

Looked healthy.

Castlevania: Portrait Of Ruin

More of the same, in the best way.

Dragon Quest Heroes: Rocket Slime

None for me, thank you.

Aside from Wii and PS3, the most requested post I’ve been asked for is on the upcoming World of Warcraft expansion. I’m not a WoW player myself, but I have a lot of friends who I discuss it with so I’ll just give you my general impressions.

Blood Elves & Draenei

Most of the features have been known for a while, but the two new races have been confirmed, Blood Elves & Draenei, as well as the fact that leveling will go up to 70. And no, 70 doesn’t seem like near enough to keep regular players happy, but we’ll see how the other new features make for an expanded experience.

The Booth

The booth was very large and had the usual array of giant artwork and screens showing trailers as well as giant statues.

The bulk of the booth though was set up for people to simply sit and play the expanded game and people looked pretty settled in for a day’s play.

They even had a nice mix of PC and Macs to keep their street cred intact with both camps.

The Game

In short, it looked like WoW which means it looked pretty good. I’ve always liked the design of WoW and it’s always neat to see a new area with a new aesthetic. Everyone playing seem pleased and engrossed and there didn’t seem to be any cause to worry.

I do however offer up the following rich guys, nerd-gods, semi-celebrities and fictional characters.

First off, pacman. Seriously.

The guy who can charge you $70 for parking. He must be a celebrity or something to charge that much. (Seriously people, use the transit system or tattoo “sucker” on your forehead.)

Adam West aka Batman aka the freakin’ mayor from Family Guy.

Optimus Prime. I was all like “Where’s Bumblebee?” but he didn’t seem to care.

Reggie Fils-Aime, Vice President of Sales and Marketing for Nintendo of America. He did his best Steve Jobs impression at the press conference.

Space Ghost, or at least the guy who does his voice. Really nice guy. His head was huge. Physically.

Jeffery Katzenberg aka the rich guy who’s the K in Dreamworks SKG.

Last but not least, Sonic.

The PSP continued to have a lackluster showing consisting largely of rehashed PS2 games. The only game that really struck me was Loco Roco, a highly stylized game where you play a blob that you have to get through a level by moving the world around and as a result change where the gravity pulls. It sounds strange, but it was a lot of fun, although I would have rather it used a motion sensor than the shoulder buttons.

There was a decent showing of playable PS3 games on the floor which was great and more than I expected. It speaks well of how far 3rd parties are in their development cycle and should calm any fears of there not being enough games at launch.

The Best PS3 Game at E3: Heavenly Sword

Heavenly Sword was head and shoulders above any other PS3 game there. Visually, it reminded me a great deal of Soul Caliber with highly stylized moves and a flow that seems natural, but instead of two people in the the ring, you find yourself fighting many many more. It easily had the biggest crowd around it at the Sony booth and will hopefully be available at launch. If you want a PS3, you’ll want a copy of Heavenly Sword to go with it.
Heavenly Sword Video

PS3 Games I Played

Heavenly Sword

Comment above.

Sonic the Hedgehog

Gorgeous, but odd. Easily the best looking Sonic you’ll ever see, but some of the environments and effects seems way too realistic in look for the cartoonyness that is the Sonic character.

Gundam Mobile Suit

Visually impressive, although extremely spare in features. Everything looked crisp and real in a way I hadn’t seen on the Xbox 360.

Gundam Mobile Suit Video

Resistance: Fall of Man

As a first person shooter, it looked good with very impressive fire and smoke effects, but visually couldn’t stand up to PC crownholder Crysis. That may be an unfair comparison, but it’s worth pointing out that the visual cutting edge will continue to belong to expensive PC setups.

Grand Turismo HD

A lot of the people watching this game were grumbling. It looked great. There’s no question about that. But, did it look better than the last GT for PS2? A little, but the difference seemed subtle. People stood around and studied it as if observing an oil painting in a museum, but no one walked away shocked or impressed by the improvements. It’s strange to see us so spoiled visually by these games, but it’s the truth of where we are at.

Formula 1 06

Visually crisp, but ultimately nothing to write home about.

Games I Watched

Marvel Ultimate Alliance

This wasn’t out on the show floor, but there was a presentation by the development team you could watch. The game allows you to put a team of four marvel characters together to fight your way though various levels of traditional bad guys. This game looked really nice with great shadowing. It allows four players to play the game online and also has a one player mode that lets you actively switch between the four characters in your team. The one player mode looked less compelling, but playing this with three of your friends looks like a lot of fun. I found myself fairly interested in this one and would consider this one to look forward to. (It’s also coming out on Xbox 360 and Wii.)

Virtua Tennis 3

This often looked like watching real tennis on television.

Genji

There were some neat heatwave and fire effects, but overall this game was unimpressive with low-res textures and poly counts that seemed too low. This was more than likely the result of it being early in it’s development cycle.

Games Not seen

Final Fantasy XIII

Metal Gear Solid

Note that Metal Gear Solid 3 was only shown as a CGI movie on the big screen. People seemed excited by this, but I didn’t see anything that looked like gameplay and I’m not going to swallow a promo movie as anything real.

Some Thoughts

All in all, people seemed underwhelmed at what they saw at the Sony booth, with a nice exception being Heavenly Sword. Yes, the games were prettier than what the Xbox 360 offered, but not dramatically so. There’s no question that this is the starting point for ps3 games and it’s bound to get better over the life of the system, but for now, it was simply underwhelming and the sense could be felt not only on your own, but in your conversations with those around you.

I absolutely do believe that the PS3 is better than the Xbox 360 from a purely hardware point of view. As both PS3 and Xbox 360 development matures, I expect the PS3 versions of games to be visually superior provided developers take the time to take advantage of the PS3s hardware. The PS3′s inclusion of a blu-ray drive is also very nice allowing for 50 GB of storage on a single disc versus the 360′s 9GB.

All these extra features though come at a price increase, largely because that blu-ray drive. Will consumers be willing to pay it? I’ll get into that in my competitive analysis.