Friday, 12 June 2009
E3 Impressions
Thanks to excellent coverage by podcasts and video game sites, I've been able to track closely all the goings on at E3 2009 last week. As an owner of a Wii, DS, and PS3, the announcements at this show about what games were upcoming were very interesting to me, as I dream about what I might be playing in a year's time. (And Microsoft's announcements were interesting too, inasmuch as they allow me to weigh what I'm going to be missing out on in a year's time!)
All of this is just one man's impressions; for more complete coverage outlets like 1up, Giant Bomb, and the excellent video podcast Co-Op are the places to go. But I thought I could organise my thoughts here by sharing what games E3 has led me to put on my "definitely going to buy" list, my "definitely now interested" list, and my more disappointed "questioning" list.
Definitely Looking Forward To
The biggest surprise for me was that there is a Wii game I am definitely intending to buy this year, happily proving my Wii's Last Stand? concerns to be ill-founded. The New Super Mario Brothers Wii game looks fantastic—it should be a blast to play with my wife and friends. Prior to E3 I had no expectations for any new Wii games, now this one is looking like a sure thing, and two more feature below on my "excited" list.
On the PS3 side, Uncharted 2 is looking better and better, and Uncharted was one of my favourite games on the PS3 already (I've played through it twice, which is saying something). The sequel looks to have a lot going for it, I really liked the trailer, and so I am sure this will be one of my surest purchases when it comes out.
Also on the PS3, Final Fantasy XIII—which was always an automatic day-and-date buy for me—finally has a date to go with it (early 2010), something I'm very happy about. The E3 trailers also raised my hopes that the story will not disappoint, and the English voice acting should be up to Squeenix standards as well.
Definitely Excited About
These are the games that now have my interest after this E3, but I'm still unsure whether I personally will buy them when they come out, wait until they can be had for cheaper, or simply pass on. But I am now paying attention.
Two more Wii titles, contrary to expectations, are on this list: Super Mario Galaxy 2's trailer looked excellent. I enjoyed the first game a lot, but at the same time I have never replayed it, nor did I go for 100% of the stars, even though I still could. So I wonder if I really ought to get this game or not. There's no justification for it but for some reason PS3 Trophies make me much more eager to play long single-player games on that system, rather than 'lose time' on the Wii (but that's my problem, not this game's).
The new Metroid game is also something I'm very happy to see announced—although not quite so happy as these guys! But I won't know whether I personally want to play the game until I hear a lot more about it. I'll be paying careful attention, though.
Final Fantasy XIV was the best surprise announcement of the show for me. I've never seriously gotten into a MMO before, but I may well give this one a shot, though like with Metroid I'll need to know a lot more about how the game turns out before I can say for sure.
Disappointments
Heavy Rain, which I have been getting hyped for, did not look as good at E3 as I had expected it to. Not only that, but the Alan Wake gameplay demonstration looked a lot better than I expected that game to. I'm certainly not writing this game off yet, but I had expected it to be a day-and-date purchase, and now I'm definitely going to wait to read some reviews of what the game actually is like to play before I decide whether it's for me.
Honourable Mention
Scribblenauts, of which an astonishing impromptu demonstration can be found in this episode of Co-Op, is pretty amazing, although I don't know enough about how it works as a game to know whether it's worth getting or not:
Dishonourable Mention
Activision suing to prevent the release of Brutal Legend is really low. EA's lawyer put it best saying it was "like a husband abandoning his family and then suing after his wife meets a better looking guy". I may pass on Modern Warfare 2 because of this (I was on the fence for that game anyway), and it certainly makes me more likely to buy an EA-published Brutal Legend. The surrounding context of the story is probably too inside baseball for most people to care much, but it is petty and mean enough that it is going to have an influence on who I buy games from.
All in all though, I'm excited about the future: this show has got me interested in a lot more upcoming games than I thought I would be paying attention to—the year ahead is looking very promising indeed.
