E3 2008 failed: very few big announcements for PS3, Xbox 360 & Wii
By Dave Parrack
The E3 Media and Business Summit is usually the place to be every year, with each of the big three console manufacturers, Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo, and most of the games developers there, showing off their wares. And E3 2008 followed that pattern, except for the fact that there was very little excitement, with few surprises, and a total lack of huge announcements for the future of the Playstation 3, Xbox 360, and Wii.
The press conferences, and keynote speeches came and went, and one after the other failed to offer anything that exciting, or new. With a few exceptions, everything announced was already known, and most of the news failed to be as big as was expected prior to the expo kicking off.
The biggest announcement was the fact that Final Fantasy XIII is coming to the Xbox 360, making it a PS3 exclusive no longer. This was a bolt of the blue, with very few people knowing about it in advance, and absolutely no-one calling it ahead of time. But apart from that, what was there for the rest of us?
Microsoft certainly came out on top in the E3 news stakes, with the FFXIII announcement being supported by the hardware price cut, Lips, and You’re In The Movies. However, even the latter two of these are pretty lame, being as they are, complete rip-offs of existing Sony products, Singstar, and the Eye Toy respectively.
Sony itself announced a movie download service, and MAG, which will reportedly allow up to 256 people to play at the same time. Both nice, but not exactly the huge news I was anticipating. There were a couple of games on show, but we knew about them already, and very few concrete details were revealed at the event.
Nintendo did slightly better, with the MotionPlus peripheral add-on, along with Wii Resort, Wii Music, and Wii Speak all unveiled. But a closer look reveals that the MotionPlus add-on is essentially just an upgrade, which some would argue shouldn’t be necessary if the Wii Remote had been properly developed in the first place. Wii Resort is just more of the same as Wii Sports, but with some weird sports added, Wii Music is Rock Band without the skill, and Wii Speak is a voice chat peripheral. Amazing.
Where were the motion-sensing controllers for both the PS3 and Xbox 360? Surely all those rumours couldn’t have been completely false. Where was the huge hardcore-oriented game for the Nintendo Wii that was promised ahead of the expo?
As the New York Times stated, both Sony and Nintendo definitely played it safe, but I’d also go as far to say Microsoft did too. It was all a bit of an anti-climax, and I’ve been left completely underwhelmed with the whole thing. Oh well, I suppose there’s always next year to look forward to.
Related:
Stumble It!
Tips N4G
July 17th, 2008
I see you mentioned that Microsoft ripped off Sony but You didn’t say how Sony ripped off Microsofts Vido Store. Did Nintendo actually show games. What the hell was that crap. Who wants to pretend they are playing a flute. The ony thing that looked intresting from Nintendo was the Shawn White Snowboarding game. That was cool. But Shawn White looks like a crack head. Is that guy white trash or what?
July 17th, 2008
Hey does anyone still bother with leipzig? I cant remember what gets announced at leipzig but thats the alternate convention surely for any motion controlling nincompoopery from sony and microsoft? But i agree in all E3 was disapointing for ALL companies.
July 17th, 2008
every conference was poor imo, Sony however I think just edged it, not for the game revelations (if there were any…) but for the simple fact that at LEAST they were honest. There was no “hey.. lets dance around and pretend we’re having fun!” or “hey lets get duffy to sing a song from singst- i mean Lips!” or any of that truly cringe worthy stuff from the Microsoft camp. Fair do’s, they dropped a bombshell about FFXIII (not for me personally, I dont really care about final fantasy) and from that angle, they won, but for just going up there and showing what they had to offer for now in an honest way, I would edge it to Sony.
Nintendo sucked. lol
oh btw Bourne I gave you an add on PSN, dont no if you noticed lol
July 17th, 2008
Wow, anyones who denies MS had the best E3 is being dishonest. Nintendo had a new device or two, but little else.
Sony RE-announced the games (and vaporware) they have been chirping about for the past year or 2. Home….check. GT….check. Killzone 2…check. LBP….check. It’s all last years stuff rehashed with a few videos of more things to come sometime off in the future. Who said Sony was honest? They said they were cutting the price of the 80gig PS3 (has BC) when they actually upped the 40gig PS3 (no BC) to 80gig. Big whoop…and VERY deceptive.
MS’s FF XIII announcement alone was big enough to steal the show, but they threw in the Netflix deal and actual release dates for their big exclusives like Fable 2, Gears of War 2, GTA content, also Viva Pinata and Banjo and a ton of XBLA titles too.
As far as MS ripping Sony off, that’s pretty funny after Sony copied video downloads (what happened to BD?), arcade titles, DLC, achievements, every feature XBL has that PSN didn’t, etc.
July 17th, 2008
oh awesome, i havent been on for a bit, mgso just released a MONSTER patch so i got a bit put off, going to have to wait ages to download it.
July 17th, 2008
im still yet to try MGSO, looks fun, but really cant be arsed with all the signing up to the different id things.
will give it a go soon I reckon.
Er how is that a bad thing btw upping the 40gb to 80gb? An extra 40gb for the same price? And no they never once said they were cutting prices, so actually, its a nice surprise
July 17th, 2008
yeah the different id’s are a complete pain in the ass, but once you get online its really good, you need to get into it, at first it doesnt hook, but then you do and its fantastic.
July 17th, 2008
I thought the ID was going to be a pain, but once you register, that’s it. Details saved. Make sure you tick the automatic sign in box mind.
FFXIII being multiplatform was the big shocker for me.
July 17th, 2008
idk…the netflix/ms news was exciting. 10,000 movies w/o leaving the couch.
i do agree that e3 just isn’t what it used to be tho.
July 17th, 2008
takes too long to d/l kevin, face it, up to 4-7 hours? thats ridiculous.
July 17th, 2008
Your right, it really isn’t. Didn’t people start taking it less seriously because it was downsized and only journalists are allowed to go now or something? No public admittance. Or did I just make that up?
July 17th, 2008
Like I said, these companies can’t afford to sit back and wait for E3 anymore. They have to get their ideas out asap. That’s my theory on the downhill slide of E3 anyway.
July 17th, 2008
PS3 PLAY TV DATED - 10TH SEPT
July 17th, 2008
All this ‘copy copy copy!!!’ stuff is fucking retarded.
Its called giving consumers what they want. If MS wants to rip Mii avatars off then so be it, you don’t have to use them and if it sells on more console for MS so be it.
The trophy this is the same deal, I don’t want it but if it makes someone happy then great!
For the record, I don’t see how Sony ’stole’ the movie downloads idea when digital distribution wasn’t started on the xbox or the 360.
E3 was a complete and utter bust, the only big announcement was final fantasy and it was no where near a ‘MEGATON!’ announcement. We saw games we’ve seen already, not a whole lot new, and companies willing to just clone each other.
And we take one step closer to having 3 consoles that are identical. Thank you MS, Sony, & Nintendo.
July 17th, 2008
Isnt the Entertainment for All Expo or E for All, held in October, supposed to be the ’spiritual successor’ to the E3 of old? might hear more then, or so i’m hoping.
July 17th, 2008
*ahem*
GOD OF WAR THREE!!!!
YEAH YEAH!!! YEAH!!!!
I dont care about any other games no more… Im done… yes.. Im done… this is what Ive been waiting for… if you screw this up sony… or “Killzone 2″ it… I will seriously fuck you up…
Okay.. the whole Final Fantasy thing… I gotta say.. bravo Microsoft… bravo… a round of applause people…
Statistically… you will see that 360 games make more money… generate more hype.. and overall please the developers more.. so it makes perfect financial sense for Square Enix to “jump ship”… having never played any turn based RPGs seriously other than Pokemon… I can say.. Im gonna wait for FF 13 to go down in price.. then buy it…
but the facts prove it (the sales numbers) … PS3 needs Bioshock and Geow 2 more than the 360 needs FF….
but… I dont care… GOD OF WAR THREE!!! suck on it…
yes… Im back kevin… read em and weep….
July 18th, 2008
Rip off? Microsoft took Singstar and made it even better! Yet another reason to get the 360 and leave the black shiny lemon alone!
July 18th, 2008
“I’ve been left completely underwhelmed with the whole thing”
Perhaps if all the blogger idiots didn’t regurgitate the same totally unfounded rumors over and over until something thinks they’re real, your expectations would have been different and you could thus REPORT on the ACTUAL news made at E3. But instead you choose to focus on the rumors YOU bought into, and can’t seem to figure out why you are disappointed. DUH.
July 18th, 2008
Hairy sack i guess you dont understand the definition of Rip-off: An inferior imitation of something. That is what Microsoft has done. accept it, switch to ps3, then talk to us.
July 18th, 2008
Hairy Sack!!!! Sorry Harry but that was funny.
July 18th, 2008
The big annoucements…wait, annoucement, there was only one, isn’t that big of a deal. Not many people are going to get an 360 because of FF13, and most that want it already have a PS3 anyway.
Most of the things that could make a difference were so small that they won’t.
MS annouced it was going casual, Sony annouced the PS3 is no longer just a bluray player, but is also becoming a computer. Nintendo annouced they’re doing so well right now that they don’t want to do anything new yet.
Sure, some of these things could affect the future. If a game with more than 200 people online at the same time, on a console game, will work out well, we might see games pushing more and more in the future. Getting movies off the internet could really get some big bucks thown at it if MS or Sony makes a lot of money from it. Heck, we could even see casual and hardcore coexist well, making video games like this for a long time.
But these annoucements are just a part of what could happen. For now, everything that could matter was too small to really care about.
July 18th, 2008
Kev - Cad- Watch out here it comes!
I don’t know how Sony will pull it off. Over 200 people online on a game. I will have to see it to believe it. It’s hard enough to find 16 people with good internet for COD4, now we need 200 people with good connections! People will be dropping out of games left and right. You will never finish a game with the same people you started with, that is for sure.
July 18th, 2008
Wylie
Is it really that Bad?
July 18th, 2008
Cad- Not sure what you mean, but if your asking is COD4 players with bad connections that bad, I would have to say yes. Sometimes its fine, but once you hit the people with bad connections look out, game over! Frustrating.
July 19th, 2008
“Over 200 people online on a game. ”
Planetside. Already exists on PC. I haven’t
played it for a few years but I believe it was 3 teams of 128 warring at the same time.
I’m sure it will take one huge visual hit because of the amount of players tho.
Point is, it can and has been done on inferior hardware.
July 19th, 2008
CAD, you only just realised what my name meant?! DUDE!!!
Bourne the operative word is INFERIOR. If it is better than what it’s replacing (which it is), it is definitely not inferior.
So using your logic (what little of it you have), you’re saying that Rock Band is inferior to Guitar Hero? They took the original concept and made it better. Exactly what Microsoft has done with Lips.
Oh yeah, how is the taste of servitude?
July 19th, 2008
Errr… Harry you don’t by chance have access to a Delorean and a flux capicitor do u? because Lips ain’t out yet
July 19th, 2008
Lips is not out yet, but we all know what it’s going to be when it comes out. Duh. Only difference is that Microsoft didn’t use a stupid CGI film to pretend that they’ve started developing it, not unlike Sony and their God Of War ‘Trailer’. Maybe when that game hits the stores in 2010 you can wipe the dust off your P$3 and play it.
July 19th, 2008
Just saying maybe u shouldn’t say a game that’s not out yet is better than a game that is out, by the way the GOW3 trailer was a “teaser” trailer for game that’s not out for a while yet, most teaser trailers I’ve seen are CGI
July 19th, 2008
Yeah Harry, I’m sure alot of people said the exact same thing about Haze…”haven’t seen it yet, but we all know it is going to be great.”
Presumption is the mother of all F%^& ups Harry. You may have just made one….. Especially when they start off by calling a game “lips”.
July 20th, 2008
Spidey, we shall call it the Haze Effect(tm)!
July 20th, 2008
Dont say it too loud SW, Harry will take the “Haze Effect”, supposedly improve it, and then call it an original. It will then be known as :
“Lips”