E3 2011: Microsoft

Sorry for the long delay! I fell behind a bit in my writing and let most of E3 pass me by, but I am back, the conferences are over, and it's time to review the crap out of them starting with good ol' Microsoft.

Now, coming into E3, Microsoft had some leery eyes pointed at it for the seemingly complete lack of console exclusives besides Gears of War 3 while Sony is pumping them out left and right. Add that to some apparently not-as-good-as-they-were-hoping Kinect sales and you get an E3 where Microsoft really needs to hit it out of the park to prove they can compete this year.

So the conference starts, and BAM, right out of the gate we get a Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 demo. In the mission they showed you're underwater, part of a team assigned to place mines on a submarine. You heard me right. You put mines on a submarine to make it surface. Then, you infiltrate it, kill everyone aboard, steal some launch codes, launch the missiles, escape the sub to a raft that you drive through explosions and warships all around you and into a waiting aircraft transport that as it lifts off shows you all the destruction happening to Prime Destroyable American City #1, New York. Call of Duty is often compared to a Michael Bay movie, and I think the demo showed why there's good reason for that. Now, the thing to remember with Modern Warfare 3 is that while the company who made it is still called Infinity Ward, who made the first two, due to legal disagreements most of the original staff of Infinity Ward is gone and has regrouped as Respawn. Will this make any difference to how well it sells? Oh god no. Will it make any difference to how it plays and if it carries that special something of the first two? We'll have to wait and see until November 8th.

Next up, the Tomb Raider reboot. Now, this game has been hyped as "grittier" and "darker" and all those adjectives commercial people use to try to make you think a game is cool or better than it really is. So, I have been skeptical. Then they started the demo...and I was frankly blown away. She starts the demo having been captured on this mysterious island, hanging upside down and bound in this almost cocoon. Swinging back and forth she catches another nearby cocoon on fire, and consequently hers, which releases her into the pit below where her side says hello to a pointy stick. Impaled, bleeding and broken, she has to escape from her pursuers through crumbling caves in stunning graphical quality. Apparently this was the first of many games to be unfortunately misrepresented by their demo, as a great deal of the action in the demo was quick-time event based whereas the longer form of the demo available on the show floor showed off a great deal more of actual combat and puzzle solving. And considering I was impressed with so little, this has definitely become a title to watch when it drops in Fall 2012.

Then EA Sports takes the stage and I take a quick snooze. I don't get sports games. I don't understand how a company can put out these yearly iterations of practically the exact same game with a few tweaks but overall the exact same experience, and that people BUY THEM. EN MASSE. Anyways, they did at least bring up the first mention of Kinect, saying that Tiger Woods, Madden, Fifa, and an unannounced title would all support Kinect. Thankfully, this is where the sports talking ends. He then branched out into non-sports titles like The Sims 3 Pets and Family Game Night 4 which will also support Kinect, as well as one little title a few people are excited for...

Mass Effect 3. Here's the thing. They showed off two features of how Kinect will integrate into the game, and neither were very impressive. First, you can choose your dialogue options by directly saying them. However, the thing about Mass Effect's conversation wheel is that the snippet on the wheel is not what is actually said. So basically you say one thing out loud, and then Shepard says something completely different on screen. It...doesn't work. Then, something with at least possible interesting applications, you can speak to your squad members during battle to tell them to do things. "Garrus, move up. Liara, singularity." And so forth. But once again, the thing about doing that is, it's a lot easier to push a button. Yes, it may give you the feeling of being more in the game, but would you really rather spend the extra time talking in the heat of battle? Sure it only takes like a second longer to say something than to press a button, but I am just skeptical of how this function can actually improve the game. In terms of the non-Kinect stuff however, this game looks fabulous. I mean, you finally get to see a Krogan female. Rock. On.

Next up, Ghost Recon: Future Soldier, specifically the Gunsmith system. Boasting over 20 million different combinations of parts, you can customize weapons in game exactly the way you want them. By spreading your hands apart, you open up the gun into its different components, and by putting your hands back together you close everything up again. You can also use voice commands for quick access to specific parts. It all looks very Minority Report, which is to say, cooooool. You can even test out the weapons, though the stance you use is very odd (similar to drawing the gun from your back like a sword, and then holding your left hand like you're about to eat something from the invisible fork you're holding while your right hand is clenched and flashes open to fire the gun...just look it up). It seems that Ubisoft, out of everyone, seems to understand that the coolest thing about Kinect is the user interface, not the gameplay mechanics. And then at the end it's announced that all future Tom Clancy titles will support Kinect.

Then they start talking about how Kinect will start working with everything on the Xbox (including a new partnership with Youtube). They unfortunately start slipping into the odd rehearsed quality they had last year here, as to demonstrate how this works, they bring a woman on stage who literally only says things like "Xbox, video" to show how you can now scroll over to the video tab with your voice. Everyone with me now, "Oooooooooooo." At least, I assume that's what they wanted us to say. Instead, it's more like "Oh.....okay." The real kicker is that they're bringing live TV to Xbox this fall. How this will actually work, and why Comcast or DirectTV aren't throwing a hissy fit, is a mystery.

A bunch of new interactivity stuff with UFC fights. Woot.

Here's where the eyes rise, people, as everything from this point is Xbox exclusive...

And they show Gears of War 3. *sigh* And bring out cast member Ice-T to play the demo with the head of Epic, Cliff Bleszinski. The demo is awesome, of course, as they take on a giant sea creature and its small exploding minions. And as a surprise that it sure sounded like no one really cared about, Ice-T's old band Body Count is reuniting to do a song to celebrate the return of Horde mode. Look for Gears on September 20th.

That mysterious game last year which was a partnership with Crytek, makers of Crysis, formerly known as Codename: Kingdoms, is now known as Ryse. It looks to be a brutal first person hack and slash set in Rome, where Kinect reads your body movements and allows you to not just use a sword and shield but also headbutt and kick. No indication of a release date, but this looks to be the first actually mature game just for Kinect. Hopefully it pays off, cause Kinect sure needs more like it.

With this being the 10th anniversary of the first Halo, they've fully remastered the campaign and several old multiplayer maps and are rereleasing it on November 15th. Fanboys rejoice.

Forza Motorsport 4 will have voice and headtracking integration with Kinect, and showed a lot of things that I know and care nothing about as someone who knows nothing about cars. But for all you racing fans out there, it's coming October 11th.

Aw, it's Peter Molyneux. I look forward to when he takes the stage because he always comes out with something really cool and awe-inspiring, only to completely disappoint people when the game actually comes out. He's mostly known for Fable, but he's also the guy behind Milo, who if you haven't seen just look up Project Natal (the pre-release name of Kinect) and Milo and be amazed. Unfortunately, the project was scrapped for wholly unknown reasons. So what new disappointment are you bringing this year? It's called Fable: The Journey, and it's part 2 in games that were made to look bad by their demos. In the demo, the game appears to be on-rails, while you swing your hands about in different ways to create spells to launch at goblins. It looked...well...kind of boring. But then Molyneux came out later and essentially said it's not on rails at all, they just decided to do that for the demo. Of course, it would be nice to know how movement is going to work then, but it appears we'll all have to wait and see.

Now here's a shocker. Minecraft. Not only is it coming to Xbox, it will be Xbox exclusive AND feature Kinect support. Want to know more? Too bad! That's all they'll say.

The Kinect train rolls on with Disneyland Adventures, which apparently recreates the entire Disneyland theme park and integrates various Kinect based minigames into it. And since it's a kids Kinect game, that's right, it's time for awkward overly rehearsed creepy kids demo time! They start off with a flight with Peter Pan where you hold out your arms like an airplane and then tilt back and forth randomly (at least it looked random) to try and get coins. Then a mad trip through Alice in Wonderland that ends with an oh so awkward "Fist bump!" Please, dear god Microsoft, stop with the child actors. It looks stupid, overly rehearsed, and utterly unrealistic. It's not even funny. It's just plain bad. But you can look forward to exploring Disneyland this holiday.

But if you really want some repetitive and random arm swinging, look no further than Kinect Star Wars! Seriously, apparently this is part three of the demo did disservice to the game in the same way as Fable (looked on rails but isn't), but I honestly doubt the game could be much better than what they showed. Here's the problem with any swordfighting game where you don't actually have a sword. You're going to hack and slash in any direction and really just kind of hope for the best. And that's exactly what this was. All that guy did on stage was swing his arm back and forth while his character on screen obediently carved through each enemy. Oh he could lean and the character would dodge to the side or even over an opponent to take them by surprise, or lean forward to charge to the nearest foe, but all he did was haphazardly swing his arm. It just looked so boring and made such poor use of Kinect. Plus it was the Clone Wars, with graphics/design from I believe the cartoon, which just made it all look BAD. GRRRR.

Then dear Tim Schafer, maker of such whimsical games as Brutal Legend, Costume Quest and Stacked, brings out his family friendly Kinect game Sesame Street: Once Upon A Monster. Which really, if anyone is going to make a good Sesame Street game, it's this man, and....oh god damn it they're back. As Schafer says, "Unleash the simulated family. Very life-like." Anyways, ignoring the complete awkwardness that follows from a grown man and young boy pretending to be father and son very very poorly, the gameplay appears to be nothing new to Kinect, but there is something magical about playing along with Elmo and Cookie Monster that could at least make this game acceptable.

It's obvious at this point that in lieu of having any hardcore exclusives besides Gears, Microsoft is pushing Kinect as hard as they possibly can. Thankfully, at just the right time they bring out what could possibly be their greatest announcement: Kinect Fun Labs (though please change the name). Essentially up until now there have been some really interesting possibilities with new and creative uses for the Kinect hardware, but they've all only been accessible through a PC. So Microsoft created Fun Labs to allow all that innovation to come straight from the Xbox. They showed off things like people scanning, where you can instantly create an avatar that looks just like you, finger tracking, where you can draw a 3D image and look at it at different angles using head tracking, and object capture where you can take literally any object, scan it with Kinect and use it in game. And that's just what they thought of. I'm sure this will open up a gigantic window of innovation and I can't wait to see what comes of it, especially as it released that day.

Kinect Sports 2. Everybody yawn with me.

Dance Central was the surprise hit of Kinect, and Dance Central 2 looks to continue the trend with a campaign mode, seamless multiplayer dancing, and voice support. And not only that, but all tracks from the first game can be imported into 2. Looks to be a must have for Kinect owners.

And then, one last "surprise", Remember last year how I said that they said Halo Reach was going to be the last Halo game, just as they said Halo 3 was going to be the last Halo game? Remember how I was skeptical? Well guess what. One year later and they show a CG trailer for Halo 4, which is not only a new Halo game but will be the start of a new trilogy. That's right Microsoft, drain that cash cow dry cause all that money just taste so goooood.

Overall I think Microsoft once again fell a little flat this year. With no big exclusive titles to throw out there they had to try and throw a lot of excitement behind their other forms of entertainment, namely Kinect and everything else besides games that Xbox does. And sadly it didn't work. Fun Labs could easily show a lot of promise, and secures Microsoft against the piracy Sony has had to deal with by bringing in the modder/hacker community instead of shutting them out. And if you're a young child, there are games such as Disneyland Adventures and Once Upon A Monster to look forward to. But for everyone else, Microsoft's ending claim that this year they would become the best selling console worldwide sounds a bit of a stretch.