The Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena hosted Sony’s E3 press event, with around 2500 members of the press and industry making available adjacent seats a rare commodity.
A blue motif washed over the main screen - a 70 foot monster – before some trance pop and a short presentation of PlayStation highlights presented in mild 3D (made possible via glasses handed out to all attendees) heralded the arrival of Sony honcho Jack Tretton to the stage.
That the words “thank you for joining us” prompted an applause break speaks to the possibly wilfully short memory of many in attendance, but the anticipated mea culpa followed soon after, if on Tretton’s own terms. Apparently the media were done a huge favour by the recent PSN disasters (“You’re welcome” said Tretton, only half-jokingly), and interestingly this apology – like so many high school apology letters - didn’t actually include the word “sorry”, with Tretton opting instead for the interestingly-worded “I want to apologise”. My guess is a twitchy fanboy situated just offstage clenching a sniper rifle simply wouldn’t let him go through with it.
Either way, furrowed brows were certainly smoothed by Tretton’s proclamation that Sony are now committed more than ever to security. Some time was then spent outlining why it’s great to own a PlayStation if you live in the States (Hulu Plus, Netflix, Music Unlimited et al) , and a new partner, CinemaNow, was announced as being on board. Then it was on to the games.
It’ll surprise only the bluntest intellects that Naughty Dog’s Uncharted 3 looks great. A short play through which took place on the decks of a darkened cruise ship amid torrential rain and fierce waves showcased excellent lighting and shadow effects as well as a tense score and the fluid gameplay Drake fans are accustomed to.
A grenade rupturing the ship’s hull triggered a memorable escape sequence, and smaller screens to the side of Our Visual Overlord fleetingly displayed stills of what appeared to be volcano, jungle and desert levels. A queasy Subway restaurant tie-in later and an Uncharted 3 3D trailer is presented, which gave a very broad outline of the game’s narrative points.
Resistance 3 was next, and Insomniac Games’ Marcus Smith outlined the state of mankind (going extinct) before diving into some 3D gameplay. This time the effect is more pronounced and is better for it; raindrops on the player’s goggles are nicely foregrounded, and the overall sense of depth – particularly when looking down a scope – is moderately astonishing. Move controls are supported too, but whether these features will ignite the so-so franchise remains to be seen. A sharpshooter gun bundle which comes packaged with Move controllers may pull a few more gamers in at least, unless they have already splurged their pocket money on PS3 HD remasterings of Shadow of the Colossus, Ico, or the God of War Origins Collection (Ghosts of Sparta and Chains of Olympus in one bundle, to be available via PSN). If you cheered heartily after processing that sentence don’t worry - so did most here in LA too.
Tretton then declared that Sony’s commitment to 3D was “unwavering”, but immediately backed up that statement with solid evidence: a 24-inch Playstation-branded 3D TV which comes complete with a six foot HDMI cable, Resistance 3 and a pair of 3D glasses, all for USD $499. Extra pairs of the active 3D glasses will retail at USD $70. Perhaps the most impressive feature of this display was its supernatural ability to show two full-screen images simultaneously – one for each player present – with absolutely zero crossover, eliminating the need for split-screen gaming. The sound of a couple of thousand jaws hitting the floor was quite deafening, for the record. Clearly the price points of these devices is geared towards driving rapid adoption too – here’s hoping that is reflected in New Zealand’s pricing too.
Unsurprisingly, Move support was another big story of the conference, with over 200 Move-ready games anticipated to be on shelves by the end of the year. Unfortunately this figure will include games such the forthcoming NBA 2K12, whose Move support (aim at a teammate to pass, click on a player to use for defence) looks like it will hamper rather than enhance gameplay. This is the antithesis of what Sony are attempting to do with Move which is to lure in more casual players, or at least those frightened by shoulder buttons. Even NBA superstar Kobe Bryant struggled with it, getting stripped of the ball and dribbling out of bounds while controlling his digital self before claiming the game was “so realistic it’s frightening”. He finally rattled home an ugly jumper using teammate Derek Fisher, and the crowd breathed a collective sigh of relief.
Medieval Moves: Deadmund’s Chest looks to be the kind of third person shooter puzzler that everyone pictured in their mind’s eye when the Move was first explained to them. The player reaches back over their shoulder to retrieve an arrow from an imaginary quiver, throws ninja stars, and swings around a sword while deflecting blows with a shield. Its aesthetic is cartoonish but endearingly so (think: Torchlight minus the blood), but the Move responds rapidly, and holding your arms out to each side to balance while walking across a beam is a nice touch.
Sucker Punch’s inFAMOUS 2 is out now in the States and from the trailer we saw, looks pretty great - the boss battles in particular. The ability to generate your own content for the title using the Move is also expected shortly. Level creation using the Move will also be available in Little Big Planet 2.
Starhawk by Santa Monica Studios (God of War) looks to be the spiritual successor to Warhawk, and the presence of a cowboy in space gave the trailer a mild Firefly feel. The action expanded from small, vehicle-heavy battles on a dusty red planet to a large space battle, so Warhawk’s RTS elements are likely to be encountered here too, although it should be said the trailer featured zero actual gameplay footage.
Sly Cooper: Thieves in Time is the fourth in the Sly Cooper series, although the first on the PS3. The highly exaggerated cartoon style of the trailer showed only the silhouette of the titular character traversing Parisian rooftops before the title was revealed.
Dust 514 is not the long-awaited 513th sequel to Dust, but rather an FPS and planetary conquest game that was pitched as being the first true cross-platform title due to it combining with the universe of the popular PC game EVE Online. The gameplay video didn’t give away much, but we do know it will also be available on the Sony NGP, will feature Move support, and that it is a PlayStation exclusive title. Look for it to be released in 2012.
An animated Ken Levine took the stage next to talk about the latest in his steampunk FPS series, BioShock Infinite, and in particular about his resistance to the idea of Move support. The tide turned when a Sony employee convinced him to include it by emphasising the idea that Move removes barriers of entry into games. Levine also announced that Infinite will ship with a copy of the original BioShock on the disc, and also hinted at an upcoming project for the NGP, but shortly after left the stage, perhaps disheartened that no-one asked him exactly what it was.
A flock of smaller PS3 exclusive announcements followed – an exclusive weapon in Saint’s Row 3, an exclusive level (Mt Fuji) for SSX, seven exclusive cars in Need For Speed: The Run, Battlefield 1943 on the same disc as Battlefield 3, and a special Move controller that looks like a phaser for next year’s Star Trek game (which also boasts an exclusive prequel game to be available on PSN). Early footage of Star Trek faintly resembled Mass Effect cinematics- and gameplay-wise and Spock appeared to be a playable character at one point, neither of which are terrible developments.
PlayStation Suite was given a fleeting mention next; it’s an application which makes Playstation content available on non-Playstation hardware (insert joke about years-old illegal emulators here). Sony were upfront about the Suite’s purpose: to get more people using something (anything!) Playstation-related in the hope they will upgrade to the PSP or PS3 in the future. Android was alluded to as a base platform, but more are to be announced.
Then the big guns were out again. The announcement? That the NGP would actually be called the Playstation Vita, and that it would feature dual analogue sticks, front and rear cameras, front and rear touch panels, a five inch screen, motion sensing capability and wi-fi. Oh, and that it would “revolutionise the portable gaming experience”. It also seemed to feature slide-out speakers, but we’ll confirm that when we get our grubby mitts on the device. That it is to be partnered with AT&T here in the States drew loud and prolonged moans from the locals in the crowd, something a voicechat ability regardless of game or location did little to temper. A friends list function and content sharing application called Near was indicated by SCEE’s Kazuo Hirai, before a raft of Vita titles were shown.
The first among these was Uncharted Golden Abyss, which demonstrated some impressively gutsy sound for such a small device, as well as some nice dynamic lighting and support for all of the above gameplay functions. For example, jumping to the next ledge in cliff sections was achieved by tapping the target ledge, and several could be traversed quickly by sliding a finger across all of them, but traditional controls may be employed instead.
Ruin, a “social action RPG” was then played, and it looked very similar to Torchlight, except you can help or hinder other players by attacking their lair – a dungeon populated by monsters whose power reflects that of their master. Niftily, cloud saves can be resumed from your PS3 should you wish to use a larger display.
Mod Nation Racers is a kart racer but not a port of the PSP or PS3 games of the same title. Highly touted was the ease of drawing tracks using the touch screen before adding jumps and varying the slant of the road. A bird’s eye view made it look simple to add scenery too, and time of day (ie level of light) could also be set. Gameplay-wise, tricks may be executed when airbourne, and owners of the game will have access to over two million pieces of user content on the game’s day of release.
Little Big Planet looked impressive on the Vita. Photos of objects could be easily imported into the game, and level customisation looked simple to achieve via the touch interfaces.
Rounding out the Vita titles was a trailer for Streetfighter X Tekken, which also featured Cole from inFAMOUS as a playable character. Again the touchscreen featured heavily in gameplay.
According to Sony, more than 80 titles are currently in development for this new platform, and EA, Ubisoft, THQ, Activision and “virtually every publisher” has signed up. No mention was made of storage type or capacity, but the system will be available at the end of the year for USD $249 or USD $299 for the 3G version.
Then, 90 minutes after it began, the conference was over, and those present were treated to sets by Mixmaster Mike and Janes Addiction.
