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Well, ultimately E3 proved to be pretty disappointing.  Sure, there were a few demos of some of the more anticipated games this year, but there were fewer surprises than expected.  Of course, it will be an even bigger disappointment if I don’t get my XBox 360 back in the next week so I have it in time to play pre-ordered copy of Soul Calibur IV.  Fortunately, I did come across a pair of Flash games today that got this week off to a more entertaining start.

The first was the physics based puzzler, Fantastic Contraption, which immediately put me in mind of The Incredible Machine, though I quickly realized the game is less about creating crazed Rube Goldberg-esque guantlets than it is about creating the eponymous contraptions.  In the 20 available levels you need to create some kind of device for each that is capable of pulling, carrying or launching a target object from the construction area to the goal area.  While you can use each of the 3 wheel types or either of the 2 resizable rod types as much as you like, you are limited by the dimensions of your construction area. You are able to connect rods to each other or to various points of the wheels to enable a variety of different effects. Even better, you can save your more impressive creations so that other people can test drive them. Most of my solutions ended up being pretty ramshackle, but the tank, at right, suggests the potential for creating some advanced vehicles. You can access and rate saved designs from within the game and I would strongly recommend you check out what people have come up with.

The second game I came across today was Bubble Tanks 2, an aquatic shooter. The game takes place in a series of bubbles where you steer your “tank” with the keyboard and shoot with the mouse. It’s a fairly standard Flash shooter, but the ability to upgrade your ship with the bubbles left behind by dead enemies and the fluid controls kept me playing longer than I intended. Making a solid shooter really is all about getting the right feel for the motion and keeping a steady progression of difficulty and Bubble Tanks 2 nails it on both counts.

But what I had really meant to do this evening is get through the last few levels of Psychonauts, which I was finally prompted to play when it was introduced in the Backlog segment of last week’s 1UP FM podcast. Since I finished sending off the first wave of resumes this afternoon, I figured I was due for a bit of a break. Unfortunately, I think I sent one of the resumes out with the wrong cover letter. I have to confess I’m not a fan of some of the job application websites out there that manage to automate the process just enough to lull you into clicking the wrong button at the wrong time. Of course, I have to finish this blog post before I can go do that, so …

Sony has a very clever alternative to the usual Power Points, using Little Big Planet to display all the usual charts, graphics and box art these companies use to brag about how successful they are.  I bet the audience was for more attentive this go round than at either of the other press conferences.  Ok, I take that back.  Tretton is droning on and on about statistics.  Hopefully he’s going to get around to some interesting announcements at some point.

zzzzzzzzzzz…

Wow, Jim Lee has some serious MMO cred.  It’s tough to get excited about DC Universe yet.  The footage doesn’t look that impressive and it’s hard to see how they can preserve the feel of the universe with so many player controlled heroes.

Please don’t tell me that they are showing us testimonials from developers?   Where are these games he keeps talking about.  Although it is a strange coincedence that I just added the Prince of Persia producer’s blog to my feed reader only to see him talking about how great the PS3 is.

I am supendously underwhelmed.  Ok, maybe the God of War 3 trailer will redeem the press conference.  Well, maybe if they had showed gameplay.  Ok, the Infamous trailer is a little more like it.  And now more talking and more rendered gameply.  *sigh*  I really don’t think that this was the press conference that Sony needed.  That was a bit of a letdown

I just can’t get enough Mirror’s Edge gameplay.  A lot of this level was already shown in an earlier trailer, but there carries through the to end of the section. I can’t wait to get my hands on this game.

Wasn’t planning on blogging about the Nintendo conference, but I was just taken completely by surprise by…

Are you kidding me? Grand Theft Auto for the DS?!?!?

I thought they were going to announce some of the DS navigation features that they were talking about.  That would have certainly kept the sales growth going.

Here’s Wii MotionPlus.  I guess they announced it yesterday so they wouldn’t have to explain what it was today.  Unsurprisingly, it’s going to be packaged with the new Wii Sports game, Wii Sports Resort.  The frisbee motion looked pretty good, but so far the games don’t look that impressive.  Well, the sword fighting mini-game could be interesting if the controls are as responsive as promised.  Now, if they only have MotionPlus support in the Star Wars: Clone Wars game they announced earlier in the press conference.  I guess not if MotionPlus isn’t coming until the spring.

And now they announce that Final Fantasy XII is coming to the Wii too!  Or maybe it’s just Wii Music.  But it’s not the symphony conducting game they showed a few years ago but rather instead it seems to an instrument simulator, with over 50 instruments modelled in the game.  Instead of being a rhythem game like Guitar Hero it instead extrapolates the actions of the Wii remote to the actually song being performed so players can influence the music but the game still kicks you mostly on track.  And apparently the conducting will still be in the game somewhere.  Wow … six people on stage including Miyamoto making fool’s of themselves trying to play the Super Mario Bros. theme in the game.  I’m definitely not sold on this game.

I thought Reggie was going to close with a giant new announcement, but no such luck.

It’s pretty tough to decide what the most exciting footage from today’s E3 events was.  Bethesda’s Fallout 3 gameplay footage looked pretty good, but every time I see new footage of Dice’s first-person free-runner Mirror’s Edge I just get more excited.

edit: Looks like I’m going to have to find a new wider template for the blog if I’m going to embed video.

edit 2: There we go.

I’m just watching the Microsoft E3 Press Conference on G4tv.  I should probably be working on some cover letters so I can send another batch of resumes out tomorrow.  But instead I got caught up in the live coverage and finally got around to starting a new blog to act as a better web presence than my old poker blog (link removed due to google’s prejudice against poker blogs these days, even those that never sold links).

They’re just announcing Geometry Wars 2.  Mmmm… co-op.  I’m glad this is not coming out until next month because my 360 red-ringed last week and it’s going to be at least a few weeks before I get it back.  I was already depressed this afternoon when I realized I couldn’t download the Too Human demo.

Lots of video content announcements, but the prices (particularly in Canada) make it pretty unattractive.  The shared video is interesting, but it really depends on the terms behind how often you can watch.  After my experience in the DRM industry, I’m pretty pessimistic and the 360’s license terms so far suggest that any of these services will be pretty restrictive.

Oh my, this You’re in the Movies demo is pretty embarrassing for everyone involved.  I suppose the core idea has some potential, but the execution seems suspect.

I wish they had Harmonix up talking about Rock Band 2 instead of Red Octane.  Now, as soon as someone gives us regular mp3 downloads when you purchase tracks in the game, things are going to get even more crazy.  But, they are only announcing exclusive artists, so meh.

Ah good, Harmonix is here.   We already knew that DLC was going to be forward compatible, but it’s awesome to hear that you’ll also be able to import all the songs off the first disc so no swapping will be necessary.  I can’t believe all the comments I’ve read in the vein of “well, if I want to play song X, I’ll just put that disc in”.  Well, I don’t know about everyone else, but if I have a few people over to play a music game, no one is going to want to swap the disc out (and then back) just to play one song.

Well, the conference is over … oh, or maybe not.  I think Microsoft really blew it on the camera angle.  Final Fantasy XII coming to XBox 360.  That is huge news, though a release date would have been nice.  Shane Bettenhausen probably had a heart attack.  I guess that leaves Metal Gear Solid, Gran Turismo and maybe Rachet & Clank as the only long-running franchises still exclusive to the PS3.  Now that I think about it, I’m guessing they will have a similar trailer at the Sony press conference tomorrow and maybe Microsoft didn’t have the broadcast rights.

Well, the much rumoured new controller wasn’t announced.  And there weren’t any suprise games announced for release this year, aside from a few arcade titles.  I guess there are still a lot of strong titles coming out in the fall, but I’m not nearly as excited as I was this time last year.