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E3 2004 - Summary 1

The spectacle that is the Electronic Entertainment Expo is so darn flashy I can't bring myself to come up with a clever headline for this feature, which accounts for the plain "Summary 1" title. No bells and whistles here. This is bare bones and telling you like it is (or was).

Last year I had the pleasure of covering E3 by myself -- running from appointment to appointment. Or not even showing up at appointments. This year I had the advantage of having AE's Eric Lahiji in attendance as well. Splitting the appointments up allowed for more time to wonder and actually play some of the games. And of course, there was the constant distraction of various booth babes and celebrities popping up here and there to completely stall the flow of people.

Vin Diesel was there to promote The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher's Bay; Stan Lee showed up at Activision's booth in conjunction with X-Men Legends; Jenny McCarthy was there for something (I'm still not quite sure what); Mohammed Ali was at the Xbox press conference; and a few Playmates showed up to promote the "Hef simulation", Playboy: The Mansion. (At least, I assume they were Playmates because they were in the famous Playboy Club bunny garb.)

Playboy Bunny (left) and Stan Lee (right)

I'll get the booth babes out of the way first because that's what everyone really wants to know about. Tekken 5? Half-Life 2? Nintendo's new DS? They pale in comparison to the bouncy models found at the booths of Playlogic, Tecmo, Majesco, Ubisoft and Namco. Then there was that naughty nurse floating around with Gary Coleman... A look at Halo 2, reserved exclusively for the media this year, is forgotten in the wake of a T-shirt thrown by a model barely wearing a tank top. At least for the typical "industry professional" in attendance this year (65,000+ in total).

BloodRayne (left) and one of Tecmo's booth babes (right)

Most of the journalists -- actual journalists, not the pretenders -- were probably most interested in the handhelds from Sony, Nintendo, and Nokia.

We already knew Nokia was going to have the remodeled N-Gage on display, so there were really no surprises at the booth. Except for the fact they had some fun games to play, particularly the multiplayer Pathway to Glory. And they also pointed out they have continued (and relatively strong) third-party support. Nokia also tried

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to distance itself from both Nintendo's DS and Sony's PSP, insisting they are going after very different segments of the market. I didn't believe Nokia until I actually got around to Sony and Nintendo to check out their handhelds.

Each one is radically different. Sony's PSP aims to be an all-in-one multimedia/game center, with noted support via its mini-discs to play games, movies and music. Although I can

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understand the allure of gaming-on-the-go and high quality audio playback and I can't help but scratch my head over the idea of watching a movie on a "480 x 272 pixel high-resolution screen." It would be fine for talkie movies, but what about the Lord of the Rings trilogy or Spider-Man? These kind of movies beg to be played on a massive screen with a subwoofer turning your spine into jelly. But I can understand its application as it relates to games.

Over at Nintendo's booth, I got to spend some quality time playing a multiplayer Metroid game that utilized both screens in a way that made sense. The upper screen handled the map while the lower screen displayed the main action. Strafing was handled with the direction arrows while the stylus (the pen-like implement included with each unit) handled the shooting and turning duties via the touch screen. It might sound a little complicated but it was actually easy to pick-up. The processing power of the unit is along the lines of the N64, will use cartridges (DS-specific games go in the top slot, GBA games slide in the bottom), can be wirelessly connected with other DS's for multiplayer, and so on. The final design, price and release date haven't been nailed down yet but it's expected to be released before the end of 2004. That's right, 2004. (We'll have more in-depth looks at each unit in the near future.)

Nintendo's DS (left) and Sony's PSP (right)

I see my glass is almost empty so I must close it there. With Summary 2, I'll dive right into the issue of sequels.

- Omni

(May 15, 2004)