E3 2006 has finished, roll on E3 07 folks

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Sony Conference delayed if you didn't know already. www.gamespot.com Why and so forth? Have to wait longer. But it's late. I...need...sleep..

Oh, I didnt know, how long is it delayed for?, Yeah I need sleep too..... ZZZzz

Gamespot says the attendees are comming in now... that could take like an hour.....I wonder whats the reason, they probably dropped the only living working PS3 backstage... :lol:

Oh well off to bed now, will probably come back tomorrow to find this thread has tripled in size!
 
No real surprise there's a delay. Hopefully it'll be starting before 1 am GMT. Maybe something's not working. Yeah, it'd be embarrassing if any hardware being featured is playing up. Maybe they need more time to let Ken Kutaragi get psyched up!

Well, listening to a fair bit of 80's/90's music at the moment!

I'm up a bit longer but yeah, much bigger thread to be sure!
 
its on!!!!!!...... oh well really want to watch it now, this is going to hurt in the morning

Hmmm...... just seen new PSP titles, some interesting ones there like killzone

Every PS3 WILL ship with a hard disk drive... just annouced... and will also be worldwide released in november..... the black mirror finish one will be the first one for sale

KY is comming on stage!!!! GRAN TURISMO HD JUST ANNOUNCED, GT4 GRAPHCIS CONVERTED TO HD... this is just a demo for e3 not an actual game that will be released... it looks very crisp..... fast loading time... this is 3 times larger (in terms of data) than commecial HD. This is being played on hdd which would be loaded in the PS3. I notice this demo has bike and cars to choose from (possibly a TT cross over for GT5?)

GT4 Online will be tested after E3, KY is saying they hope to deliver the next GT... NOT FAR after the launch of PS3!

Eyetoy demonstration of a Pokemon style card game where cards can be placed on a table and the monster appears on screen out of the card to fight.....

Playstation 3 online service will be FREE OF CHARGE!, PSP will now be able to emulate PSone games downloaded from this service..... Ridge Racer 1 being showed on PSP

Playstation Card System annouced for online shop using credits, showing ps3 online shop screen.....Singstar on PS3 will have HD content, finally can buy songs and videos to update the game, "My Singstar"... online community, you can even add your performances to the network if you think your that good!

Real gameplay of Gengi on PS3, the dual shock 2 is being used...

F1 for PS3, you can use your PSP to render a real time wing mirror..... seemless integration between PS3 and PSP.....
 
After the conference was delayed for an hour, and broadcasting problems on GameSpot. Here is what I have to add:

The joypad is the same as the PS2 joypad, and it is lighter. Aswell as having the bottom thumb changed. Also it is 6 degrees sensor, the PS3's graphics shows.

How well it can handle CGI graphics in real time, also prices:

Asia: 59,800 yet
USA: $599 for 60GB version.
UK: 599 euros for 60GB version.

GT HD, was just made for E3. And well the graphics will be improved, it showed a scooter and cars on the menu.

More cars off and on track, bigger crowds in game. And GT5 will not expand the series, but explode it into bigger areas.

That building that got blew up in last years E3, is part of a game called Eight Days. And well that is one of the best looking games I have seen too date, PS3 will also have Crysis, HL2 (Since VU Games came up on the list of companys and devs supporting PS3).

And F.E.A.R, I cannot remember much at the moment. But I post more up later on.

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And a full run down of the events at the Sony conference.

Source: GameSpot

4:40pm: Attendees are filing into the auditorium as a DJ spins the Beastie Boys, Michael Jackson, and Sean Paul. A giant screen bears the classic PlayStation logo. Banks of monitors flank the room on either side of the stage.
4:52: Kaz Hirai takes the stage and welcomes the crowd. He mentions Sony's 2005 E3 Conference and the unveiling of the PlayStation 3. "In essence, the real power of the PLayStation 3 rests in the hands of the content creators and ultimately the consumers.... PlayStation 3 is the most ambitious project we have ever undertaken in our history."

4:55: Hirai teases some of today's news, but then says it's time to take a look back at Sony's past performance.

4:59: At the 18-month mark, the PSP is the fastest selling console in Sony history. They shipped 47.3 million games as of the end of March. And now they're showing a list of new games for releease by the end of the year. Apr Escape 2. Planet PSP. Killzone Liberation. B-Boy breakdancing game., Loco Roco. Syphon Filter Dark Mirror.World Tour Soccer 2. Talk Man. Gangs of London.

5:03: The Greatest Hits program is coming to PSP starting with ATV Offroad Fury, Ape Escape: On the Loose, Hot Shots Golf, Twisted Metal, and Wipeout Pure.

5:05:RSS channel, expanded UMD video profile, Voice-over IP, camera and GPS support being added to PSP in future updates. Then they show a video of gamers around the world talking about their PlayStation memories.

5:08: It's arefresher course on the PS3 stats. It will support standard definition as well as high-def setups. It will communicate with the PSP and support Blu-ray video, PSone, and PS2 games.

5:12: Hirai gives a few stats saying PS users are more likely to be HD viewers. The Hard disc drive will ship with a hard drive in the box for every system.

5:14: Hirai says the "clear black" color system will be available at launch.

5:15: SCE president of worldwide studios Phil Harrison takes the stage, then promptly introduces Kazunori Yamauchi of Polyphony Digital. Yamauchi is holding what looks like a DualShock controller.

5:19: The next Gran Turismo will run at 60fps with menus designed for HD resolution. Players will be able to play vehicles ranging from race cars to commercial transportation to scooters. Hirai demonstrates the Tokyo track in replay form. He says it is broadcasting three times the amount of information on screen as normal HD broadcasts, or 12 times the amount of information GT4 on the PS2 conveys to a television. In loading another track, he asks the audience to pay attention to the load times. For Gran Turismo HD, he says it has been optimized for the hard drive-equipped PS3 and says players should be able to get from the menu to the race in two or three seconds. For the demo shown, it takes slightly longer.

5:24: A pack of cars race around a track. The engines sound like jets taking off an aircraft carrier, but before the race is finished, they cut back to the original Gran Turismo to show how far the series has come.


5:28: The third track demo is the Grand Canyon with vintage cars racing around. After the demo, Hirai says Sony will be conducting beta testing based on GT4 online capabilities in Japan and the US. He says the world of GT will not expand, but rather explode. They hope to deliver the next GT "not too far" from the PS3 launch.

5:31: EyeToy creator Dr. Richard Marx is here to introduce the Eye of Judgment, an EyeToy card battle monster game. He is placing real cards in the EyeToy's view and monster graphics are appearing on the cards to do battle. This game will be at Sony's booth.

5:34: Kaz Hirai is back out to talk about the online strategy. He says online and network will be like air conditioning in a car: a standard feature. He says online and networking for the PS3 "is as essential as the air that we breathe." He says by offering a variety of social functionalities beyond gaming (messaging, player profiles, friends list), Sony will create a community, a "virtual society," free of charge.

PSP users will be able to play emulated PSone games booting up directly from the memory stick. He navigates through the PSP menu and boots up a game. Galaga comes up as the game loads. It's Ridge Racer.

5:40: Hirai says this is part of Sony's plans to leverage its systems lifespans and extend them for more than 10 years. People can pick up for "The PlayStation Card" at retailers, which will allow them to buy additional content. Phil Harrison shows the online store interface for the PS3.

He shows an example of how it will work using Singstar for the PS3, scrolling through dozens of songs from Billy Joel to Destiny's Child. The interface includes a price ($0 for now to keep the pricing strategy secret) as well as other information about the song. There's also the option to see who else is on Singstar, and customize the user's background.

5:45: Bill Rich of Game Republic takes the stage to introduce Genji 2. Dozens of samurai battle on screen as Bill cuts them down where they stand. He switches characters on the fly, and says that ability will be used by players to create new and unique combos. To take on a giant crab boss, he uses the more powerful character to flip the crab on its back, then calls in the swift character to hop on its stomach and attack a glowing purple weak point. This will also be playable at Sony's E3 booth.

5:50: Harrison shows a PS3 F1 game with an interactive wing mirror. A PSP he is holding is displaying a rear view in the game in real-time.

5:51: Ninja Theory's Heavenly Sword is next. A red-headed woman in white uses a pair of large swords and a variety of hand-to-hand combat techniques to best a number of opponents in gladitorial combat. The screen cuts to cinematic angles for special moves and particularly impressive sequences, including one complex sequence that has players following a number of button prompts on screen.

5:56: A quick trailer of Lair played, followed by clips from the next Getaway, Afrika (working title), Everybody's Golf (better known as Hot Shots Golf in the US), and Monster Kingdom. They are followed by the debut of Eight Days, which showed a high octane shootout at a dusty truckstop in the middle of nowhere.

6:03: Next up is a trailer for Naughty Dog's next project. A pan around maps and jungles ends when a man in a t-shirt and jeans starts getting into gunfights with armed mercenaries. No name was given, and they quickly go to Insomniac president Ted Price taking the stage. He talks about Resistance: Fall of Man, about an alternate history where World War II never happened and aliens invade. He says it is "intense, bleak, and brutal." Then he introduces a trailer for it.

6:07: The Resistence trailer qualifies as bleak, brutal, and intense. It is a noisy, violent first-person shooter set in an utterly destroyed city. Price thanks the audience and says the game will be playable at the show. Harrison says "that sums up our playable section," and returns the stage to Hirai. Hirai turns the topic to third parties, and introduces a selection of titles from other publishers. Ubisoft's Assassin's Creed is first, followed by a new Gundam game from Bandai Namco, Konami's Coded Arms Assault, Bandai Namco's Ridge Racer 7, Ubisoft's Brothers in Arms: Hell's Highway, Bandai Namco's Tekken 6, Sega's Sonic the Hedgehog, Sega's Virtua Tennis 3, Sega's Virtua Fighter 5, Midway's Stranglehold, Koei's Fatal Inertia, Koei's Bladestorm: The Hundred Years War, and From Software's Armored Core 4.

:17: Electronic Arts CEO Larry Probst takes the stage. He says he will show two brief demos, and introduces NBA Live executive producer Kevin Wilkinson. He shows a PS3 player model reacting to a cursor moving in 3D space, then shows a PS2 player model not reacting to the same thing. He details "footplanting, which makes the players in the PS3 game actually have to move their feet and plant them to move instead of just sliding around. He shows the players moving around in 360-degree arcs, then demonstrates a real-time demo of what he's talking about.

6:21: The second EA demo is for Tiger Woods's next game, which uses the "Ucap" motion capture technique. Instead of a playable golf game, the demo shows a lifelike Tiger Woods model that grins, frowns, and reacts to shots with realistic facial expressions and body mannerisms.

6:25: A trailer for Square Enix's Final Fantasy XIII is shown, with a couple scattered hoots and hollers throughout the audience. Then a Metal Gear Solid 4 trailer comes up, to an even larger crowd reaction. It deals with the next game's plot and shows a number of the returning characters rendered in detail for the PS3. An elderly Solid Snake talks about one last thing he has to do, then puts a loaded gun in his mouth, calling it his "final mission."

6:32: Ken Kutaragi takes the stage, and asks the crowd if they enjoyed the latest progress on Ps3 titles, which is met with some applause and cheers. Kutaragi then promises "one more big thing we have kept secret." He talks about the controller of the 1994 PlayStation controller's debut. He promises to enhance controllability to the next tier for the next generation. He then holds up the final PS3 controller. It's a silver DualShock with a little black button in the middle with the classic PlayStation logo. He asks Harrison to demonstrate what the controller can do. A demo trailer shows a crate, hopping around of its own accord. It breaks open and the PS3 controller is inside. He lifts the controller up, and the controller on the screen lifts up. With no external sensor required, he can move the controller in six degrees of movement.

6:36: Harrison notes that the Bluetooth-capable, wireless controller will be lighter than the PS2's normal controller, and calls it "a fantastic innovation." Harrison says Incognito's Warhawk will make use of the motion-sensing capabilities, then asks Incognito's Dylan Jobe to demonstrate. He controls the game's fighter using the PS3 controller as a proxy, tilting the controller to gain altitude, bank, perform barrel rolls and other actions.

6:41: Hirai takes the stage once again and recaps what's been seen so far. Then he announces the global launch details. It will be available in two versions: one with a 60GB hard drive, and one with 20GB. It will launch in the US on November 17 for $499 ($549 CDN) for the 20GB version and $599 ($659 CDN) for the 60GB one. The machine will launch in Japan on November 11 with the 20GB version fetching 59,800 yen, and the 60GB one bearing an "open price," which means retailers will set the price themselves. Europe and Australia will also get the mahcine on November 17, with the 20GB version running for 499 euros, and the 60GB configuration going for 599 euros. Hirai thanked the audience and invited them to get their hands on PS3 games at kiosks throughout the hall.

Images from GS

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http://i.i.com.com/cnet.g2/images/2006/127/psconf5551_screen.jpg - Eight Days
 
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Ok guys I,m not a big fan of Nintendo, but I try and watch a live stream of the Nintendo conference. But I be sure to watch the MS conference live hopfully.

Source: GameSpot

Eight Days E3 2006 First Look

This new action game from Sony's London Studio was shown for the first time at Sony's E3 2006 press conference


During Sony's E3 2006 press conference, a new action game from the company's London studio was displayed for the first time. Titled Eight Days, this game looks to be a hybrid of third-person shooting and driving action that actually looked slightly reminiscent of the recent PSP title, Pursuit Force--though obviously jacked up for the PlayStation 3.

The trailer shown at the conference began with a number of seedy looking dudes standing around in the Arizona desert and generally looking…seedy, checking out guns in the trunk of a car. Suddenly, a pair of high performance sports cars come shooting down a desert road. Literally. Passengers in both cars are shooting at each other like mad, kicking up tons of dust and sending bullets all over the place. At one point, the video shifts to what looks like an in-game shot of the two cars bumping into one another, grinding at high speeds in an almost Burnout-like fashion. One car finally lands the fatal shot on the other, and it flips over, destroyed.

Back where the seedy guys were hanging out, the surviving car arrives with a bang. Two action hero-looking guys jump out and get into an immediate gun battle with the thugs. This sequence goes back and forth between what looks like in-game and CG--how indicative of the real game that will be, obviously we don't know. All we know is that it looked really, really good. The gun fight was extremely well animated, with plenty of cool dodge moves, including one spot where one character reloads and tosses a gun to the other, and another spot where one character ducks for cover by running straight into a window of a nearby diner. Of course, he's immediately pelted by bullets as he ducks under the front counter. The hail of gunfire here looks simply awesome, with glass breaking, and wood splinters everywhere. Total chaos.

It sort of goes on like this for a while, mad amounts of gunfire, all looking really nice. Finally, we see the two heroes run off as a gigantic tanker truck comes barreling through, skidding along and finally crashing right into the diner in a huge destructive mass. After this, the trailer cuts to the logo for the game. Then comes more footage of one of the guys picking up a lighter off of one of the fallen bad guys; he flicks it open amid the chaos and spilling gasoline from the tanker. He drops the lighter and walks off. Just in case you're not good at predicting situations, yes, everything blows up real, real good.

Again, it's tough to gauge how much of the Eight Days trailer was gameplay and how much was prerendered. Certain sequences included a full HUD, but even then, is it too good to be true? One way or the other, Eight Days was easily one of the best surprises of the conference demos, and we can't wait to know more about the game. We'll bring you more on Eight Days as soon as it becomes available.

Source: GameSpot

E3 06: Heavenly Sword Impressions

Sony shows off the upcoming Heavenly Sword game at their E3 Press Conference.


Today at Sony's pre-E3 press conference, they showed off a preview of Heavenly Sword, an upcoming action game from their developer Ninja Theory. We were shown a brief demo that took place in an arena level, where an unknown female protaganist took on a few dozen enemies. Compared to the demos previous to Heavenly Sword, the game is definitely impressive graphically.

We didn't get much more than a couple minutes worth of gameplay, but what we did see was very impressive. The female fighter was apparently cornered by her enemies, and forced to fight her way out of the arena in order to live. She's packing a number of weapon, or, to be more precise, a pair of swords that appear to be modular as Kratos' swords in the God of War game, complete with grappling hooks that can attach to enemies and move them around or whip them around the arena, knocking into other enemies, a la God of War itself.

Like God of War, Heavenly Sword appears to put a premium on animation quality, lending itself to fluid attack and finishing attack animations. There were aerial attacks on display, as well as some incredibly painful-looking finishing attacks, such as the one where the fighter took her swords, forced a man's legs open, and brought them down straight into his crouch. Ouch.

Two other interesting attacks took place later on, one of which involved the woman throwing her helmet, which then bounced off the first target towards multiple other nearby enemies, a la Captain America. To round out the demo, the woman knocked a single enemy up into the air, with button press prompts showing up onscreen, as when Kratos in God of War initiated a killing blow on one of his larger enemies. After kicking the enemy up well above the arena, the combo was completed, which sent the woman landing safely on the ground, with the enemy landing hard on his chest in the middle of the arena. One twitch, and he was dead.

All in all, the Heavenly Sword demo was one of the most impressive playable demos on display during Sony's press conference. The game is apparently playable on the show floor, so we'll have more details as they're available. Stay tuned to GameSpot.
 
Source: GameSpot

E3 06: Warhawk Impressions

Warhawk returns for the PS3, and was used as the first controller demo for Sony's E3 Pre-show press conference.


Warhawk is back! The first Warhawk game was a launch title for the original Playstation, and now it's being used as a technological benchmark for Playstation 3.

Although the demo we were shown was very short, it was impressive. The newly-announced motor controls of the Playstation 3 controller were used to tilt the ship in the game left and right as the controller was moved around, with extreme tilts of the controller resulting in barrel rolls, which any player of the original Warhawk will remember as being one of the primary defensive maneuvers, along with Immelman turns, which are themselves present and accounted for.

The ship itself looks more like an F-15 or another modern fighter jet than the boxy ship featured in the original Warhawk, but some design similarities still exist. One completely new feature is the ability to engage in vertical landings, thanks to your ship's ability to shift its exhausts straight down to engage in a cushioned landing. No telling whether or not this will be used for take-offs as well, but it makes sense that it would.

In terms of combat, we weren't treated to any particularly great footage, but what was on display still looked quite nice. The classic red diamonds are still used to designate your lock-on targets, while cluster missiles appeared to make a brief appearance in the show as well. Oddly enough, the specific point on the large ship that was painted as a target wasn't actually hit very often by the guided missiles of the Warhawk. Whether this means that you can't actually target subsystems of a ship or that the demo simply needs a little more work is yet to be resolved, but overall, the combat looks pretty sharp, with high-powered machinegun strafing runs, and presumably the usual array of dumbfire and guided missiles at your disposal.

Source: GameSpot

E3 06: Coded Arms: Assault First Look

Konami's PSP first-person shooter graduates to the PlayStation 3 in Coded Arms: Assault. We get our first look at Sony's E3 2006 press conference.


Coded Arms was the original first-person shooter for Sony's PlayStation Portable system, and now the game is branching out into a series with Coded Arms: Assault for the PlayStation 3. Very little of the game was shown during Sony's E3 2006 press conference, but the scant bits shown gave a look at how the game's visuals might be upgraded for Sony's newest console. Generally speaking, the trailer simply showed a number of panning shots of what looked like the lead character from the original Coded Arms, complete with a more tricked out version of his crazy future suit. This time, however, he seemed to be armed with an arm-mounted cannon, ala Samus or Mega Man. The one actual first-person shot of the trailer showed the lead guy pressing a number of buttons on his arm cannon, though sadly, no actual combat.

Throughout the trailer, you also got to see a number of shots of the environment transforming. You'd see a lot of computer code fading into a full city landscape as the camera panned around the lead character. This could be indicative of the game once again including randomly generated environments, though no information that specific was actually given during the rather brief trailer.

It was a fleeting but intriguing look at Coded Arms: Assault, and we're certainly curious to see more in the future.

Source:
GameSpot

E3 06: Gran Turismo HD Impressions

Straight from the Sony press conference and the Gran Turismo creator himself, we get an updated look at the next GT game.


t speaks to the influence of Sony's Gran Turismo series that the first PlayStation 3 game the publisher decided to show at their E3 2006 press conference is the upcoming monumental release of the next Gran Turismo game. Dubbed in the video as Gran Turismo HD, the game known at last year's E3 as Vision Gran Turismo was shown off by the series' creator, Kazunori Yamauchi. He explained that the E3 demo being shown was actually built from assets from the previous game in the series, Gran Turismo 4, upgraded and optimized for PS3 HD presentation. In terms of numbers, the demo was running at full 1080p resolution at a stellar 60 frames per second. And yeah, it looked real nice.

The E3 stage demo featured three tracks which should be familiar to long-time GT fans--Tokyo, Le Mans Sarthe, and Grand Canyon. The track- and car-selection menus were considerably redesigned from what you may be used to in the GT series and there were ten vehicles to choose from, from vintage sports cars like the Shelby Cobra, to a F1-styled open wheeler, and even a handful of motorcycles (Polyphony Digital did just finish the two-wheeled Tourist Trophy, after all), as well as more powerful GT sports car rides.

It didn't seem as if any of the three track demos shown during the presentation were being controlled by Yamauchi--instead, all looked to be running in replay mode, and Yamauchi (holding what a new Dual Shock Analog controller) was controlling the various camera angles as it ran, switching from traditional follow views, to standard hood-less, first person, in-car camera angles. A few laps on the Tokyo track showed the familiar downtown environment (first seen in the Gran Turismo 3 A-Spec) running with considerable wide-screen flair. Buildings and foliage were impressively modeled and the game held its steady frame rate throughout the guided lap.

The Tokyo demo course featured suped-up models from makers such as Nissan. For the second track, France's Le Mans Sarthe, Yamauchi pulled out the big guns: fully tweaked, GT sports cars befitting the home of the annual 24 Hours of Le Mans race. During this race, we got a few peeks at some of the new features the next Gran Turismo game might be packing: first of all, we counted as many as ten cars on the track at one point, a considerable upgrade from previous games, which featured a maximum of six cars on the track at any time. Secondly, and this is a bit of speculation on our part, we couldn't help but notice a few of the backmarker cars actually attempting to make passes on one another. Could this be a peek at some marked improvements in Gran Turismo's notoriously rigid artificial intelligence; could AI-controlled cars be actually racing one another? We'll only know when we see more of the game, and get to play it for ourselves.

The final course in the demo was the Grand Canyon rally track. Nestled on the precarious edges of America's famous natural landmark, the Grand Canyon course hosted Yamauchi's Shelby Cobra, as well as a few other unusual old-school rides, such as Jay Leno's Tank Car 03, a cylindrical open-engine car, exposed-axle monster that looked like a Formula One car from the 1930s. Grand Canyon was perhaps the most impressive track featured in the demo from a visual standpoint; with plenty of overhead, wide-angle shots, which showed the sharp detailed cars and tracks set against the backdrop of the massive photorealistic canyon itself. More impressive was the massive crowds lining the outdoor course, all made up of realistic looking individual 3D models. Even better, the crowds reacted to the traffic as it sped by, dancing out of the way of traffic as the cars twisted around the dusty corners, enthusiastic flashbulbs popping all the while.

One of the cooler, if more subtle, aspects of the Gran Turismo HD demo was the amazing audio quality; most obvious during the first-person in-car views. The sound of the cars' engines was almost overwhelmed by the sound of the wind whipping over the car's hood and body, sounding more like jet engine than an engine powering something with four wheels. We didn't get a good sense of the game's music soundtrack but, for GT fans, the sound of the engines is likely music enough.

Obviously, this being a limited game demo, there are still questions to be answered about GTHD. First off, the number of cars in the game as well as the number of playable tracks was not revealed by Yamauchi. What we do know is that the Polyphony Digital is busy working on arguably the most important aspect of the next Gran Turismo--online play. While no details were revealed in the conference, Yamauchi did say the development team was currently beta testing online play based on Gran Turismo 4's capabilities. Here's hoping all of that testing results in an innovative suite of online features for the next GT, something that was sorely missing from the previous game in the series. One thing's for sure, the game won't be lacking for power--Yamauchi mentioned the PS3 version of Gran Turismo will be pushing 12 times the amount of information Gran Turismo 4 for PS2 pushes to your television.

While no hard release date was offered for the game, it's obvious that Sony is banking on the Gran Turismo series to help make the PlayStation 3 launch a hit. As Yamauchi said, his team is aiming for the next Gran Turismo to come out "not too far" from the launch of the PS3. As an example, he mentioned GT3, which he mentioned was released roughly a year and a half after the PlayStation 2; hopefully we won't have to wait that long. His final words to the assembled crowd at the press conference were, "Please look forward to it." We suspect that mission's already accomplished.

Source:
GameSpot

E3 06: NBA Live 07 First Look

We get our first look at the newest NBA basketball game from EA Sports at the Sony E3 press conference.




EA Sports showed off an early version of NBA Live 07 for the PlayStation 3 during Sony's E3 2006 press conference. Most of the video and presentation centered on the amount of detail that the design team has put into the player models themselves--specifically from an animation and emotion standpoint. Instead of having well-detailed, but zombie-like players running around on the floor, EA is promising players who are actually aware of their surroundings, and specifically the ball. Heads and eyes will track the ball and other key elements during the game. Faces will even show appropriate emotion depending on the situation.

EA was also very proud to show that players in NBA Live will have improved footwork and actual, planted feet as they move around the court, or even turn around in place. Ice skating has been a huge flaw in the game over the years, so it was satisfying to see players move around with more realistic inertia. Players in NBA Live 07 will also move with full 360 degree freedom, instead of only turning at 45 degree angles as they have in past versions of the game.

The representatives from EA loaded into a practice court similar to the one in last year's NBA Live 06 on the Xbox 360, showing off Houston Rockets swingman Tracy McGrady. They moved T-Mac around the court, showing as he actually planted feet before exploding into cuts and direction changes. The EA reps then loaded up a virtual Dwyane Wade into the practice court and showed off some more moves from each of the all-stars, including turnaround jumpers, dunks, and other shots. From what we saw, there's been a marked improvement in the animation of the players compared to last year's game, so we're looking forward to seeing these characters in an actual game. We're also interested in finding out how much of this new animation technology, if any, will be used in the Xbox 360 or current generation console versions of NBA Live 07.

Source: GameSpot

E3 06: Monster Kingdom First Look

We get the first few peeks at Monster Kingdom, a dark action RPG slated for the PlayStation 3.


During the Sony press conference at E3 2006, we got an early glimpse of a game that is currently being called Monster Kingdom. Our only previous intel on the game came back in January from a release schedule on Sony Computer Entertainment Japan's website which billed the game as an action RPG titled Monster Carnival.

The short trailer began by showing a male character with light brown hair and glasses who bears a striking resemblance to Metal Gear Solid sidekick Otacon. Showing the character walking through various environments, including taking a path up to a darkened house, text appeared on the screen saying "A wondrous place where dreams and realities come true" and "7 doors and 7 worlds". A few monster characters were shown as well, including a blue dragon and a few other animal creatures, indicating that this game will probably infuse both realistic and fantasy elements together. The final blurb of text said "The next generation of dark fantasy" before the screen faded to black and the next trailer appeared.

Though we only got to see a few moments of this game, our interest has certainly been piqued, especially since this game is billed as one of the PlayStation 3 games that will be playable on the show floor at E3. If that’s the case, you will certainly be hearing more detailed impressions from us in the next few days when we get our hands on these mysterious characters and figure out exactly how this game is going to feel and what it’s going to look like.
 
Great....... I wake up to find the PS3 wont have a vibrating controller...... that really sucks!..... and it looks exsactly the same as the DS2 without shock...... is that seriously a joke!
 
Love the fact that tilting the controller now does something! It's the classic joke to take the mick out of people waving the controller around, but now they're right :p
 
No vibration?! Maybe good for your hands, but I like the vibration when shooting (MGS), pulling off moves (SCIII) and the general feel it gives.
 
BMWteamPTG
no way, they wouldnt make a PS3 and make it without vibration..theyre working backwards.

Well, sadly they have...... I do have to say it is stupid as evey other console has rumble, even Nintendo's one which has motion sensors aswell.
 
The trailer for Halo 3 is just great, or in other words "Wow". But I am trying to download the HD version of the trailer on my 360, but it stops at 64%.

Source: GameSpot

We got a close-up look at the Halo 3 trailer with Bungie representatives and have all the latest details on one of the biggest game announcements of E3.

Microsoft officially unveiled Halo 3 during its E3 press conference today, and the company released a trailer for its highly-anticipated sequel on the Internet and its Xbox Live service. Halo 3 will be the first Halo game designed for Microsoft's Xbox 360 console, and the importance to the company was highlighted by the fact that Bill Gates, Microsoft chairman and chief software architect, was on hand to help announce the game.

When the trailer was shown to the audience at the Grauman's Chinese Theater, where Microsoft held its annual games briefing, the crowd erupted. Halo 2 ended in a cliff-hanger, with the Master Chief, the hero of the Halo series, returning to Earth in the midst of a climactic battle between the Convenant, an alien coalition, and Earth's defensive forces. The Halo 3 trailer begins with a slow shot of the dusty African plains. Wreckage litters the landscape, and a woman's voice is heard. It's Cortana, the artificial intelligent construct that is Master Chief's chief ally. In brief, cryptic sentences, she talks about "being the source," and she sounds like she may have been somehow combined with Gravemind, the intelligence behind the Flood, another alien menace. As the Master Chief enters into the frame, she says in a distorted voice, "I know you. Your past. Your future."

Suddenly, Convenant Ghosts and battleships appear in the skies. The music swells, and in the distance, a huge hatch slowly opens in the ground. A bright beam of light begins to build, blinding the camera. Cortana then chimes in, "This is the way the world ends." The Bungie logo then flashes on the screen, followed by the text: "Finish the fight in 2007."

Bungie, the internal Microsoft studio that created Halo, also released the trailer onto the Internet, and a high definition version was put up on Xbox Live Marketplace, the online service available to Xbox 360 owners. To quote the accompanying text found on Xbox Live, Halo 3 is about Earth under Convenant rule: "With its defensive forces, all but obliterated, Earth has fallen to the unstoppable might of the Convenant. These alien occupiers have discovered something beneath the ancient African sands - something incredible... something Forerunner." The Forerunners are an apparently extinct alien race that built huge artificial ringworlds called Halos, and the Halo games have focused on the mystery surrounding these strange objects.

The importance of a new Halo game for the Xbox 360 cannot be underestimated. The original Halo was a launch title for the first Xbox, and was easily the biggest hit, driving sales of that system. Halo 2, which launched in 2004, became a cultural event, with thousands of gamers lining up for hours for the midnight launch. Halo 2 made entertainment history by generating $125 million in sales in one day. However, Microsoft didn't mention Halo 3 at all during last year's Electronic Entertainment Expo, and fans had been left wondering when the software giant would finally drop the big news. Well, the waiting for news of Halo 3 has now come to an end. Now they'll have to wait to 2007 for the game itself.

Screens:

http://i.i.com.com/cnet.g2/images/2006/128/926632_20060509_screen001.jpg
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Source: GameSpot

E3 06: Grand Theft Auto IV coming to 360, PS3 in 2007

Microsoft confirms next Grand Theft Auto is coming to Xbox 360 in October 2007; Rockstar Games confirms simultaneous launch on PS3.


In one of the most shocking announcements at E3, Microsoft revealed that it quite literally stole away some of Sony's audience. One of the PlayStation's most notoriously popular franchises, the Grand Theft Auto series, is confirmed to be coming to the Xbox 360. Previous editions of GTA were released exclusively on the PlayStation 2 in October, and were later ported to the Xbox. Now we know that Grand Theft Auto 4 will be hitting the Xbox 360 on "day one," alongside the PlayStation 3 version of the game.

At today's Microsoft pre-E3 conference, Peter Moore pulled back his right shirt sleeve and revealed the familiar Halo 2 logo. Duping the audience into thinking that a new Halo was about to be announced, the Englishman then pulled back his left shirt sleeve, which revealed a tattoo that showed a Grand Theft Auto IV logo.

Grand Theft Auto IV will be available on October 16, 2007, in North America, and October 19 in Europe.

Moore did announce that Microsoft and Rockstar have signed an exclusive agreement to provide episodic content via Xbox Live, though he did not specifically limit the content to GTAIV.

Following the announcement during the Microsoft press conference, Rockstar Games issued a press release confirming that GTAIV would be hitting both the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 simultaneously in the fall of 2007. The brief announcement specifically confirms that Scotland-based Rockstar North, creators of the previous GTA titles, will be developing the game.

-----

I hope an online mode is out on both versions.
 
The first official in game gameplay movie of Crysis has gone up on GameSpot. And what I can say is wow, when you see flame lights on the water it looks lush.
 
Source: GameSpot

E3 06: Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops First Look

Finally, an honest Metal Gear Solid on the PSP, and it's even more intriguing than we would have expected. We view the first footage.


At Konami's annual pre-E3 media briefing today, Kojima Productions took the lid off Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops, the first true-blue MGS game to hit the PSP. But what about Acid and Acid 2, you say. Duh. Those are card-battling games, and while those certainly involved Solid Snake in a significant capacity, they didn't have much neck-snapping. Well, they did, but you snapped necks by playing cards rather than by grabbing an unsuspecting soldier and twisting his damn fool head around.

Anyway. Portable Ops looks like it'll play just like the console Metal Gear Solid titles, which is exactly what fans have been waiting for. What's even better is, this game is considered part of the core Metal Gear Solid timeline as defined by Hideo Kojima, so it counts as an installment in the saga of Solid Snake. The game is set in 1970, six years after Snake Eater, and rejoins Naked Snake (nee Big Boss) now that's split away from the FOX unit. Big Boss is now being charged with treason, and you'll have to fight your way through any number of heavily guarded compounds and take out a number of renegade FOX agents to prove your innocence.

The most intriguing things about Portable Ops were revealed in the trailer we saw at the press conference. Essentially, this looks like Big Boss's Darth Vader story. If the seeds of his descent into villainy were sown at the end of Snake Eater, he'll be right on the brink of the dark side by the time Portable Ops is over, since references are overheard in the trailer to "the tragedy of Big Boss" and the rise of Outer Heaven, the mercenary state established in the first Metal Gear.

Taking a cue from the recently released MGS 3 Subsistence, Portable Ops will also include a multiplayer mode with some unique features. Not much info is available about the core gameplay here, but we imagine it will be similar to the shooter-style matches found in Subsistence. You'll be able to recruit other players into a squad, including characters that are only available in multiplayer, and there will even be a "white flag" system that lets you surrender to other players rather than fight it out to the death and lose. We're not sure what benefit surrendering will provide, though.

We are sure that Portable Ops looks awfully good for a PSP game; from the trailer we saw, it's almost as good-looking as its PS2 counterpart. And with cutscenes provided by the same comic artist who illustrated the Metal Gear Solid comic book, the game ought to be an aesthetic tour-de-force. The game is due out in the winter 2006 timeframe, so we'll bring you a lot more on it as soon as we can.

Screens

http://i.i.com.com/cnet.g2/images/2006/128/932978_20060509_screen001.jpg
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http://i.i.com.com/cnet.g2/images/2006/128/932978_20060509_screen007.jpg

Check out the rest on GameSpot, or if you want I can post more up later on guys.
 
Source: CVG

E3 06: Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell Double Agent Xbox 360 Impressions

Sam Fisher's back and badder than ever. We got our first look at the latest Xbox 360 build in action for the first time, just prior to E3.


After three games in as many years, it's probably time the designers behind Splinter Cell put a new spin on the highly acclaimed stealth action series. How about starting by making hero Sam Fisher a bad guy? That's the premise of Double Agent, the fourth game in the Splinter Cell series in which Fisher will infiltrate a terrorist cell in an attempt to bring it down from the inside. Just because you've joined the bad guys doesn't mean you'll have to act like them, though. The designers wanted to give the player as much freedom as possible to engage various scenarios as he or she sees fit, and we got to see several such open-ended situations in action during our recent demo of the game on the Xbox 360.

In fact, the demo started off with Fisher in a dingy back room where his cohorts had bound and gagged a prisoner. The player was immediately given a command to kill this helpless captive, at which point the game switched to a first-person view, which showed Fisher pointing a gun right at the guy's head. But you don't necessarily have to do the deed yourself. Like many of the crucial story points in the game, this one gave the player the option of refusing to carry out an act that Sam Fisher, Boy Scout that he is, would consider to be wrong. If you're feeling evil, though, you'll certainly be able to go through with heinous acts like this one. In this particular case, the prisoner was doomed from the start, because even if you don't make Fisher do the deed, one of the other bad guys will. But in other situations, you'll have to decide whether or not to take action, and then face the consequences of your decisions.

Of course, the choices you make are going to affect the terrorists' faith in you, not to mention the progression of the storyline. Based on what you decide to do--or who you decide to kill, primarily--you'll get different bits of dialogue later in the game, and some missions will even feature entirely different objectives. In fact, it's possible for you to miss certain missions entirely, based on the way events play out, and of course there will be multiple endings. But all that should just give you an incentive to go back and play the game differently to see what changes.

In another mission we saw, Fisher was dispatched by his terrorist pals to the Sea of Okhotsk to hijack a tanker, and this level started with a mechanic new to the Splinter Cell series: skydiving. As Fisher descended, it appeared the player could guide his free-fall to some extent. Alas, his parachute became tangled and didn't deploy correctly, which kicked the sequence into a minigame where the player had to guide Fisher's hand over the various straps and buckles of the chute's harness to get it to unfurl properly. The mechanics here were said to be similar to the series' lock-picking minigame, where you'll have to subtly move the analog stick and wait for the appropriate controller vibration in order to succeed.

After Fisher hit the ground, we saw him explore a severe arctic environment where he stealthily approached an enemy encampment. Sam's appearance will apparently evolve significantly throughout the storyline based on his environment. In this mission, he was wearing a suit clearly suited for extremely cold weather. Good thing, too, since he promptly jumped right through a hole in the ice and swam through the frigid waters to get closer to the bad guys. A Ubisoft rep talked about how you'll be able to perform stealth kills in this scenario by literally pulling enemies down through the ice and taking them out underwater (we weren't able to see this in action).

Finally, the most explosive mission of our demo took place in the civil war-torn Congo capital of Kinshasa and sent Fisher on an assassination mission of an undisclosed nature. This level forced the player to dispense with any pretense of stealth, as hostile forces were laying waste to the already-beleaguered city streets with machine-gun fire and heavy explosives. As a result, Fisher had to run and gun his way through the chaos, occasionally engaging in firefights that caught innocent bystanders in their crossfire. The level of destruction in this mission was truly impressive--at one point, a bus was launched off the ground by a massive explosion and rolled down the street, flattening the hapless souls caught in its path. At the end of the level, Fisher reached another one of those pivotal moments in which he had to decide whether or not to take out a supposed ally at range with a sniper rifle.

If you've been wondering if Double Agent is actually going to look as good as those impressive screenshots that have come out so far, we're pretty sure it will. The game really does look just about as good as the initial screens have indicated, and we can't wait to see how the visuals shape up as the game gets closer to release. And since that's now slated to happen in September, we won't really have that long to wait, after all. Stay tuned for more on Double Agent at E3 and in the coming months.

Screens:

http://i.i.com.com/cnet.g2/images/2006/128/926930_20060508_screen001.jpg
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Source: CVG

Haze shoots out of the haze!

New Free Radical shooter, announced by Ubisoft for PS3, 360 and PC.


Well aren't we feeling smug. As we exclusively revealed earlier this week, TimeSplitters developer Free Radical has a whole new first-person shooter for you to get high on - it's called Haze, it's a near-futuristic military blaster, and it's coming out for PS3, Xbox 360 and PC early next year.

Set 25 years in the future, the tale revolves around independent military organisation Mantel, who thanks to their advanced weaponry and bio-mechanical support, are the scourge of terrorists and evil dictators everywhere. As a soldier in this unit, you've been asked to investigate a rebel faction based in South America. Unfortunately, things go a little, well, tits up.

The PR blurb is promising devastating firepower, dense and humid jungle ravines, breathtaking mountains, armies of bastard-hard guerrillas (thems our words, not Free Radical's), and a variety of multiplayer modes that let you participate as a member of either side.

We'll probably hear a lot more on this title in the weeks to come. In the meantime, here are the first set of screens.

Screens:

http://www.computerandvideogames.com/medialib/screens/screenshot_157043.jpg
http://www.computerandvideogames.com/medialib/screens/screenshot_157042.jpg
http://www.computerandvideogames.com/medialib/screens/screenshot_157041.jpg
 
Thats what I thought, but the other big game to compete against Crysis has to be UT2007.
 
Ok the MotoGP 06 demo went up on Live early today buds.

Source: CVG

Pro Evo for Xbox 360 officially announced, plus the mastermind behind the game slams England's chances!


Konami has officially announced that Pro Evolution Soccer, the football game that true football fans love, will be kicking onto Xbox 360 later this year.

Pro Evolution Soccer 6 will feature a whole host of new features like more physical contact between players, more opportunities for snap shots, more balanced referees and more ticks and feints. The Master League mode has been improved and a new International Challenge mode lets you take part in the qualification and finals of a World Cup-style competition. There'll also be tons of Xbox Live options.

And the game's creator and Producer at Konami Seabass (real name Shingo Takatsuka) told CVG today that England's chances of winning the World Cup have gone down the pan after Rooney broke his infamous metatarsal. "A few weeks back I thought England had a very good chance and would probably come second to Brazil," Seabass told us, "but after Rooney's injury they have dropped a long way down my list."

We also talked Pro Evo on Xbox 360 with Seabass, and he's confident that our version will be the best in the series yet. "We really wanted to bring Pro Evo to the Xbox 360 at launch," he told us, "and we want to apologise to our fans that we haven't been able to do that. However, we have been working for a very long time on Pro Evo for Xbox 360 and we're confident that it will be great."

Seabass promised us that the Xbox 360 version will feature far more realistic ball physics (the team has done "exhaustive research" into this apparently, which we reckon means they've been playing five-a-sides too much), player animations, refereeing decisions and collision detection.

One particular area he really wants to work on is the goalkeepers. "In Pro Evo when a player shoots from close range he is guaranteed to score, but in real football a keeper sometimes makes a spectacular reaction save. I want to bring those kind of goalkeeping heroics to the Xbox 360 version of Pro Evo."

Seabass also believes that Pro Evo will help shift the Xbox 360 and Xbox Live in Japan when it launches - a view backed up by Ninety-Nine Nights producer Sangyoun Lee. "I think we'll help the Xbox 360 in Japan because our game is so great!" laughed Seabass modestly.

So who does the genius behind Pro Evo reckon will win the World Cup? "I want to say Brazil, but it's so boring to pick them. Plus, their strikers haven't been performing too well lately. So I'll pick Czech Republic - they're ranked highly at the moment and I think they're a very powerful team."

If his footballing tips are of the same quality as his development skills, it might be worth laying a tenner on the red and white army... Seabass promised we'd see more of Pro Evo on Xbox 360 at August's Tokyo Game Show, and we expect the game to be available around October.
 
Lol, you are obsessed with Czech republic :lol:

As for pictures of pro evo 6, don't expect any big changes in graphics as the last game was just about the limit of PS2 graphics.
 
El Gigante
Lol, you are obsessed with Czech republic :lol:

As for pictures of pro evo 6, don't expect any big changes in graphics as the last game was just about the limit of PS2 graphics.
Ofcourse I'm! :crazy: Waaay too obsessed!
And about the graphics...I don't care, as long as it looks better than FIFA, which it does.
 
Cosmic
Ofcourse I'm! :crazy: Waaay too obsessed!
And about the graphics...I don't care, as long as it looks better than FIFA, which it does.
I think we yet to see the truly great looking Fifa's on the 360. But I am tipping the best looking Fifa on a next gen console, to well be on the PS3.
 
TVR&Ferrari_Fan
I think we yet to see the truly great looking Fifa's on the 360. But I am tipping the best looking Fifa on a next gen console, to well be on the PS3.
Pssffff...FIFA is always rushed, title after title yet nothing amazing so far.
Looking at some XBOX360 screenshots, it isn't anything impressive.
 
Fifa sucks. Every year they add some new gimmick, like 'mind control' or something which makes it even more crap. Pro evo is just real football, which makes it great.
 
There's some pics of the next gen WE at the "The New PS3" thread in the Playstation 3 forum. Not really impressive in my opinion though.
 

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