E3 2005

[AndrewTS 0]

Hmm, I already have Donkey Kongo 2 and I thought Fire Emblem was coming out real soon.  Odd that Nintendo would be so quiet about the new Zelda leading up to E3, just to let the name slip out right before to this magazine(which one is this supposed to be from again?).  Not sure I'm buying this as legit.

It's fake, someone just took a magazine scan of the 2005 lineup and added some names.

My bad. Saw it on another MB and thought it was legit.

[haws bah gawd 0]

Im kind of disappointed that THQ isnt showing any new wrestling games. Im thinking theyre probably going to wait and make the newest games for NR, PS3, and XBOX 360. However, I had aread a rumor a while back that Raw vs Smackdown 2 for PS2 was already in development, so maybe something will come of it (hopefully a video at least) at E3.

 

Hopefully FFXII will get released sometime before my death. I dont believe since the days of waiting for the original Perfect Dark, Halo 2, and the new Ninja Gaiden has a game seem this many delays.

[AndrewTS 0]

According to those rumors, we'll be getting MGS4 on the PS2.

 

I wouldn't put much stock in them. Plus, I have doubts that Microsoft and WWE themselves are exactly pleased with THQ's console-unique WWE game strategy. Maybe SvR2 isn't far enough along to justify showing it off. After all, isn't plenty of the Yukes team doing Day of Reckoning 2? That's probably why we haven't heard much about SvR2.

 

Of course, they should have realized this when they hooked up with THQ in the first place; WCW had that agreement with THQ, and the N64 got the AKI titles, and Playstation owners had those abortions Nitro and Thunder (well, that and the quickly outdated WCW vs. the World).

 

After playing Def Jam Vendetta, more than ever I want to see a new AKI WWE game, but ah well.

 

It seemed the next gen consoles were a long way away, then *bam*, Microsoft comes out with theirs, Nintendo apparently has bumped up their plans, and Sony--well, Sony can sit on their asses and take their time, but have already leaked that the PS3 will be more powerful than the X-Box 360.

[Jericholic82 0]

man I wish I could go to E3, I mean LA aint too far away, but I heard its expensive to get in, is that true?

[AndrewTS 0]

This site claims its real: http://www.n-next.com/index.php?subaction=...t_from=&ucat=1&

 

It's Game Informer, allegedly, but that stuff's too blurry to read.

 

What the hell is on the cover, even? Alone in the Dark The Movie The Game?

 

EDIT: It matches up to a cover on GI's site: an X-Box 360 game called Gears of War.

 

Oh, and Daxter gets his own PSP game:

 

http://psp.ign.com/articles/613/613684p1.html

 

Um...yay?

 

Shadow, Daxter--who next? Clank? Another Luigi game? The year of the 2nd bananas!

[edotherocket 0]

Halo 3's release will coincide with the launch of PlayStation 3 according to none other than Bill Gates.

 

In an interview in the new issue of Time magazine - the cover of which features Gates holding an Xbox 360 - big Bill reveals that PS3 will "walk into" Halo's Xbox 360 debut.

 

"Note to the hardcore faithful: the next version of Halo will not, repeat not, be ready in time for the launch of Xbox 360," reads part of the article.

 

"It will be part of the all-important second wave next spring. 'It's perfect,' Gates says, radiant with bloodlust. 'The day Sony launches [PlayStation 3] they walk right into Halo 3.'"

 

Of course, this means that - according to the Microsoft boss, at least - PS3 is due to go on sale in the spring of 2006. Either way, we suggest that you start saving now...

 

- Gamesradar.com

[Use Your Illusion 0]

Twenty bucks says they end up completely rushing it and it turns out a shell of its predecessors.

[Use Your Illusion 0]

man I wish I could go to E3, I mean LA aint too far away, but I heard its expensive to get in, is that true?

You wouldn't get in, period.

 

E3 is only open to members of the gaming media. So, unless you have friends in high places or the stealth skills of Solid Snake, you won't make it past the guards at the front door.

[AndrewTS 0]

I think it's members of any press, really. Obviously Maxim/Giant/etc. could get reporters in if they so choose, but if you're some sort of legitimate journalist...

 

*pause for laughter*

 

...supposedly they'll let you in.

[Matt Young 0]

It's official. A member of my friend's crew wasn't able to make the trip, and due to my close proximity, I get to attend Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday.

 

First WrestleMania 21, now E3. I fucking love living near L.A.

 

Part of my duty there will be to take pictures (especially of booth babes- it was requested) so, provided everything works out okay, I should have some good shit for you guys this weekend.

[Jobber of the Week 0]

You wouldn't get in, period.

 

E3 is only open to members of the gaming media. So, unless you have friends in high places or the stealth skills of Solid Snake, you won't make it past the guards at the front door.

They do sell regular admission, but it always costs hundreds and disappears in a flash.

[Guest Vitamin X]

Halo 3's release will coincide with the launch of PlayStation 3 according to none other than Bill Gates.

 

In an interview in the new issue of Time magazine - the cover of which features Gates holding an Xbox 360 - big Bill reveals that PS3 will "walk into" Halo's Xbox 360 debut.

 

"Note to the hardcore faithful: the next version of Halo will not, repeat not, be ready in time for the launch of Xbox 360," reads part of the article.

 

"It will be part of the all-important second wave next spring. 'It's perfect,' Gates says, radiant with bloodlust. 'The day Sony launches [PlayStation 3] they walk right into Halo 3.'"

 

Of course, this means that - according to the Microsoft boss, at least - PS3 is due to go on sale in the spring of 2006. Either way, we suggest that you start saving now...

 

- Gamesradar.com

This part made me laugh.

 

Although I have to say it's a tad ridiculous to assume that releasing one fuckin video game (I don't care if it's Halo or not) against a brand new next-gen console is really going to do anything to harm PS3's sales, especially since Sony already has a much larger userbase and more developer support. Only way this will work is if the PS3 came sans backwards compatibility, then they'd have a shot. But I think everyone pretty much knows by now there's no way Sony's NOT going to continue dominating the console market.

[AndrewTS 0]

Although I have to say it's a tad ridiculous to assume that releasing one fuckin video game (I don't care if it's Halo or not) against a brand new next-gen console is really going to do anything to harm PS3's sales, especially since Sony already has a much larger userbase and more developer support.

 

Gates and Moore clearly reside in some fantasy land at this point, just like Iwata and Miyamoto.

 

Only way this will work is if the PS3 came sans backwards compatibility, then they'd have a shot.

 

The PS3 is backward compatible--plays both PS2 an PS1 games. Although they say memory stick support, which sounds like it's using the same save media as the PSP. So, any data you still have on PS1/PS2 memory cards could be worthless, unless there's an accessory to convert them to a memory stick.

[Use Your Illusion 0]

The PS3 is also launching with a Grand Theft Auto game.

 

Microsoft is the Christian, Sony is the lion.

[AndrewTS 0]

The PS3 is also launching with a Grand Theft Auto game.

 

Microsoft is the Christian, Sony is the lion.

I don't think MS even has a prayer, though.

[razazteca 0]

Does that make Nintendo stuck in the desert for years wondering what to do...just walking the earth for a sign of hope?

[Guest JRE]

So....Xbox 360 is backwards compatible.

[Use Your Illusion 0]

It actually gives Nintendo a chance to really blow us away, as both Sony and Microsoft are clearly sticking to the guns they have (just look at the upcoming games for the PS3).

 

If Nintendo burst onto the scene with something completely accessible, yet different to both Microsoft and Sony, they could really pick things up for themselves. Could they beat Sony and reclaim their spot as number one? I doubt it. Could they move into the number two spot? Likely.

 

Time will tell

[Guest Vitamin X]

One thing is for sure:

 

Microsoft is FUCKED.

[BUTT 0]

Beat-em-up fans will like this one:

 

http://www.gamespot.com/ps2/action/finalfi...wise/index.html

 

A new Final Fight game.

[AndrewTS 0]

One thing is for sure:

 

Microsoft is FUCKED.

Oh yes. Sad, but true.

 

Beat-em-up fans will like this one:

 

http://www.gamespot.com/ps2/action/finalfi...wise/index.html

 

A new Final Fight game.

 

Cool. It's a shame Streets of Rage 4 was cancelled, but Sega probably would have screwed it up anyway.

 

I say it again, the beat 'em up is coming back--in 3D form!!

 

So far:

Urban Reign

Beat Down: First of Vengeance

The Warriors

MK: Shaolin Monks

and now Final Fight: Streetwise.

 

Now if they all feature much deeper gameplay, plenty of modes, etc. it might be a good thing.

 

In 2008 maybe we'll get a shmup revival.

[BUTT 0]

One of these days they have to make a new Double Dragon game. They just have to.

[Jobber of the Week 0]

You know it's E3 time, when the fanboyism goes through the roof.

 

Jesus christ, guys, you're talking about people "not having a prayer" based on hardware specs. Wait until we see some actual games.

[Guest Vitamin X]

See, here's the thing. I really dislike Sony as a corporation, and after seeing what could have been done with the current-gen systems courtesy of the Xbox and the Gamecube, it feels like Sony is dominating the market with an inferior console but with a dominant library.

 

Now, since we're all or at one point have been wrestling fans at one point or another, we all know how bad one company dominating the market is for everyone, as is evidenced by WWE. If Sony goes and reigns supreme next round yet again, who's going to keep pushing them to get better? We're not just talking inferior hardware here, Jobber. It's been reported that a great number of developers who were looking at making games for the X360 have jumped ship to the PS3 after they saw that Sony had a much more capable system.

 

If it means anything, in a surprise move, Squeenix is bringing FFIX to the X360 along with making a strong commitment to develop for them. That could help quite a bit, but the PS3 already has the edge. Now, I've also been wondering if releasing a console during the Spring would be more beneficial than releasing one around the holiday season. Microsoft isn't releasing their system that much ahead of the PS3, only a few months, really. But it will be the "hot holiday item" kids will be wanting to put on their Christmas lists, while the PS3 has time to be released and gain steam all throughout 2006 without the insane holiday rush.

 

Jesus, it feels so soon to be talking about the PS3 and the next-gen systems, but well, here we are.

[El Psycho Diablo 0]

I don't see how it's that much more capable..and this IS Sony we're talking about. I don't buy into the hype they spit out.

 

Besides, unless something comes out very soon that's a must-have PS3 title, I'll wait. Especially knowing how bad the first-gen PS2's were..

[Guest Vitamin X]

For comparison's sake, the official tech specs behind the PS3 and X360:

An IBM PowerPC based CPU with 3 symmetrical cores running at 3.2 GHz each

 

A custom ATI Graphics processor and more than 512 MB of memory for high definition games and entertainment applications

 

All games optimized for 16:9 aspect ratio, HD Output (720p and 1080i); multichannel surround sound output

 

Detachable and upgradeable 20GB hard drive to download demos and trailers along with new game levels, maps, weapons, vehicles, skins, community-created content, and more; to rip music for playback and to listen to custom play lists in every game

 

A wireless controller with Microsoft-patented wireless technology; Xbox Guide Button on every controller, the launch pad that instantly connects gamers to their games, friends, and music and to power on or power off Xbox 360 without leaving the couch

 

Gamer Profile software that remembers what players have achieved in games

 

Instant, out-of-the-box access to Xbox Live, including: a built-in Ethernet port for connectivity; Xbox Live Marketplace for downloadable content; a Message Center to receive voice and video messages from friends; ability to talk to friends, even while watching movies or listening to music; and an Xbox Live Headset

 

3 USB 2.0 ports for Xbox Live Camera peripheral; to plug in wired game controllers that are also common for Windows PCs; to stream media from any portable media device, digital camera, and Windows XP PC

 

Progressive-scan DVD movie playback out of the box; DVD and CD music and photo playback out of the box; support for DVD-Video, DVD-ROM, DVD-R/RW, DVD+R/RW, CD-DA, CD-ROM, CD-R, CD-RW, WMA CD, MP3 CD, JPEG Photo CD

 

Windows Media Center Extender built in to access recorded TV (including high definition) and digital movies (including high definition), music, video and photos stored on Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005-based PCs through any Xbox 360

 

Support for up to four wireless game controllers and an optional Universal Media Remote with Windows® XP Media Center Edition Button for Media Center Edition functionality

 

Support for Xbox 360 Wireless Network Adapter via 802.11b, g and a

 

Interactive, full screen 3D visualizers

 

Two memory unit ports to save data on portable memory units, starting at 64 MB

 

Detachable Face so each console can be personalized

 

Parental Controls to restrict the games and movies that are played; Xbox Live controls to manage Friends List, voice and video communication, and Gamer Profile sharing

CPU

 

Cell Processor

PowerPC-base Core @3.2GHz

1 VMX vector unit per core

512KB L2 cache

7 x SPE @3.2GHz

7 x 128b 128 SIMD GPRs

7 x 256KB SRAM for SPE

* 1 of 8 SPEs reserved for redundancy

total floating point performance: 218 GFLOPS

GPU

RSX @550MHz

1.8 TFLOPS floating point performance

Full HD (up to 1080p) x 2 channels

Multi-way programmable parallel floating point shader pipelines

Sound

Dolby 5.1ch, DTS, LPCM, etc. (Cell- base processing)

Memory

256MB XDR Main RAM @3.2GHz 256MB GDDR3 VRAM @700MHz

System Bandwidth

Main RAM 25.6GB/s

VRAM 22.4GB/s

RSX 20GB/s (write) + 15GB/s (read)

SB< 2.5GB/s (write) + 2.5GB/s (read)

System Floating Point Performance

2 TFLOPS

Storage

Detachable 2.5" HDD slot x 1

I/O

USB Front x 4, Rear x 2 (USB2.0)

Memory Stick standard/Duo, PRO x 1

SD standard/mini x 1

CompactFlash (Type I, II) x 1

Communication

Ethernet (10BASE-T, 100BASE-TX, 1000BASE-T) x 3 (input x 1 + output x 2)

Wi-Fi IEEE 802.11 b/g

Bluetooth 2.0 (EDR)

Controller

Bluetooth (up to 7)

USB 2.0 (wired)

Wi-Fi (PSP)

Network (over IP)

 

AV Output

Screen size: 480i, 480p, 720p, 1080i, 1080p

HDMI: HDMI out x 2

Analog: AV MULTI OUT x 1

Digital audio: DIGITAL OUT (OPTICAL) x 1

Disc Media

CD PlayStation CD-ROM, PlayStation 2 CD-ROM, CD-DA, CD-DA (ROM), CD-R, CD-RW, SACD, SACD Hybrid (CD layer), SACD HD, DualDisc, DualDisc (audio side), DualDisc (DVD side)

DVD: PlayStation 2 DVD-ROM, PlayStation 3 DVD-ROM, DVD-Video, DVD-ROM, DVD-R, DVD-RW, DVD+R, DVD+RW

Blu-ray Disc: PlayStation 3 BD-ROM, BD-Video, BD-ROM, BD-R, BD-RE

 

I'm not sure how to decipher the power inherent in the systems, but it doesn't seem like there's that much of a difference in power. I tried looking for a more detailed version of X360's official specs, but that's the best I could find.

[Jobber of the Week 0]

I know what you mean in that I could bitch for hours and hours about how GTA, San Andreas specifically, looks so much worse than it ought to because they're gimped to using the PS2 as a base design spec thanks to the Money Mountain that magically appeared on Rockstar's doorstep one day.

 

In reality, I expect all three consoles to last a full life cycle (although I don't expect Revolution to do much better than GameCube, I expect it to fall short of N64's numbers and be Nintendo's last home console), and certainly competition can thrive for another few years like it has this gen.

 

The point about what I said about Sony dropping a bigger engine into the same design as PS2 and letting loose remains, though, unless their specs suddently become altered later (I'm expecting it will, this whole announcement feels rushed and a bit ametuerish, perhaps to compete with Microsoft's.)

 

Here's the simple fact on what the PS3 hardware, out of the box, does: It makes things look more pretty. That's it. Developers are, as of this writing, still on their own online-wise. Developers will not be able to explore the possibilities of a hard drive without alienating the people who will not buy an add-on. Sony is still advertising Squeenix and EA Sports sequels out the wazoo, except this time they're just that times much more pretty with extra shiny effects.

 

And, of course, what Sony lacks in new things to show they make up for with suits. I wouldn't really blame them for that except that people are falling for what we heard five years ago. Remember "The PS2 can render a scene from Toy Story in real time?" Remember the beautiful FF8 dance scene rendered real-time that was unlike anything we ever saw in a game again, due to it being tweaked out the wazoo like every tech demo always is? Remember how great we thought it was that we were at last going to be seeing CG-quality graphics in real time with no quality loss?

 

Expect the same thing to be said about that FF7 opening tech demo, I guarantee you that. And I guarantee you the same result. And all that talk about devs switching over is probably sourced from, you got it, boastful Sony reps. Which isn't to say that hasn't happened a few times, but I bet I can imagine which developers they were and what their games looked like. I'm guessing it was something aimed at the Japanese market, which makes it a much safer bet to go with Sony even if MS got their hardware into devs' hands first.

 

Which isn't meaning that the 360 is going to be any better. In the end, I expect it to be about the same. Which means, of course, that MS is going to have to be paying out for games because they can't battle Sony's brand recognition without, but Sony did the same thing re: Nintendo.

 

Again, it just blows me away how this is mirroring Nintendo and the original PlayStation. Sony beat Nintendo's household name recognition by embracing technology faster, making things easier for devs, and buying some decent names. PS3 is, if these specs are final, not very inventive in the tech department plus MS has been developing the XNA programming platform. The only last piece is for Sony to raise licensing fees to ridiculous levels like Nintendo did during the SNES years.

 

 

I guess my bitch with PS3 is that it's the most conservative of all the consoles. Nintendo's Revolution is the far other side of the ballfield, way out there and God only knows what they're smoking when they talk about how they're going to change things as you know it. Somewhere in the middle, with more options than the PS3 but not as wildly unusual as the Revolution, is the 360, which I think is a good place for it.

 

If you enjoy what you currently have on PS2, and want more of the same, except make it more pretty, then this is good news for you. For those of us who enjoyed not using memory cards and downloading extra maps and figured that it all was useful enough to appear everywhere in the next round of consoles, it's kind of disappointing.

 

PS: Oh god, they're using Memory Stick AGAIN. Sony, won't you and your proprietary formats ever reach a price point similar to the other, more standard flash RAM types?

[El Psycho Diablo 0]

Another thing..

 

How many games do you see really using that Blu-Ray disc? Most games now don't even fill up a 4.2 gig DVD, much less the space a BD-ROM's supposedly capable of.

[Scroby 0]

You know for it being E3 time, the only company I want to know about is, Nintendo. Even through I'm a strong Microsoft fan, I want Nintendo to rise up and take over again...but not killing off the 360. I'm excited in knowing about the "revolution" and more about the new Zelda game and I want to know what Nintendo is bringing out of the woodwork for us. I know the Revolution will play Gamecube games and DVD's, I just really want to know what else it will do and I'm a Zelda fanboy, what do you want?

 

As far as Microsoft launching the 360 this year I think they should wait till the middle of December or early Jan.. The Xbox has a lot of good games coming out in Oct. and Nov. and if the 360 can't play these games, then I think sales of the games coming out would be hurt since the 360 would soon be following the release of these games.

[Guest Vitamin X]

Have the Xbox come out on Black Friday. That'd be nice and hellish.