This is just a quick post to let everyone who is joining Giant Bomb and wants to add me, my username is Jotun.

So right after Nintendo's snoozefest it was Sony's turn. I think the overall look of the presentation was pretty cool and the littlebigplanet presentation was the most original way I've seen a company talk about boring stats. I think they could have gone without the entirety of the PS2 section as well as skimmed the PSN and PSP sections as well. That would have given the presentation a bit more flow.

The games they showed were pretty cool looking. Resistance 2 changed from a "meh" from me to a "Oh wow, I must play this game!". Hopefully they do something about the camera bob when the character walks, it really needs it because it looks rather mechanical the way it is. Infamous, LBP, GoW3 are reasons enough to be excited to own a PS3 in the coming months and years.

They also announced the new on-demand movie and TV download service. I thought it was a good choice but I was worried about how long it would take them to launch the damn thing (Home anyone?) but to my surprise it was available the night of the conference. Now there's a surprise!

While the announcements were kind of predictable and the presentation dragged on in some spots, I feel Sony has come a long way from the "Massive damage to giant enemy crabs" disaster and has some genuinely compelling stuff lined up for PS3 owners.

Grade:B

I'm sorry but they've lost me.

Animal Crossing looks great but it isn't the "hardcore game" that was going to win us real gamers back. I guess my Wii will serve as my Gamecube and virtual console machine from now on.

I kind of take this as a giant slap in the face of everyone who helped make Nintendo what it is today. All for more market share and money. I hope you're happy Nintendo, I really do.

Grade: D

Today kicked off the veritable circus of video game news that we know as E3. As a gamer, this is probably the most exciting time of the year for me (aside from the release dates of the games, mind you) and what I look forward to watching the most is the press conferences from the "Big Thee".

Today was the day Microsoft let the gaming world know what's what in their neck of the woods. Making several surprising announcements including a completely re-vamped dashboard (including a new personal avatar system) along with features that seem to be added to steal a bit of the Wii's market. Casual games like 1 agaisnt 100 and Deal or no Deal will act as a sort of interactive television broadcast. Some of these games will feature a real host asking the questions in real time with everyone on Xbox Live. Players will be the competitor, audience and one of the thousands of spectators during the broadcasts. From the sounds of it these features will be on a scheduled basis (like a TV show).

While I think it's an interesting idea, I don't really agree with adding this in the dashboard. While it's obvious that Microsoft is aching for that Wii money, I doubt many hardcore game fans are going to show too much interest. The avatar system really just seems like a "me too" feature resembling a cross between Nintendo's Mii characters and Sony's Home service. Color me unimpressed. While I do like teh idea of having a "party" of people you can lead around (playing games, watching movies, sharing pictures) I do, however, think this feature could have been just as compelling if it were done within the existing Xbox dashboard. While I'll reserve my final judgement on the "improvements" for when I get my hands on it, I'll just say for now I'm not sold on it yet.

Aslo announced was a partnership with Netflix. The new service should allow existing Netflix members view "one of thousands of movies" straight to their TV using their Xbox 360. This also includes a feature to share your movie with friends. I'm not sure if you can chat while the movie is playing of if it just streams to both of your consoles simultaneously. I really like this new feature and can't wait to use it. As an avid Netflix member I enjoy many of their movies on their streaming function. I've always wanted to watch them on my TV rather than my tiny computer monitor. Wishes do come true!

The games mentioned were pretty much standard fare. We saw Gears of War 2, Fable 2, Geometry Wars 2, Fallout 3, Lips and a few others you'd expect to see. The biggest announcement was a former Playstation 3 exclusive, Final Fantasy XIII, is making it's way onto Microsoft's console day and date with the Playstation 3. I think this is a great announcement for gamers who wanted to play this game but weren't quite convinced to purchase a PS3 yet. While I do think it's a bit unfair that the 360 still retains Star Ocean 4 exclusivity while gaining FFXIII, I'm sure we'll hear about a PS3 version of that soon enough if multiplatform is what Square-Enix is going for now.

I always look to the press conferences for one thing: to get me excited about owning that companies products for teh coming year (and beyond). While Microsoft did indeed show some interesting new features, I feel that the game showing wasn't all too strong this time around. I'm looking forward to what the 360 has to offer this year but unfortunately 2009 still remains mostly a mystery.

My Grade: B-

Stick around for my impressions on Nintendo and Sony tomorrow night.

Thanks for reading!

(Edit: this was written at 1 in the morning after a long day at work. Please mind the spelling and grammatical errors as well as bad word choices.)

Hey everyone, hope you're enjoying Retro Revival Week (I know I am!) I'm always up for an excuse to play the awesome games of yester-year. With that, let's talk about what I've been playing, shall we?

Ninja Gaiden (NES)
Super Mario Bros 1 and 3 (NES)
Super Metroid (SNES)
Final Fantasy III (SNES)
Star Fox 64 (N64)
Super Mario 64 (N64)

I plan on enjoying some Playstation titles as soon as I find the cd holder with my old games without cases in it. I really wanted to play this shooter called N2O but I can't find it. Damn the luck.

Hope everyone enjoys the rest of RRW, I'll be sure to post something a bit more in-depth in the coming days.

Peace

"Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."

-Benjamin Franklin

Happy Independence Day.