Ok, I’m saturated with E3 2010 news, and ready to throw down the final verdict.  It’s a long one, so grab some popcorn and adult libation (or beverage of choice) and read on…

Xbox 360:

I was really surprised by how bad Microsoft’s press conference was.  For the last few years, Microsoft and the Xbox were the cool kids, ripping that mantle away from Sony with the Xbox 360 and keeping it when the PS3 launched and bombed.  They had Beatles members up on stage.  They had energy, and excitement.  Gears of War, Modern Warfare, Halo 3… they just rocked it, and their press conferences seemed like hip events compared to the other guys.  But I think that over the past year or more they’ve concentrated too much on being like the other guys when they didn’t need to be, instead of just continuing to be themselves.  When Nintendo was struggling with the Gamecube, it was apparent that they needed to do something to right the ship.  They did that not by copying what the other guys were doing, but by forging their own path.  They took a lot of flak for that in the gaming press, but look where it’s gotten them now.  Microsoft seems to be doing just the opposite.

Kinect is awful.  The name is awful.  The games are awful.  You even get the feeling that the things that only look half awful probably looked better than they are, because their presentation was highly scripted, and that in the real world they’ll probably be worse.  Kintectimals would be great if there was some AI at work that analyzed what you said and did, and reacted dynamically to it (think z-machine parser for the 21st century).  But you know the thing will have a 40 page booklet explaining every move and voice trigger exactly, that you’ll need to replicate to get the game to react.  Kinect Sports and Your Shape: Fitness Evolved are blatant rip-offs of Wii Sports and Wii Fit.  (And Your Shape: Fitness Evolved… is that supposed to evoke some Halo: Combat Evolved memories or something??)  Kinect Adventures… minigames, really?!  Because you can never have enough minigames?  This stuff was all the rage two or three years ago, albeit in a slightly different way.

On top of that, you can tell that there was a design decision early on to say “Project Natal will be marketed as a device where you are the controller.  You don’t need to hold anything, you just use your body.”  The problem is that by making that decision, you force game designers down that one implementation path, instead of the best implementation path.  Kinect Joy Ride and Forza are prime examples.  No one but Microsoft thinks playing a driving game by just holding your hands up in the air is a good idea.  They showed that you could look around your car interior by just rolling your shoulders… great idea!  But how about using the voice integration to call out orders to a pit crew with your voice before you go into the pits?  Now that would be cool (hey, give me a call, Microsoft, I’ll give you some more ideas).  And then let us control our car with our controller.  Or sell us an affordable wheel accessory.  Holding your arms up does not immerse you more into the game.  Its bad game design based on a bad marketing decision.

The Star Wars game suffers the same type of issue.  An on-rails lightsaber game, in which you’re not even holding a lightsaber?  Will all Kinect games like this have to be on-rails then?  Who wants to swing a pretend air lightsaber??  At least the Wii games had tangible plastic accessories you could hold!  Why not make a game where you swing an actual physical object, and use the motion detection for force powers?  Because someone in marketing decided it was better that you were the controller.  Clearly it’s not.

Finally, something not widely reported on, but well documented by Stephen Totilo at Kotaku, is that as it stands right now, you have to stand to play every Kinect game.  (See what I did there?  As it stands… how clever am I?  Don’t answer that!)  Apparently Kinect has trouble recognizing your body when you sit.  Even playing driving games!!  In fact even using hand gestures to control a movie might require you to be standing!  Are you kidding me?!  This seriously needs more press.

The voice commands looked good if (a) they work for everything, and (b) they work well.  I suspect that they don’t work for everything, and if you still have to have a remote handy, then why bother.  How well will it work is one of my biggest questions.  I have a regular voice, but it seems like I have a hard time with voice recognition stuff.  I must have just the wrong tone.  They didn’t seem to have any trouble with that onstage, but how well it works for everyone remains to be seen.  Also, will some kid be able to walk by a room and shout “Xbox stop” while his sister is watching a movie and the Xbox responds?  Or will it know remember the voice of the person logged in.  I suspect the former.

The fact that no price was given for Kinect is a telling sign it’ll be expensive.  The latest predictions hover around $150.  Amazon, Gamestop, Walmart and Best Buy are already pricing it that way.  Will you have to buy a $60 fitness game on top of that, making it twice as expensive as Wii Fit?  Ok, ok, enough of Kinect for Xbox 360.  I’ve spent as much time on it as Microsoft did during their press conference. i.e. too much time.  What about the rest?  The new Xbox 360 doesn’t do much for me, at least until my out-of-warranty machine red rings.  They should have had built-in wireless from the start.  Microsoft is so confident that it won’t red ring that they removed the ability for the new one to display red rings!  And the lineup of non-Kinect games was pretty lackluster and one dimensional.  Call of Duty: Black Ops, Metal Gear Solid Rising and Fable III are all multiplatform, and none are release day purchases for me (maybe Fable III, we’ll see).

So what am I excited about from Microsoft?  Well, from what we saw at the show and what else trickled out afterwards, I’m looking forward to the following:

Gears of War 3 – I love the GoW franchise and can’t wait for this to come out

Halo Reach – I’ve played all the Halo games (except the RTS one), and no doubt was going to get this one.  But I was really surprised by the space combat, and it’s really heightened my enthusiasm.

Castlevania: Harmony of Despair – 2D Castlevania rocks, and this looks awesome.  Plus it has 6-player online co-op.  Day one purchase.

Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light – Looks like a great take on Lara Croft and has co-op as well.  Yay for more co-op games!

And I’m amazed to say, that’s it.  For me, Microsoft clearly had the worst showing.  It looks like Microsoft has put too much effort on “me too” and not nearly enough effort concentrating on what made them great.  The Xbox 360 has thrived despite console failure rates approaching  something like 50% in past years.  When consumers are willing to put up with that to use your product, you’re clearly doing something right.   With this Kinect thing getting closer to release, hopefully Microsoft can refocus and get things back on track.

Sony:

I have to say that Sony surprised my at E3, probably because my expectations were very low.  Sony has been the wayward child the last few years, clinging to past glories and refusing to admit to bad hardware choices for both the PlayStation 3 and the PlayStation Portable.  I have 3-4 times more Xbox 360 and Nintendo Wii games than I do PlayStation 3 games… each, not combined!  And I’m talking about over 200 games total, not just a small shelf.  I use the PS3 for watching DVD’s and Blu-ray discs far more than I game on it.  And while the PSP seemed to have a strong start, over the past year or more it releases have trickled to a near standstill.  (Don’t even get me stared on the asinine PSP Go!)  But I have enjoyed a few games lately on my PS3 (Heavy Rain and Final Fantasy XIII come to mind), so I was hoping that they’d have a decent show, and they didn’t disappoint.

First, the 800-lb gorilla called PlayStation Move.  I was fully prepared to hate it, and I have to say that Sony’s press conference has made me give it some consideration.  When I look over the list of 1st and 3rd party titles coming that will use it, I don’t see just a tremendous amount I’m keen on.  A lot of it looks like games that Sony shoehorned PlayStation Move controls onto, like Heavy Rain and Resident Evil 5.  Even new titles like Killzone 3 were shown without motion controls.  But I thought that Sorcery looked great.  I might get it for just that and for Time Crisis: Razing Storm.  If it was $150 I wouldn’t, but I already have the PlayStation Eye from buying Eye of Judgement, so $80 for the ball controller and the nun chuck (or whatever the heck they’re calling them) put it in the realm of possibility for me.

As far as non-Move games, I think Sony announced some heavy hitters that should do well for them over the coming year. The poor PSP may even be getting some love.  I was surprised at the list of titles.  (Why they can’t release a download-only PSP that lets you access your back-catalog for free and has two analog sticks is just beyond me though.) My only real problem is that many of Sony’s storied franchises are just not my cup of tea.  I’m not big on sports titles, other than the occasional hockey title, so MLB10, Tiger Woods, PGA Tour 11, Madden NFL 11… it’s all kinda wasted on me.  Same with racing titles.  Gran Turismo 5 looks visually fantastic, but I won’t be getting it.  MotorStorm… no thanks.  Twisted Metal?  Looks like fun if you like deathmatch games (I don’t) or have 100 people on your friends list to play with (I don’t).

What else?  Well, I wasn’t really big on original Little Big Planet to start with, and LBP2 just looks freaky weird.  Like they didn’t know where to go after they did the first one, so they went with top-down minigames.  Makes no sense to me.  Killzone 3 looked good, but I’ve never played the other ones and the setting just looks so generic FPS to me.  I’ve read conflicting reports on whether or not you need a 3D TV set to play it in 3D.  I assumed you didn’t since they told the audience during the press conference to put on their 3D glasses, and I’m guessing those big screens were not 3D TV screens.  But some online posts says that you do.  If you don’t and I can just use a pair of glasses boosted from the movie theater, I may get it just to see what I think.  Otherwise I don’t think Killzone 3 does much for me, and I’m sure the motion controls will be just tacked on and horrible.

I’ve never been big on the Medal of Honor series so that’s probably out.  I have inFamous, Dead Space, and just about every version of Assassin’s Creed ever released, but I’ve never finished any of them, so if I can control myself I’ll probably hold off and pick them up cheap.

You see where this is going?  To me, Sony had a great lineup of games that I don’t play much of.  So what am I excited about?

Portal 2 – I was blown away by Gabe Newell walking onstage at a Sony event.  Probably the last person I expected to see.  The fact that he said that Portal 2 on the PS3 will be the best console version of the game, and that it’ll have Steamworks integration, really have me considering it on PS3.

Final Fantasy XIV Online – I know very little about it.  I played FF XI for awhile but drifted away because of the hefty grouping requirements, and I don’t know if this will be changed in XIV.  But I also know that I’m a sucker for Final Fantasy games, and will probably buy it anyway just too see for myself that I won’t end up playing it much.

Valkyria Chronicles II – Even though it’s shrunk down to the PSP for the sequel, it still looks like it could be just as good.

God of War: Ghost of Sparta – You can’t go wrong with God of War games.  Chains of Olympus on the PSP was great, and this will probably be even better.

Paradise Eve: The 3rd Birthday – A PSP spin-off of the Paradise Eve series, what they showed at E3 has piqued my interest.

Ys: The Oath in Felgana – Ys games are generally great, and this looks like it will be another great one.  Can’t have too many Japanese action RPG’s.

Finally, I can finish talking about Sony without mentioning PlayStation Plus.  Few things get me as riled up as digital content that is marketed as something you own, when in reality it’s something you rent.  To me, that’s exactly what PlayStation Plus is.  The “free” content is “mine” for as long as I pay for a subscription.  Gee, what a great deal (for everyone but the consumer).  Sony knew it missed the boat on making money off their service like Microsoft does, but once you go down that path, it’s hard to go back.  Placing restrictions on it just makes it worse.  I’ve very disappointed that Sony went down that road.  They keep removing things from the PS3 to make it cheaper and cheaper, and now they’re charging you more on the other end.  As with the PSP, it just seems like their business strategies this generation suck.

Overall, I can see why some people might pick Sony for best in show, because I thought that they unveiled a pretty strong lineup.  It’s just not a lineup that gets me overly excited.  While they definitely came out smelling sweeter than Microsoft, my best of show is in another castle.

Nintendo:

I’ve felt in years past that Nintendo brought a small but decent selection of offerings to the E3 table, but they didn’t do a great job of presenting them.  They didn’t always showcase their strengths, particularly to the audience that is E3, and did themselves a big disservice.  I think it partially shows in game sales, where there are a plethora of great game titles that were completely overlooked on the Wii.  Their list of “games you should have played but didn’t” is overflowing already, and we haven’t even moved to the next generation yet.  It took a couple of years, but Nintendo finally listened to its critics and delivered an E3 worth remembering.

Gone were the screen after boring screen of “Look how much money we made last year.”  Gone were the middle-aged moms on stage trying to convince the 20-30 something crowd that Nintendo had cool videogames.  Gone was the awkward parade of Mii minigame demonstrations.  There were no fingertip peripherals, or indeed ANY peripherals in sight.  Instead, it was all quality games, games and more games.

As expected, the Nintendo 3DS debuted.  It looks very similar to a DS, but with a slightly larger screen on top, an analog slider nub above the D-pad, a 3D slider adjust on the side, and 2 cameras on the outside for taking 3D pictures.  For us internet viewers watching at home, and indeed for those live in the auditorium, it was not really possible to see the 3D effect in action, so I was very interested to hear whether it was worth upgrading from my newly purchased DSi XL.  Well, a few hours later after seeing it in action, Kotaku said “it’s astounding” and Destructoid said “it is truly incredible.”  Good enough for me.  The strong launch lineup looks good too.

The one complaint I do have is that they still need to showcase 3rd party development more in their press conference.  There are some really great looking titles coming for both Wii and DS/3DS that got at most a logo shot, or worse not even a mention at all during the press conference.  Five minutes less Zelda and five minutes more of 3rd party titles would have been a better choice.

But just as a mentioned earlier that I think Sony just doesn’t have a lot of properties that I personally like, Nintendo looks like it’s just the opposite.  The list of things I’m looking forward to is long:

The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time (3DS) – ’nuff said

Resident Evil Revelations (3DS) – RE in 3D!  I’ll probably jump right out of my skin.

Metal Gear Solid Snake Eater 3D (3DS) – Much more interested in this that the slicing and electrifying 360 game

A Boy and His Blob (3DS) – I don’t know any details on this, but lovingly own the boxed original and the Wii remake.  Jelly bean tossing in 3D?

Animal Crossing (3DS) – Screens look great, and the story has changed, making you the both the new town citizen and the mayor at the same time.  I’m glad they mixed it up, hopefully there are more additions and changes to keep it from getting stale.

Star Fox 64 (3DS) – 3D flying!

Kid Icarus: Uprising (3DS) – The biggest launch title, we finally get Kid Icarus back.  The 3D looks to really showcase what the 3DS can do.

Paper Mario (3DS) – Looks gorgeous and really seems to capture the essence of the Paper Mario series.

Mario Kart (3DS) – Look out for that banana!

Professor Layton and the Unwound Future (3DS) – A sense of depth in this game could really add a new dimension.  (Har har)

Golden Sun: Dark Dawn (DS) – Very tempted to play these games again before this one comes out.  This was announced at E3 2009 but we finally get a look at it, and it looks great!

The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword (Wii) – Finally, the new Zelda!  Despite the demo issues onstage, I’m sure it’ll be awesome.  I wish we didn’t have to wait until Spring 2011, but I won’t be lacking for things to play.

GoldenEye 007 (Wii) – ZOMG GoldenEye!  It’ll be really interesting to see the similarities and differences between the N64 version and this one.

Wii Party (Wii) – Yeah, yeah, it’s a minigame collection.  But one of them a year isn’t bad, right?

Disney’s Epic Mickey (Wii) – Wow.  This game looks fun.  I love how the levels that replicate old cartoons are 2D, black & white, etc, while other areas are lush three dimensional color.

Kirby’s Epic Yarn (Wii) – One of the biggest surprises to me.  Kirby is a piece of string?  Somehow, it just seems to work and looks like a lot of fun.

Metroid: Other M (Wii) – Just a few more details on what we already knew was coming, but it looks good.  Already on pre-order.

Now that’s a list!  And there’s a few more that I’m mildly enthusiastic for (but would have made the list for the other two consoles) like Dragon Quest IX (DS), and Donkey Kong Country Returns (Wii).

And the winner is…

Again, I’m sure that in part that Nintendo’s types of games are more my style, but I also think they really brought it this year.  And I’m not the only one (check out the Penny Arcade E3 strip).  Hands down, I have to give Nintendo my Best of Show.  I’d give Sony 2nd place and Microsoft a distant 3rd.  Now to go get a 2nd job to be able to afford all these new games!