E3 2011: The Big Three; Also Homefront Developer Closed, Bethesda Hacked, and Robin in Arkham City

Well now it's time for me to go over as much about E3 as I can. Over the next 5-7 days, I'll try touch on as much as possible to give a full rundown on what went down at E3.

First I want to start with the most obvious of targets: The Big Three. In other words: Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo. At E3 2010, Nintendo was the OBVIOUS winner of the three. What about this year? Well, might as well go in the order that they presented in, so let's start with Microsoft

MICROSOFT

Microsoft's press conference started relatively strong with some demos for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 and Gears of War 3 (though that wasn't the most impressive but the Horde demo later delivered). Then Kinect started to be the main focus and everything kind of went downhill from there with the exception of the announcement at the end for Halo 4 and a new trilogy, though I'm still on the fence about that.

Let me try to explain why Microsoft's press conference was a failure in my eyes. I don't want to sound like I'm just hating on the Kinect because it's a fun thing to do. I have reasons for hating on it. The big problem is that Nintendo has had the hooks in the motion control aspect for over five years and they've done it far better than Kinect has. Sure there's shovelware but the Nintendo developed software for the most part has been phenomenal.

Microsoft hasn't really shown anything new that really works and adds to the experience. That's why I felt that the time spent on Kinect was kind of wasteful. IGN wrote an article on a Sega published game called Rise of Nightmares for the Kinect which is meant to be serious but because they were flailing about while playing it, it became hilarious. Everything that I've seen with Kinect so far seems that it would pull someone out of the experience.

I'll admit I found the Sesame Street game a little charming but it's not for me and the other family-friendly stuff there isn't going to do a lot of good. Sesame Street will because it's a recognizable brand for children but for the other stuff, it just isn't marketable. So Microsoft started out okay and then weakened from there.

SONY

Sony's had a rough year this year. That's probably putting it in the lightest terms possible. So how did they do with their press conference? Pretty damn well actually. I enjoyed this press conference a lot more than Microsoft. It of course started with an apology for all the hacking crap and PSN outage. They kind of had to do but I'm still glad that they did.

As for what they showed off, the big one they showed was obviously Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception and it looked damn good. It doesn't look very different from Uncharted 2 which is why it wasn't on my Top 10 of E3, but they really didn't need to change much from Uncharted 2. They also showed off a new Sly Cooper, Resistance 3, Starhawk, and the HD remakes for the Metal Gear games, the God of War PSP games, and the Ico Collection.

Of course the Vita was the big one they showed. Sony's new handheld showed some real power with a new Uncharted title for the system as well as a new ModNation Racers. It appears that they are also getting nice 3rd party support which is definitely a plus. Sony also went into the Move but they didn't into anywhere near as much as Microsoft into the Kinect. So Sony, had a good E3 this year.

NINTENDO

Nintendo also had a good press conference though nowhere near as good as last year's. The good came from a few big announcements and updates on games that we heard about last year and then kind of disappeared. We've got Kid Icarus: Uprising, Super Mario 3D, Luigi's Mansion 2, Star Fox 64 3D and others either newly announced or backed up for 3DS, Link's Awakening now on Virtual Console and Four Swords Adventure coming free.

Another good thing was Shigeru Miyamoto. You could say I'm cheating with calling him a positive but the guy is just such a joy to watch. He takes so much pleasure from his work and he deserves to. I could enjoy watching that guy's enthusiasm all day and when he was on stage, everything was just much more enjoyable.

As for the bad, it overlaps with another good thing: the unveiling of the Wii U. Yes that is what it's called. A lot of people made judgments on this but I can't because of the bad thing about the press conference. Nintendo just presented it very poorly and it made it impossible for me to make a judgment. New details have come to light which make it easier for me to judge it but I'm speaking from the mindset of someone who just watched the press conference (I know it was a week ago).

However, the Wii U has a lot going for it. First of all a new Super Smash Bros. (called it) for both the Wii U and 3DS which will both function together in some fashion. Second and very important, 3rd party support. Nintendo seems to be attempting to gain good 3rd party support for the system in many genres which is one thing the Wii had trouble with and some of the games coming to the Wii U, like Aliens: Colonial Marines, Batman: Arkham City, etc. look great. An important move by Nintendo.

WINNER

As for the winner of the three, it's between Sony and Nintendo. In the end, I'm going to have to say Nintendo because of their new console unveiling (even if the presentation was kind of weak) and the plethora of titles announced for both it and the 3DS. The concert at the beginning with Zelda music and a montage was also enjoyable and Miyamoto is always fun to watch. So Nintendo takes it home again.

Agree or disagree? Give your thoughts in the comments below.


In other news THQ closed Kaos Studios, the developer behind Homefront. I can't speak to the quality of Homefront itself nor can I give reasons as to why Kaos was closed down. It's always sad to see a developer go unless the game that resulted in their demise was REALLY crappy but from what I've heard, while Homefront may have been very flawed, it wasn't that. It also seemed like it sold reasonably well so I'm stumped as to why Kaos was shut down.

So good luck to those who worked at Kaos Studios. Meanwhile, this does not mean that Homefront 2 is not coming as it has been handed off to THQ Montreal.


Bethesda Softworks joins Epic Games and Nintendo in recent hacking attacks against video game companies. The hacking group known as, LulzSec (no I'm not kidding), hacked into the network and stole information and have apparently made admin passwords public.

LulzSec has made it pretty clear that they hack sites, pretty much just because they can which somehow makes them seem even douchier than the guys stealing information. They aren't posting customer information because apparently they like Bethesda so what the hell is the point? They're just being dicks now. This hacking thing is getting WAY out of hand and it's annoying to me to see these asshats hack into a site just for the fun of it. I hope this is the end of it but unfortunately it probably won't be.


While I predicted as soon as Catwoman was revealed as playable that Robin wouldn't be in the game, I might have been wrong. Apparently a pre-order bonus from Best Buy will get you a code that will allow you to play as Robin. How will this work? I'm guessing it's going to be similar to how the Joker was playable in the side-challenges.

But it makes me wonder if Robin is involved in the story at all. If they create the character for the challenge mode, then it would seem logical that he's in the story somewhere. Hopefully there will be an update on this and I'll keep you guys informed.


THQ Closes Homefront Studio
Bethesda Confirms Brink Site Hacked, Personal Info Risked
Bethesda Hacked, Details About To Be Leaked
You Can Play as Robin in Batman: Arkham City According to Best Buy Ad