E3 2008 :: Blog

There is a lot of reason to be skeptical of Microsoft's real-time strategy game, Halo Wars.  For one thing this is the first new Halo game not developed by Bungie, the company that has spent the last decade doing nothing more than making games starring the Master Chief.  And it's not just that, there's also the worry that Halo won't translate well to this brand new genre, a genre that hasn't exactly been perfected on the non-keyboard home consoles.

Yet as worried as I was, I was definitely excited to see what Ensemble Studios had in store for their first brand new console game.  This is a company best known for PC classics like Age of Empires and Age of Mythology; they definitely know what they're doing when it comes to making real-time strategy games.  Halo was one of the first games to prove that you could do an amazing first-person shooter on a home console, so it only seems fitting that Halo Wars will try and do the same thing for real-time strategy games.  But does it succeed?  After some initial doubt, I have come away convinced that Ensemble Studios is on to something big with this title.

Unfortunately playing Halo Wars at E3 was trickier than you may imagine.  For whatever reason Microsoft decided not to feature the game on the show floor, limiting the amount of people who actually got hands-on time with the short demo.  Instead journalists who wanted to try out Ensemble's upcoming game had to make an appointment and visit Microsoft's behind closed doors meeting area.  Oddly enough, this was also the only way you could play the upcoming Banjo Kazooie game, Lips and a few other big holiday titles.

But this article isn't about some SingStar rip-off; this is a hands-on preview of Halo Wars.  Before I could sit down with the game, Microsoft made us sit through a short tutorial hosted by one of the developers at Ensemble.  He explained what we would be playing, the history of the title and what they hope to deliver.  They also explained some of the nuance of the controls, which I'll get to a bit later.  After rushing through his memorized tutorial and answering a few questions from a group of six or seven people, Microsoft told us to find a console, pick up the control and, most importantly, have fun.  It was time to play Halo Wars.

Unfortunately the demo only allowed us to play the game as a two-player co-op game.  Each person got their own comfy couch and large HDTV to stare into, as well as a second player who was working with you to defeat the dastardly Covenant.  In my case I was teamed up with a fellow journalist, Patrick O'Connor, who currently works over at Defunct Games.  Together we built up our base, trained an army of soldiers and kicked some alien ass.

The way the demo level was laid out made it so that my real life teammate and I never had to work together, he had his own battle to fight and I had my own.  He top half of the screen, I took the bottom.  For the first two-thirds of the game we barely spoke, only communicating at the end to devise a plan to rush the last remaining bad guys in spectacular fashion.  The truth is, we could have gone the entire match without saying a word, our coordination was absolutely inconsequential.

But don't think you're going to have to be able to use this tactic on every level.  Justin "Bear" Rouse explained that the game will feature a number of unique levels, some that will require teamwork and others that are more like what we experienced.  He also explained that the game would allow three-player online co-op, which meant that there would be some gigantic levels with huge armies of enemies coming after you.  No matter if you're playing with one or two friends, Halo Wars should prove to be an exciting multiplayer experience.

Of course, none of this is going to matter if the controls are bad.  Thankfully Ensemble has done a few clever things to make the controls work.  Let's just make one thing clear, there's no way that the Xbox 360 control will ever be able to duplicate the precise controls of the keyboard and mouse.  There's no better way to select a large group of enemies than by clicking and dragging, and you can map so many movements to hotkeys to make the whole experience that much easier (and faster).  When it comes to real-time strategy games, keyboards will always have the advantage.

But that doesn't mean all is lost, Halo Wars manages to feel pretty good when you're playing it.  Part of the reason for this is because some of the actions have been dumbed down (or deleted altogether).  Another reason is because Ensemble was able to find clever ways of using all of the buttons and analog sticks.  It's not the most intuitive control scheme of all time, but it didn't take me long to figure out how to move my soldiers, call for back-up and build new vehicles.

The basics are simple, your right analog stick acts as the cursor, so you can select individual units with the "A" button or hold that button down and select a larger group.  Each of the units has a primary and secondary fire, which are activated by pressing the "X" and "Y" buttons respectively.  Whenever you're building something or ordering up new units (vehicles, soldiers, etc.) a large circle will appear on the screen with eight possible selections, allowing you to easily select what you want and get back to the action.  Better still, all of the characters and upgrades are in the same locations, so if you play the game enough you will be able to select new units without even looking.  It's this sort of clever thinking that makes me think that Ensemble is going in the right direction when it comes to making this real-time strategy game.

Outside of the controls, a big chunk of this game has to do with the types of characters and vehicles you can develop.  After all, half the fun of this real-time strategy game is the fact that you're playing characters that you've grown to know and love in past Halo games.  Seeing as this takes place decades before the first-person shooter games, Halo Wars won't allow you to take control of Master Chief.  What you can do, however, is control an army of Spartan warriors, which is the next best thing.  From what I could surmise from the demo this game will feature at least eight different soldier characters, each with their own unique weapons and attributes.  One thing I noticed was that you could now choose flame thrower characters, which makes sense in the real-time strategy world, even if I don't exactly remember it being part of the canon.

Beyond the various soldiers, players will also be able to make develop and drive a whole host of familiar vehicles.  Obviously we've seen the pictures and videos of people tooling around in the Warthog, but you can also jump into flying vehicles and other crafts that show up twenty years later in the first-person shooter games.  Better still, crafty players can even have their soldiers commandeer the enemy crafts and use them to win the war.  In other words, everything you know and love about the Halo universe is alive and well in this strategy game.

One thing I noticed was that you were somewhat limited on where you could build your various installations.  The game started me out with what looked like a large, empty TV dinner tray, complete with room for you to place all sorts of factories and training facilities.  What you do is select the installation you want to drop on this land and where it will sit.  This means that all of your buildings will be in one small area and not spread out like in other real-time strategy titles.  Building and upgrading these facilities is a breeze, and it's actually pretty cool to watch them dropped in by a large helicopter-style craft.  It's also worth noting that while you can pick up various materials, you won't have to train grunts to mine or chop down trees.  In fact, you won't even need to deliver the material back home; just picking it up is good enough.

For the most par the standard real-time strategy rules apply to Halo Wars.  For example, I knew that I could only train a certain amount of soldiers before I had to build more places for people to live.  I also knew that if I upgraded my facilities then I could make bigger and better units.  Ensemble isn't setting out to reinvent the wheel; instead they are trying to focus on making the best playing console RTS game they can come up with. 

Unfortunately I didn't have a chance to try out the single-player portion in any capacity.  Justin Rouse mentioned that there would be a lengthy single-player campaign that fills in some of the gaps in the Halo universe, but he wouldn't expand on exactly what he meant by that.  What I do know is that this is a prequel ... and that's basically all of the story I know at this point.  It's definitely clear that Ensemble has come up with some stunning cinemas, so I can only hope that they feature high quality cut scenes between levels, building an epic story that actually makes me want to fight on.

I also was not allowed to try out the competitive multiplayer mode, which should prove to be the biggest draw to Halo Wars.  Justin Rouse confirmed that the online game will offer matchmaking and medals, much like the first-person shooter titles.  Whether the matchmaking he talks about is as well thought out as the matchmaking in Halo 3 remains to be seen, but it sounds like Ensemble is on the right track when it comes to developing the online component.  I'll be honest with you, between all of the PC real-time strategy games I'm not sure there are any online modes that hasn't already been tried.  We'll have to wait and see if Halo Wars can deliver brand new game types.

Beyond a few minor quibbles, Halo Wars is definitely shaping up to be one of the better Xbox 360 games on the horizons.  The graphics may not have the detail of the first-person shooters, but it's undeniably a Halo game.  With its single-player campaign, online mode and three-player co-op, Halo Wars has a lot to offer.  Ensemble Studios may just be able to create a real-time strategy game that works flawlessly on a home console, and after two decades it's about time somebody gets it right.

Now that E3 has come and gone I thought it might be fun to look back and what we just went through and come up with a few fun (and informative) awards.  Everybody else is doing it, so why can't we?  Below you will find some of my favorite moments, paired with some E3 moments I will never forget (no matter how hard I try).  That's right, we're going to hand out E3 awards ... regardless of whether they like them or not!

Game of the Show: Fallout 3

Fallout 3 is everything you could possibly want from an epic adventure game, complete with a huge landscape, interesting characters, great graphics and a nice sense of humor.  Unfortunately I was only given 30 minutes to play through the game, but that was more than enough time to convince me that this is one of the best games around.  What's even more impressive about the game is how different my 30 minutes were from other peoples.  As I walked away from the demo I was comparing notes with other people.  One person talked about how they decided to go to an abandoned school and search for artifacts.  Another person talked about going into the town and killing the Mayor.  Yet another person decided to go hunting, trying to cover as much ground as he possibly could.  What's interesting is that all three of these stories sounded like things I would want to do.  These are the things I can't wait to try out when the game ships later this year.  Sure, I had a great time doing what I did, but hearing all of the other possibilities only makes me want to play the game more.  30 minutes just isn't enough time to play a game like this ... but it is enough time for me to know that Fallout 3 is definitely the game of the show!

Biggest Announcement: Final Fantasy XIII for the Xbox 360

This year's E3 wasn't about huge reveals, which is why Final Fantasy XIII somehow manages to win this award.  Don't get me wrong, Final Fantasy XIII coming to the Xbox 360 is a big deal ... however; it's certainly not of the same caliber of somebody announcing a new console or Nintendo announcing Kid Icarus.  But since nobody did that, I guess we'll have to settle for this weird Final Fantasy XIII announcement.  Yes, Final Fantasy XIII is coming to the Xbox 360 ... but only in the U.S. and Europe.  What looked like a game changer may not have the full impact because Square Enix won't be releasing it in Japan.  Still, this is big news for those Xbox 360 owning gamers who are sick of the half-assed RPGs found on the console.

Biggest Disappointment: Nintendo's Press Conference

At Nintendo's 2007 press conference they spent much of their time talking about their upcoming line-up, which largely focused on games that would broaden the group of people who played games.  While the core audience didn't care about Wii Fit, they accepted that Nintendo was going to spend a year growing the market.  This year we all expected the pendulum to swing the other way, with rumors of a new Punch Out, Kid Icarus and more.  But Nintendo had something else planned.  Unfortunately their plans involved talking about snowboarding, glossing over the Nintendo DS, ignoring WiiWare and really only announcing one or two games that we didn't know about ... all of which were casual games.  The Nintendo press conference was so bad that they later apologized for it, but it makes you wonder if Nintendo really cares what the core audience cares about.  Seeing how the Wii continues to sell remarkably well, it's their belief that the core gaming audience isn't the group that will help them win the war.  Judging from this press conference, it's painfully clear that Nintendo doesn't care about you (unless you're a grandmother or a soccer mom).

Craziest Concept ... That Works: Flower (PS3)

Who would have thought that playing a flower would be so relaxing and rewarding?  While the concept of Flower may not appeal to the hardcore first-person shooter fans out there, it is something brand new and innovative that, most importantly, worked.  And when I say it worked I mean that it's fun, the kind of weird experience makes you sit up and take notice.  Flower isn't hurt by its stunning presentation, the graphics are perhaps the best displayed at E3 this year.  And it's not just me saying this; everybody that came away from Flower was wowed by the stunning art style and creative gameplay.  Flower is a crazy concept, but at least it's a crazy concept that is fun to play.

Craziest Concept ... That Doesn't Work: Rock Revolution (Xbox 360/PS3)

On the flip side, Rock Revolution is a crazy concept that DOESN'T work.  Now don't get me wrong, I don't think it's crazy to come out with a brand new music game featuring fake plastic instruments.  But Konami has jumped in the crazy river without a life preserver on this one.  For starters, the drums have seven different objects to hit.  And it's not just that it has too many rubbery things to hit, it's also that the placement of these objects seems to be completely random (both on screen and off).  And that's not even the craziest part.  Konami, for whatever reason, will NOT be making their own guitar!  That's right, they want you to go out and buy a Guitar Hero or Rock Band guitar so that you can play it.  Heck, if you want to play three players then you're going to have to buy two!  And don't even get me started on the fact that this game offers 50% less songs than Rock Band 2, all of which are covers.  And did I mention that the Konami band failed out when showing us the game at their press conference?  Yeah, Konami has to be crazy to think people are going to buy this over Rock Band or Guitar Hero!

Where the Hell Is ... Award: Whatever Bungie Is Working On

Way to get our hopes up, Bungie.  In the week leading up to E3 Bungie tossed a countdown timer on their homepage and let slip that they would have a brand new game announced at E3.  Microsoft's press conference came and went, and there was absolutely nothing from Bungie announced.  Then I sat next to Bungie at the Sony Press Conference and they joked that maybe their new game would be announced there.  It wasn't.  Here we are weeks later and we still don't know what Bungie working on.  So what's the deal?  Various media outlets have done some digging and come back with various reports (mostly based on speculation and rumor), but we aren't any closer to knowing what the Bungie game is.  So, Bungie, where the hell is your next game?

Best E3 Party: MTV's Rock Band 2 Party

Talk about an amazing party ... that I didn't have a chance to attend.  While I did manage to hit a few noteworthy parties (Activision, Kotaku, etc.), there just wasn't enough room for me at the Rock Band 2 party.  So what made this party so good?  Well, how about the fact that The Who was there?  Or maybe you're into more contemporary bands, like Coldplay?  Either way, that's the kind of thing that you got to check out at the Rock Band 2 party.  On the other hand, I did talk to a very drunken Shane Bettenhausen at the Activision party.  That's as good as watching The Who perform, right?

Least Informative Press Conference: Capcom

When you go into a press conference you expect to hear people rattle on about how well they're doing, their top selling games and what they have to show for the next year.  Usually this is a boring affair that the media dreads attending.  But I had high hopes for Capcom.  After all, this is the company that is bringing us tons of big classic game resurrections (Bionic Commando, Street Fighter, 1942, Mega Man, etc.) and everybody was expecting them to at least mention something about Dead Rising 2.  But no, that's not what we got.  Instead we got an hour of Capcom talking about the Lost Planet movie.  That's right, the only thing they announced was Lost Planet: The Movie.  Worse yet, the hour-long press conference didn't provide any real useful information.  Surprise, Capcom thinks that Lost Planet is a perfect fit for Hollywood.  Surprise, Capcom thinks this movie will be better than all the other movies.  Surprise, this movie is still two years away.  Surprise, I don't care.  At least I got to meet Solid Snake.

The "Force Them To Play" Award: Travis Barker and Hayley Williams (Tie)

At their non-E3 E3 press conference, Activision decided to trot out a couple of "celebrities" when talking about how amazing Guitar Hero: World Tour is.  Since their big focus this time around is the drum set, they brought out Travis Barker (the ex-drummer of the faux-punk band Blink 182) to tell us why the drums are so amazing.  This would have been a perfect time for the obviously drunk Travis to sit down and show us why he's endorsing this brand new game.  But that's not what he did.  Instead he left the stage and somebody else played the drums.  The same thing happened with Hayley Williams, the lead singer of faux-Christian band Paramore.  Like Travis she came out and endorsed the product, telling us how excited she was to be able to sing her own song in the game.  But she opted to not sing anything at the Activision event, which makes no damn sense.  Activision paid these people to show up to their event, so why not make them work for their money?  Activision should have forced them to play.

The "Force Them To Stop" Award: Duffy

Who?  Yeah, exactly.  When this Welsh singer/songwriter was first introduced I thought we were going to get one of the Duff sisters.  Boy was I wrong.  Instead we were treated to her wailing away at what can best be described as Amy Winehouse-lite.  Her job was to demonstrate Microsoft's new SingStar clone, Lips.  Unfortunately her rating was just "ok" and her demonstration didn't exactly instill much confidence in the actual game.  But that's not my complaint; instead I was annoyed that I had to sit through something that would have been better suited for American Idol than E3.

Best Downloadable Console Game: Braid

While Sony had an overall better showing when it came to downloadable games, there's one game that really resonated with me.  And best of all, it's a game that everybody can buy right now.  It's Braid, Jonathan Blow's stunning homage to Super Mario Bros., Donkey Kong, and a ton of other 8-bit platformers.  But this is more than just a boring old 2D action game, it's a brain-busting puzzle game that will actually require you to use a part of your head that you probably didn't even know you had.  The gimmick is that you can rewind time, which certainly plays into a lot of the puzzles.  However, that's not all you can do, in some levels you will be able to slow down time, use your shadow and much, much more.  Couple this with some amazing hand drawn graphics and you have a work of art that every serious gamer should pick up.

Best Resident Evil Game that Plays EXACTLY Like Resident Evil 4 Award: Resident Evil 5

Going into E3 I couldn't be more excited about playing Resident Evil 5.  I've been a big fan of the series since 1996 and can't wait to see what Capcom comes up with this time around.  But when I finally had a chance to sit down and play Resident Evil 5 I was a little disappointed.  Not because the game is bad or the graphics don't hold up, but rather because it felt almost exactly the same as Resident Evil 4.  Not that that's a bad thing, Resident Evil 4 is one of the best games on the GameCube, if not one of the best games of the entire last generation.  But it's hard not to be a little disappointed at how similar everything is, complete with yet another chainsaw wielding baddie just looking to chop your head off.  Still, the game looks amazing and  it's clear that Capcom is only showing us a small slice of what Resident Evil 5 will offer.  Resident Evil 5 will no doubt be one of next year's best games, but don't expect it to radically change the formula.

Best 8-Bit Game of E3 2008 Award: Mega Man 9

Believe it or not, this is my eighth E3 in a row.  In my eight years flying to L.A., eating at La Bella Cucina and fighting through the crowds I have learned one thing: Everybody wants to have the best looking game.  Let's face it, we're a group that chases great graphics (usually to the detriment of good gameplay).  But this year was different, because this year we had a company put forward a brand new 8-bit game.  That's right; Capcom's Mega Man 8 is a brand new 8-bit game, complete with new bosses, graphical glitches and much, much more.  I'm curious to see if this approach works or if people consider it to be nothing more than novelty.  Either way, Mega Man 9 was definitely the best 8-bit game of E3 2008!

So far in these updates we've been to Microsoft, MTV and the press conferences, so that only leaves the actual show floor.  Unfortunately the floor itself was kind of boring this year.  But don't worry; we've managed to bring together nine pictures that will make you feel like you were right there at E3.  Okay, maybe it won't do that, but it's better than just having miles of text.

Some have said that this year's E3 in the Concourse Hall was smaller than last year, but to me it felt like it was roughly the same size as Barker Hanger.  Then again it's been twelve months since I was at Barker Hanger and I'm not very good with judging size.  Either way, the show was about the same size, which meant that all of the booths had roughly the same space to wow the audience.  This was Konami's booth, and as you can tell, not a lot of people were being wowed.  Then again, Konami's big game was a one-on-one 3D fighting game starring Castlevania characters.  Wait, no, they wanted me to call it an action fighter ... or something like that.  You know, never mind, it's a one-on-one fighting game, no matter which way you slice it.  (It also wasn't very good!)

Here's another shot of the Sega booth.  Sega had a number of interesting game resurrections, including Golden Axe and Samba De Amigo (neither shown in this terrible picture).  What we have here is a shot of what you see when you first walk into the E3 show floor.  It's stripped down, but that doesn't mean that this display is any less confusing when you're first walking into the hall.

Unlike Sega and Konami, Electronic Arts always had a crowd around it.  That may be because they had some fantastic games to show off, but the love for the oft-delayed Mercenaries 2 confuses me.  Yes, it is a fun game, but haven't we been here before?  And why does it look so terrible?  And who did they pay to design those terrible characters?  Either way, EA was popular both on the floor and in their own special room.

Capcom's booth may not have been huge, but it had a lot of the stuff gamers were wanting to see.  Don't believe me?  Then you clearly didn't play Flock.  Oh wait, you didn't play Flock.  Hmm, you'll see what I mean when it ships this December.  Wait ... December?  The game looked all but finished, how can it still be half a year away?  Oh well, at least they had Mega Man 9, right?  The truth is that Capcom really did have an amazing showing, but all of the good stuff was tucked away behind closed doors.

Now THIS is where Capcom was hiding all of the good stuff.  This is the first thing you see when you walk into Capcom's closed-door booth - Resident Evil 5.  You can't tell from this picture, but there are 4 Resident Evil 5 displays set up.  Gamers would wait in line and cycle in when somebody finished their demonstration (which was only 10 - 20 minutes).  Beyond those TVs we had a bunch of Capcom's downloadable content, including a lot of stuff that was actually on the show floor.

But the real reason to go to the Capcom booth was to play on the Street Fighter IV cabinets.  Let's face it, we're probably not going to see these things in the U.S., so I wanted to spend as much time playing on one as I could.  Oddly enough, the way they set it up was so that only one person could play on a cabinet.  That meant that if you wanted to play multiplayer you had to have the next cabinet over challenge you.  It was nice having my own cabinet, but it did seem odd that there could only be three games going at once, as opposed to six.  Note that there are a few technical problems plaguing the Street Fighter IV machine on the right (yes, that's Windows).

Even further into the Capcom room we have Defunct Games' own Patrick O'Connor.  As you can tell he's trying on the oversized Bionic Commando arm.  My god that arm is huge, maybe a little bigger than it needs to be.  Either way, he had a lot of fun posing for the camera.  Also, is it just me or is the main bad guy in Bionic Commando actually M. Bison from Street Fighter II?  I'm just saying.

We couldn't end an article without showing Patrick looking like a fool.  Here we see him dancing like a pro on the Wii version of High School Musical 3.  Oddly enough we learned that Patrick has actually seen High School Musical, which dumbfounded me.  Maybe that's why he was so damn good at those HSM dances.  And doesn't he look like he's having the time of his life?  I bet he is, I bet twenty years from now when he's thinking back about his favorite memories this will be at the top of the list.

Forget Resident Evil 5, Fallout 3 or Gears of War 2, the sequel I was most excited about Street Fighter IV.  I know it seems crazy, especially with all of these bigger and more impressive games monopolizing everybody's time, but it's been more than a decade since we've had a real Street Fighter sequel and I couldn't wait to check it out.  Well I've finally had a chance to check out Capcom's newest fighter and feel that I can accurately judge it.  Is it the next big revolution in the fighting genre, or is it too little too late?

That's not to say this is a bad fighting game, on the contrary.  Street Fighter IV manages to offer some of the best fighting action I've seen all year (especially when put up against Soul Calibur IV and Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe).  The fighting is fast, the graphics are ultra-detailed and the game feels exactly like a traditional fighting game.  Don't be worried by the change in the graphics, the game plays exactly like Street Fighter II, down to the way you throw fireballs and teleport across screen.

Street Fighter IV also features all of the original World Warriors, including fan favorites such as Ryu, Ken, Blanka, M. Bison, Vega and Chun Li.  There are also a few other new fighters, but they have all been regulated to the bottom of the list of characters.  It's not that they are bad (though at least one of them is so silly that I almost wish Capcom would have simply removed the character from the game), it's just that they don't feel as well thought out as the original World Warriors.  Perhaps that has more to do with the fact that I've known these World Warriors for a good 15 years.  It's always hard to meet new players, and even harder to select them over, say, Guile or Sagat.

As you've seen from the videos and screenshots, Street Fighter IV uses 3D polygonal graphics to represent both the characters and the world.  But don't be confused, the game is not 3D.  This is still 100% 2D, you'll never have to dive in or out of the screen to avoid attacks.  You control the game exactly the same as you did the other three titles (back to block, three punch buttons and three kick buttons).  On top of that, the original characters have all of their old movies ... and a bunch of new deadly moves for you to figure out.  There's also a few extra moves that everybody can do, such as a dodge and an art attack.  Both of these moves take some getting used to, but I suspect they'll add a lot once players understand how to use them.

The version of the game I was playing was from a Japanese arcade unit.  As the this writing the Japanese Street Fighter IV arcade cabinet is just now starting to ship, so lucky Japanese gamers will have a chance to plug as many tokens in as they want.  Unfortunately I was limited to only a few rounds, so I wasn't able to try out each and every player.  Hopefully Capcom will have an arcade-perfect port lined up for us this winter (early 2009).  Street Fighter IV may not bring a lot of new gamers to the Street Fighter universe, but it does do a good job of giving long time fans exactly what they have been waiting for.  If you consider yourself a Street Fighter fan then this should be at the very top of your 2009 list.  With Street Fighter IV and Resident Evil 5, it looks like next year Capcom is going to have the best year ever!

I won't lie to you; I've been one of those skeptical gamers coming down on Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe.  I don't know if it's my worry about the toned down gore or that it just feels wrong, but there's something about the project that gives me an uneasy feeling.  It's not the comic book crossover that bothers me; I was a huge fan of both Marvel vs. Capcom games.  It's not the Mortal Kombat characters, as I'm a big fan of Ed Boon's mythology.  So what is it?  What is my problem with this project?  I went into this game demonstration hoping to get to the bottom of these questions.

First let's start with the good news, since there is definitely a lot of it.  Although the game is a bit of a departure from the recent 3D Mortal Kombat games, this crossover actually feels more natural than I had originally thought.  Better yet, the gameplay is basically two-dimensional, which makes this game feel more like Mortal Kombat II than, say, Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance.  The graphics may not be the best we've seen in a next-gen fighting game, but the character models and backgrounds look appropriately rough and disturbing.  The characters are huge and each of the locations have a nice touch of polish that you don't normally get with 3D Mortal Kombat games.

The trick to this game is that all of the punches and kicks feel like they are coming from a group of the strongest individuals in the universe.  When you punch your opponent it doesn't just hurt, it looks like you're breaking every bone in his face.  What's more, you can actually punch your opponents through the walls, ceilings and out of windows.  The levels may look small and confined, but you'll be able to open up the arenas in cool and surprising ways.

So far Midway is being tight lipped on just who will appear in the game, however the version I played featured three fighters from the Mortal Kombat universe and three from the DC universe.  The Mortal Kombat cast features Sonya, Sub-Zero and Scorpion.  All three of these characters retain their original moves, most of which are done exactly as you remember them.  The DC super heroes include Batman, Superman and the Flash.  Obviously the Flash is the fastest, however I found myself having the most amount of fun  playing as Batman.  Where does he get those wonderful toys?

Sadly there is some bad news.  As of this play session the controls don't feel quite as responsive as other 2.5D fighters (see: Street Fighter IV).  Mortal Kombat has never had the most fluid controls, but it's a little too noticeable here.  I also had a hard time pulling off some of the classic moves on the Xbox 360 control.  Hopefully this is just a matter of them polishing it up in the last few weeks of development.  Also, where are all the characters?  Marvel vs. Capcom 2 had more than fifty characters, and from the looks of it this game will only have 24.  What's the deal Midway?

There's still hope that some of these problems will be rectified, but for now I'm anticipating this game ... even if I'm still a skeptical.  The game has a lot of potential and I can't wait to see what the final version looks like.  From what I could tell the blood and fatalities are still in the game, but Midway wouldn't confirm Babialities, Beastialities and Friendships.  I guess that means they're in the game.  No matter what, Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe is shaping up to be a solid fighting game.

This year it's difficult to get on the show floor of E3.  After all, you have to be invited, register, and then show up.  But it's even tougher to get into the behind-closed-doors rooms.  One of those rooms we managed to get into was the Microsoft room.  How exciting is it?  Well, it's not all that exciting, but I do have exclusive pictures of this event.  These are the types of pictures you won't see anywhere else!

 This is where we start our adventure.  We walk up to the Microsoft PR woman, tell them we have a bunch of cameras, and then we walk in.  or something like that.  Actually, we had to wait until the final day to check out Microsoft, but at least we're bringing you pictures.  Sorry, I don't have any video for you.

 This is what you see when you first enter the Microsoft room.  You'll probably notice that it's green ... very, very green.  And I don't mean it's energy friendly, in fact I suspect that Al Gore would frown at E3.  Either way, this room is full of all of Microsoft's upcoming games, including Halo Wars, Fable II, Lips, Banjo Kazooie and more.  It's not a bad set-up, but if you were expecting some huge room with obscure games (Alan Wake?) then this is pretty disappointing.  Thankfully the couches were comfy and the room smelled good.  It's amazing how bad some of E3 smelled.  Thankfully this isn't smell-o-vision.

 Our first stop at the Microsoft booth/room was to check out Halo Wars, the much-anticipated Halo-themed real-time strategy game.  Before we could jump in and try out the game for ourselves we had to listen to this guy explain the basic details.  Microsoft didn't want us filming or taking pictures, but they didn't mind me taking a few snapshots of this guy talking.  Halo Wars is shaping up to be an extremely accessible action/RTS, which is exactly what it needs to be.  The home console user isn't used to playing this type of game on the Xbox 360, so it is going to need to be simpler and easier to play than other recent attempts (Command & Conquer 3, Lord of the Rings, etc.).  The good news is that it feels like Halo Wars is really coming together, so I expect big things when it is released sometime next spring.

 This is "Bear" ... a gigantic guy who used to play football.  Actually his real name is Justin Rouse and he was there to show us how to play Halo Wars.  But the truth is, I barely needed him.  The controls came natural and the tactics feel like they're pulled right out of a more established RTS series (WarCraft, Supreme Commander, etc.).  As you can tell Justin "Bear" Rouse had no problem posing for a picture.  And I don't blame him, he's definitely photogenic.  Just keep one thing in mind, when he showed us his driver's license (don't ask) he was a good 150 pounds heavier.  He's definitely one developer I would not want to get in a fight with.  Not that I'm looking to get in fights with developers.  Actually, let's just move on.

 Eventually we made it over to the Fable II section.  This is Peter Molyneux eating.  I know this probably isn't the most flattering picture of Peter, but they had him giving us a walk-through while he was chowing down on this delicious looking sandwich.  Thankfully he wasn't spitting out little pieces of sandwich while explaining how mind blowing Fable II will be.  Between bites he did manage to tell us why he hates chickens.  Apparently when he was a kid he spent a little too much time around the family farm, because he actually ended up clucking long before actually talking.  Is that embarrassing?  I suspect that when you have a game as good as Fable II coming out it doesn't matter how embarrassing your childhood is.  Sorry we couldn't get a better picture of you Peter.

 Here is a picture of people having a good time playing Halo Wars.  If it feels like I'm spending a lot of time looking at Halo Wars it's because I am, there were quite a few stations to play Ensemble's upcoming game.  Not that it's a bad thing, the game itself was a whole lot of fun.  And look at these people, don't they look like they are having fun?  I mean, the guy is pointing at the screen, if that's not a sign somebody is having fun then I don't know what is.

   The nice thing about this year's E3 is that there weren't that many people.  I know a lot of people prefer the circus-like atmosphere of the E3 of old, but when I'm trying to get work done I just want to walk up to the game and play it.  Microsoft understood that, they only allowed certain people in, and even then it was by appointment.  This allowed us to get one on one time with developers and the PR folk.  If you look closely at this picture you will so both developers and PR folk (but I'm not telling you who's who). 

 Microsoft was concerned about what we thought about Halo Wars, so they send one of their undercover agents to ask us questions about our play session.  I'm not sure how helpful I was, I just stared at her like a deer in headlights, hoping that if I didn't say anything she would leave me alone.  She didn't, which is why she followed us to the Konami event asking us what we thought of Halo Wars.

 Maybe this is where they are keeping Alan Wake and Too Human.  Oh wait, nobody at this E3 wants to play Too Human ... sorry Dennis Dyack.

Anybody that knows me knows that I absolutely LOVE Rock Band.  I mean, I can't get enough of it.  I find myself downloading songs every week, playing it with friends on the weekend and practicing Snow (Hey Oh) on expert when I'm by myself.  Yup, I'm absolutely addicted to this game.  So maybe that's why I was so excited to check out Rock Band 2 at E3.  Sure it's nothing more than a more polished version of the first game (with 85 new songs), but so what?  I'm really just looking for it to give me an online world tour and some new songs.  I'm also expecting it to pose for my camera.  Check out what my camera caught in these five Rock Band related pictures!

 This year I decided that it would be a good idea to get an interview with Harmonix, that way they could show us all of the cool new features in this Rock Band sequel.  Our adventure started right inside the MTV Games waiting room, which featured a large glass case of fake plastic guitars, posters, game discs and whatnot.  More importantly, though, was the food table that is creeping into the shot at the bottom of the picture.  Knowing that we would be tired and hungry, Harmonix was giving out delicious turkey/roast beef sandwiches, along with whatever you wanted to drink.  Giving the lack of time we had to actually eat at E3, this open feast was the perfect respite. 

 When we finally made it into the Rock Band 2 booth (which sat around 15 people) we had one of the Harmonix guys show us all the new stuff.  In this particular feature he's explaining how the interface will now resemble the Rock Band Music Store.  He was really excited about the whole game, so much so that he managed to curse up a storm even when talking about the most trivial new feature.  By the way, I'm not sure why but it looks like one of the wall panels was starting to fall off.  Try and not let that affect your opinions of Rock Band 2.

  Before we could rock we had to watch Harmonix show us how it was done.  When you think about it there was no reason for them to do this, outside of the fact that they wanted to wow us with their high score and expert fake instrument playing.  But I didn't care, because I knew the sooner they rocked the sooner I would have my own opportunity to pick up the axe and impress the crowd.

 This is Harmonix still rocking.  Man, won't these guys gets off the stage so I can play my song?  Talk about a bad opening act.  Anyway, while they're doing that let's talk a little about that drum set.  Do you see that thing?  It looks exactly like a real electronic drum set ... which makes sense giving the $300 price tag.  Add in that Alesis box and you can actually use it to record real music.  Heck, you can even plug it into the Guitar Hero: World Tour game and it will work.  It truly is a thing of beauty. 

 This Rock Revolution drum set, on the other hand, is definitely NOT a thing of beauty.  Everything on the drum feels like it is randomly placed, and the whole thing is so small and cramped that it's extremely difficult to play.  Also, notice the Guitar Hero III guitar ... that's there because they don't actually have a guitar to show off.  It's not because their guitar wasn't done, but rather because they aren't actually making a new guitar.  Weird.  To add insult to injury, the headphones connected to this game didn't even work, so when I played the guitar I couldn't figure out what song I was playing.  By the looks of this drum set it doesn't look like Rock Band 2 has anything to worry about.

One of the most exciting parts of E3 each year is going to the various press conferences.  Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft are known for bringing out their big guns and really wowing the audience, especially when they have big new announcements that knock us off our feet.  Unfortunately there weren't a lot of those kinds of announcements at this year's event.  Regardless, it's still fun to document the sights of the E3 press conference, so bear with me as I go through nine pictures of the various press conferences, from the big three to the smaller ones. 

  Every year Microsoft, Nintendo and Sony announce their upcoming wares days (and sometimes hours) before E3 actually starts.  This year Microsoft had the first conference, scheduled the day before the E3 show floor opened for business.  Microsoft's press conference was held in the West Hall of the Los Angeles Convention Center, where part of the old E3 took place years ago.  What you see here is the outside of the West Hall, plastered with Xbox 360-related window stickers.  I don't know about you, but I think this makes it look more like a GameStop than a video game convention.

Here I am at the Kodak Theater.  Does that sound familiar?  It should, because it's the same place the Oscars and the American Idol finale take place.  But this event wasn't about celebrities and karaoke singers; instead it was about Nintendo's most popular characters boring us for an hour and a half.  Here we have Nintendo gloating about how well they are doing, all while forgetting about actually announcing anything.  Believe it or not, our seats were about as close as the media could get.  The seats in front of us were reserved for Nintendo employees and extra super special people.  Not sure it mattered much, there was nothing at the press conference that required you to sit as close as possible.  In fact, I would argue that it would have been better to be a full 9,000 miles away from this terrible press conference.

Towards the end of the Nintendo conference Reggie Fils-Aime says that he has one more "big" announcement and then introduces Shigeru Miyamoto to the stage.  Could it be a new Kid Icarus game?  Maybe Punch Out?  Nope, it's Wii Music.  No, I'm not kidding.  Shigeru plays a virtual saxophone and talks about how cool it is to air drum.  Surely this can't be the end of the conference, Nintendo has to have something even bigger to announce.  Right?  Nope, Wii Music is their big announcement.  They even play a song from F-Zero, which of course makes me think that maybe they are going to, you know, announce F-Zero Wii.  It would make sense, but no, F-Zero wasn't announced.  What you can't see in this picture is all of the disappointed faces at the Kodak Theater.

 At the Capcom press conference Defunct Games' own Patrick O'Connor manages to meet David Hayter, who plays Snake in the Metal Gear Solid franchise.  Patrick claims to be a huge Metal Gear Solid fan, but currently he hasn't played through Metal Gear Solid 3, Metal Gear Solid 4, Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops, Metal Gear Solid: Ghost Babel, or either of the two Metal Gear Ac!d games.  I'm sure he's just getting around to them ... right?

Konami decided to introduce their Rock Revolution game by offering us an impromptu performance by The Sheenas, an all-girl Ramones cover band (no joke).  If you squint your eyes you would almost think that's Joey Ramone on stage.  Well, maybe you don't need to squint, this is kind of a blurry picture.

 After successfully playing Blitzkrieg Bop, the product manager for Rock Revolution decided to pivot over to her game.  This picture shows her with a Guitar Hero III control (since they don't actually have their own guitar) and a very sweaty drummer.  Both Rock Band 2 and Guitar Hero: World Tour managed to show off their game by giving us two guitarists, a singer and a drummer ... but Rock Revolution decided to just go with the two people.  What's worse, this guitarist (who could successfully play bass in a Ramones cover band) failed out half way through the song.  It wasn't exactly a ringing endorsement for Rock Revolution.

Thirty minutes, that's all I had.  Thirty minutes of Fallout 3.  You see, that's not nearly enough time to really get to know this huge, enormous, gigantic, epic game.  Yet thirty minutes is about all I needed to know that I was playing something truly amazing.  I was playing something that would change my life.  I was playing what may just be the single best game of the year … if not one of the most important games of the century.  Judging by the 30 minutes I spent with Fallout 3 I'm not afraid to call it a masterpiece.

Then again, it could be that everything after the thirty minute mark is absolute rubbish.  I guess we won't know until the game comes out later this year.

Speculation aside, Fallout 3 is everything you want it to be.  It has a gigantic wide-open area full of post-apocalyptic animals, crazy townsfolk and secret areas to explore.  At a glance the game looks a lot like The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion (also developed by Bethesda), only with guns, mutants and Nuka Cola.  But give the game a closer look and you'll see that this game is so much more.  It's everything a first-person shooter fan wants, plus it allows you to have a turn-based RPG experience.  If any role-playing ame can cross over and change the way people think about RPGs, then this is the game that will do it.

The problem is that I just can't say much about the game.  Thanks to a rather stringent non-disclosure agreement (albeit verbal) I find myself unable to actually talk about the game's interesting story.  What I can tell you is that the controls feel absolutely perfect, allowing you all of the controls you expect from both an RPG and a fast-paced action game.  And the atmosphere is spot-on as well, especially when it comes to the different radio stations and the various voice acting.  The graphics are also strong, especially when you're outside looking at the beautiful vistas filled with destroyed buildings and dangerous creatures.

Then again, what I don't know about the game could fill up three books.  How will the ultimate story play out?  Just how much control will I have over the ultimate outcome of the game?  Will this be the kind of game I want to go back and play over and over again?  Will there be enough to do in this post-apocalyptic Washington D.C.?  Will I get tired of my character by the end of the game?

See, those are the types of questions I can't answer until I've had more than 30 minutes to digest such a large game.  The good news is that I can't wait to do all this, preferably as soon as humanly possible.  As much as I hate to take 100 hours of my schedule to play through another epic RPG, this is one game I'll make an exception for.  Bring on Fallout 3, because this really is one of the best (if not the best) game at this year's E3.

I'll admit, I was skeptical going into Rock Revolution.  After all, I'm a gigantic fan of Harmonix's Rock Band, to the point where I find myself buying new songs each and every week (I currently have over 100 downloaded songs).  So from the get-go I knew that I didn't need another fake plastic drum set to clutter up my apartment.  But even with this skepticism I was still willing to give Konami the benefit of the doubt.  Maybe I shouldn't have.

My first taste of Rock Revolution came at the Konami press conference.  After showing off two new Castlevania games and a new video about Silent Hill: Homecoming, Konami decided to have their big rock finish and give us a sneak peak at none other than Rock Revolution.  Unfortunately things did not go as planned.

The project manager (a short haired young woman named Lauren Faccidomo) came out and told us that we were about to rock.  And she meant it.  We did, in fact, rock, thanks in large part to her all female Ramones cover band (no, I'm not kidding).  Together they played a solid cover of Blitzkrieg Bop, a song that can be found in none other than Rock Band.  Their concept (if you can call it that) was to transition from their real band to their fake Rock Revolution band.  Unfortunately this did not go as planned.

Instead of featuring four band members on stage, Konami decided to bring out only two.  One guy sat at the drums while the project manager picked up her Guitar Hero III cordless guitar and got ready to rock.  The drummer was good, which is a miracle given how many different objects there are to hit on that drum set.  Lauren, on the other hand, didn't seem very prepared for what she was about to do.  In fact, it kind of looked like she had never picked up a fake plastic guitar before.  After struggling for a minute or so, Lauren failed out and the game was over.  And that, my friends, is when she wished us a good night and the event ended.

Obviously this should have been a sign.  When the project manager can't even make it 65% through their own song (on medium no less) you know something's wrong.  I realized then and there that I needed to play this game.  And guess what?  It's just as bad as I thought it was going to be.

Okay, so first the bad news.  Unlike Guitar Hero World Tour and Rock Band, Rock Revolution does not feature any master tracks (every song is a cover).  What's worse, the only instrument Konami seems interested in developing is the drums.  That's right; they aren't making a guitar or microphone.  In fact, the game doesn't even support a microphone.  Yet this game allows four people to play.  So if you can play the guitar, bass and drums, then what exactly is the fourth instrument?  Simple, it's a second drum set.  Because what the world of music games needed was two drummers.

So what's the good news?  Well, there isn't any.  It's a terrible, terrible game.  There are far too many things to hit on the drum kit and the whole set-up doesn't feel very natural.  Oh, and one of the drum pads is gray, which is next to impossible to see when it's rushing at you in-game.  And you might as well not even try to play this game if you're color blind.

Needless to say, this game is an absolute mess.  The question I couldn't get an answer to is why anybody would buy this over, say, Rock Band 2 or Guitar Hero World Tour.  It has a number of songs you already own in other music games, a terrible interface and no guitar accessory.  Seriously, they want you to buy this game and then go out and buy Guitar Hero III.  Konami's only real hope is to get Rock Band and Guitar Hero taken off the market with lawsuits.  And guess what?  They're already doing that!