Day 1 of E3 has ended, and let me tell you, Microsoft has a lot of stuff going down. I am writing this as a favor to our readers who aren't too well informed on what’s gone on so far. Where do I start?
The Microsoft press conference was full of surprises, ranging from the shocking to the joyous! One of these surprises was the announcement that the XBOX 360 would be getting two exclusive maps for Modern Warfare 2 via DLC (a huge win for Microsoft, as Call of Duty 4 was one of the biggest games of '07 and '08). After that, we had some teasers and gameplay footage for the previously announced Halo: ODST, which appears to be a Ghost Recon-ish game, where you play as an ODST trooper rather than a Spartan, and work in a squad, taking down the Covenant and attempting to solve a mystery inside the ruined city of New Mombassa. After that, the entire press conference was shocked with the reveal of a small teaser showing the brand new, previously unknown, Halo game, called Halo: Reach. It seems like the game is based around the Fall of Reach, a Halo novel written by Eric Nylund. No news on whether or not this is an FPS or something else. Release date: 2010. Next thing that caught my attention (as I've been a fan of the series since its inception) was the gameplay and teaser trailers for Splinter Cell: Conviction, which has been on the burner for nearly two years. Ubisoft has changed the entire gameplay concept from what it was originally - now all combat is based around real-time events, and a unique objective system that doesn't pop up in the oft-seen HUD format. Since the main character, Sam Fisher, no longer works for the government (or anyone for that fact), his actions are based around aggression and his desire for revenge. The action seems to be faster paced, as well as working around melee combat. It seems like a better version of the Bourne video game.
Of course, another big surprise was the reveal of Left 4 Dead 2, which really, no one saw coming - the original game was released less than a year ago, and had very little DLC support. The focus here seems to be on melee combat, with chainsaws, saucepans, baseball bats, and other fun items. A new class of special zombie was revealed, which is a cross between the Tank and the Hunter. Killing zombies never gets old!Crackdown 2 looked pretty awesome too. The original Crackdown was a game that I would often play when I was bored and didn't really want to play anything else. Some crazy new angle (maybe aliens or monsters) appears at the end of the teaser, but other than that, it appears like the game is more of the same (also, we now get 4-player co-op).
Of course, another big surprise was Hideo Kojima appearing on stage, and showing off a teaser trailer for the 360-bound Metal Gear Solid: Rising, a game based around the MGS character and Snake sidekick Raiden, the nimble, sword-wielding cyborg. Not much else is known about the game, but damn, 360 owners have been looking forward to an MGS game on their console for a looooong time!
Some new Microsoft partnerships to announce - the 360 will soon be integrated with the Facebook network. You can update your status, upload pictures and send messages via your 360, and with compatible games (hopefully all of them) you can take screenshots in game and upload them to Facebook, and update your status with your leaderboard position and scores! In the same vein of news, Microsoft announced that they would be teaming up with Twitter to work on the 360 as well - we're assuming it would work in the same way as Facebook.
That's my summing up of the first day of E3, hopefully you read this and feel more informed.
- Chad
No comments:
Post a Comment