Also only noted in brief passing during Sony’s montage of upcoming PSP games: Invizimals, an augmented reality monster hunter/battler game from Barcelona studio Novarama that utilizes the PSP’s camera attachment to “hunt” invisible creatures and capture them via included augmented-reality cards.

The PSP camera originally debuted in Japan in 2006 and was released across Europe a year later as Go!Cam (the Go! brand obviously now widening with the latest model PSP), but still has yet to make its stateside appearance: the teasing of Invizimals is the strongest sign yet that it might finally arrive.

David Cage’s collective output at Quantic Dream has always been nothing if not massively ambitious: from the wide open world of his PC/Dreamcast debut Omikron to the multi-camera cinematic perspective and directly user-controlled actions of PC/Xbox 360’s Fahrenheit/Indigo Prophecy, with both just undercut from being true masterworks by tiny details.

The jarring quick-time event sequences that undercut the latter will assuredly be returning to his PS3 exclusive latest detective thriller, Heavy Rain, but, from the trailer above, you can see how hard Quantic has worked to integrate them more tightly with the scene: notice the razor thin R1 floating just above the gun during that stand-off moment.

Either way, it’s still one of my most anticipated games for the console, and I’m very curious to continue to see how they’ll continue to walk that tightrope between player freedom and directed narrative.

Nintendo’s newest New Super Mario Bros takes the polygonal realism of the DS version and puts it in HD, and adds four player drop-in, drop-out play to the mix. New powerups, as above, include the propeller suit and the ice-ball firing penguin suit, and the game now banks on the same “co-opertition” aspect explored in Zelda: Four Swords.

Like that game, you can rely on the other players to help get you through a bind, but they can also undercut you in a mad dash to collect the most coins (by tossing you out of the way, or refusing to pop your Yoshi’s Island-esque bubble that you return to life in), with a multi-player ranking at the end of each level.

One game even I continually neglected to mention over the course of E3 — not for lack of interest, but simply from the constant torrent of incoming games — was Sin and Punishment 2, which, as you can see from the trailer above, is looking as fantastic and ephemerally pastel as it should.

The game is, of course, the sequel to the Nintendo 64 original that took some seven years to finally make its way to the states (under Nintendo’s Virtual Console banner), years spent working up a near-mythical level of cult acclaim.

That acclaim is in good part due to the track record of developer Treasure, who — for basically as long as you can remember — has been churning out some of the smartest and equally whimsical and hardcore shooter/action games from Bangai-O to Gunstar Heroes to cult-legend scribble dodgeball game Rakugaki Showtime to Ikaruga and Radiant Silvergun.

The Wii S+P will bring the dual Wii-mote/Nunchuk controls the original was begging for, allowing you to control your character/slash foreground characters while simultaneously aiming and shooting at those in the back, and, by all on-the-floor accounts that’ve made their way to me, was shaping up extremely well ahead of its early 2010 release.

Hit the jump for some fantastic hi-res character art and illustrations. (more…)

E309: THE 5 THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT SONY’S PRESS CONFERENCE

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6.2.2009

Brandon Boyer

9 Replies

1.) Sony unveiled their own new motion tracking system, aptly titled the PlayStation Motion Controller

Sony were up front about the rampant leaks in recent weeks, saying up front “we consider ourselves to be industry leaders, and press leaks are no exception,” but it still had a few surprises up its sleeve.

Primarily, the PlayStation Motion Controller, a ‘magic wand’ type add-on that utilizes the PlayStation 3’s camera to track 3D movement across one or two hands. Sony went through a bevy of demonstrated uses, making the controller act as first person shooter aiming device, writing utensil, two handed archery simulator, and real-time strategy unit selector, all with a legitimately impressive amount of finesse.

The company said it would be releasing more information about the device soon, in anticipation of an early 2010 launch.

2.) Sony are circling the wagons and re-emphasizing a lineup of third party exclusives

After losing Grand Theft Auto to competing consoles, first and foremost Sony announced that Rockstar North, the studio behind the GTA series, would be creating Agent, a story of global espionage and assassins set in the late 1970s that will be exclusive to PS3.

Sony also showed the first footage of Final Fantasy 14, a new online version in the series (the first since FF 11) that was announced as a game that would “launch exclusively” for the PS3.

Also shown: the first official trailer for The Last Guardian, the third game from Ico and Shadow of the Colossus creator Fumito Ueda that leaked recently as Project Trico — the updated trailer showed a fantastic deal more detail than that early target video.

For the PSP, Hideo Kojima came on stage to reveal Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker, a game he said was set, too, in the late 70s, and would serve as the official sequel to Metal Gear Solid 3, and would take full advantage of the PSP’s capabilities. Kojima promised he was heavily involved in the game both as script writer and as executive producer, with much of the same original team as MGS4, and would not be a simple spinoff project.

Other PSP titles in its lineup coming in the near future: a new exclusive Resident Evil, LittleBigPlanet, SOCOM, Monster Hunter Freedom Unlimited, Motorstorm, Hannah Montana, Harry Potter and the exclusive Gran Turismo mentioned in the Qore leak.

3. Sony is placing greater emphasis on the PSP as a media device

Sony’s already widely leaked PSP Go will be launching on October 1st in America and Europe at a 249 dollar/euro price point, and alongside it will come a new PC media manager app called Media Go, meant to better sync photos, music and video between your PC and the PSP.

Also added to the new PSP model firmware this fall (as well as the PS3) will be an on-device port of its proprietary musical application SensMe, that, like iTunes’ ‘Genius’ functionality, will analyze your music with ’12 tone recognition’ and create new playlists based on your mood.

Adding to the PS3’s already sizable video library — which will now include new content partners Showtime, G4, E, HDNet, Starz, TNA, Magnolia Films, and new anime and sports channels — Sony announced that content delivery will be coming natively to the PSP this fall, as well.

4. Sony still strongly believes in the ‘play, create, share’ theme

To that end, they not only announced new partners for LittleBigPlanet like Disney — who will be adding Jack Sparrow, Cinderella and The Incredibles costumes — but they announced a new PlayStation 3 exclusive game from its internal San Diego studio and Vancouver’s United Front called ModNation Racers.

At heart a kart racing game along the lines of Mario’s own, the twist is — like LittleBigPlanet near-infinite customizability in both characters, cars, and tracks. United Front demonstrated the track building feature, which was as easy as painting tracks, terrain types, scenery like trees, mountains and villages, and powerups with a virtual PhotoShop brush applicator, and then instantly tested out the track with no loading or delay.

The game featured a superdeformed character design style similar to LittleBigPlanet‘s Sackboy, which the developer said was inspired by vinyl toy scene artists like Kidrobot and Tokidoki, and are therefore completely after my one true heart.

5. As I suspected, Sony are actively chasing more independent developers for PSP

How? By announcing a price drop for its PSP developer kits by some 80 percent to $1,500 in North America, and 1200 euros across Europe and PAL territories.

E309: THE 5 THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT NINTENDO’S PRESS CONFERENCE

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6.2.2009

Brandon Boyer

10 Replies

1.) Nintendo is going back to basics with more Mario

The overarching theme of this year’s E3 conference was striking a better balance between the new gamers Nintendo has been reaching out to for the past several years without alienating its long-standing audience.

For the latter category, then, they brought back Mario, with New Super Mario Bros. Wii, a single-to-four-player classic sidescroller due this holiday season that brings in the ‘co-opertition’ elements it brought to Zelda: Four Swords to its other hit franchise.

Nintendo also announced Super Mario Galaxy 2, an extension of its 3D Wii debut that will more prominently feature his Yoshi companionship, Mario vs. Donkey Kong: March of the Minis, a version of its Mario puzzler series coming next Monday as a DSiWare downloadable, and a fall 2009 localization of its DS Mario & Luigi RPG: Bowser’s Inside Story, a Fantastic Voyage-esque game that sees the characters moving through Bowser’s body on the lower screen, mixed with Bowser’s own exploits on the screen above.

2.) Nintendo is revitalizing other franchises with new partners

Nintendo ended the conference on its hardest-core note, by announcing that Ninja Gaiden developer Team Ninja would be partnering with the company to develop Metroid: Other M: a third-party action based Wii followup to Retro Studios’ first person games, due out in 2010.

3.) Nintendo is not finished with creating and exploiting new hardware interfaces

Namely, the newly unveiled Wii Vitality Sensor, a small WiiMote-connected device that clips onto your finger to measure your pulse. Nintendo head Satoru Iwata explained that the company wants to be able to “visualize something otherwise invisible” — nervousness, focus — and possibly create new games that focus on relaxing, rather than stimulating, the player.

Nintendo also re-revealed the new MotionPlus sensor which gives the WiiMote greater precision with the upcoming sports mini-game collection Wii Sports Resort, due July 26th, and third party sports games like EA’s Tiger Woods PGA Tour and Grand Slam Tennis, and Sega’s Virtua Tennis 2009.

That also goes for Wii Fit, which will be getting its own expansion, Wii Fit Plus this fall with new workout activities, new minigames, and, most importantly, the ability to string exercises together without any interruption (as does older PC, Xbox, PS2 fitness trainer Yourself Fitness).

4.) Nintendo also wants to more tightly integrate with social networks

Like Microsoft announced yesterday with its Xbox 360 Facebook application, Nintendo also announced that its DSi handheld — equipped as it is with two on-board cameras — will also be able to natively integrate with Facebook to upload user photos directly to the service.

5.) Nintendo want to continue to cater to everybody

This was made clear from the start with their underlying and repeated catchphrase “everyone’s game”, and their diverse first and third party lineup.

Games showcased for the DS: Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days, a localization of create-your-own-microgame studio WarioWare: DIY, new Zelda adventure Spirit Tracks, gritty new Ubisoft IP adventure game C.O.P.: the Recruit, and a return of underdog Game Boy Advance RPG series Golden Sun, all for the hardcore. For the wider audience, James Patterson’s Women’s Murder Club: Games of Passion visual novel series, and fashion-based game Style Savvy.

And for the Wii: Square Enix’s open world adventure Final Fantasy: The Crystal Bearers, Sega and High Voltage’s first person shooter The Conduit, Capcom’s Resident Evil: Darkside Chronicles, and EA’s rail shooter sequel Dead Space Extraction.

New images and movies will be added to this post as they are released!

Also revealed at Monday’s Ubisoft press conference, the company’s commitment to bring Desperate Struggle — the follow-up to Offworld favorite developer Grasshopper’s original ultraviolent slacker slasher No More Heroes — to North America in ‘early 2010’. The new trailer above more than speaks for itself by amping up the style and the inescapable innuendo by a factor of 50.

Ubisoft have always known they’ve had a hit character on their hands since the debut of their mini/party-game collection Rayman Raving Rabbids, but they’ve apparently hit an even more graceful stride with the first full trailer for the Wii’s Rabbids Go Home above.

I can’t say I even fully grasp what the final game will entail — Ubisoft says it will solely consist of two Rabbids “pushing a shopping cart and causing mayhem” — but, second only to Valve’s “Meet The…” series, it’s so confidently stylized and effortlessly funny that I’m almost instantly willing to follow wherever they lead.

ONE SHOT: RALLYING SUPPORT BEHIND THE KING OF KONG CONTENDER

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6.2.2009

Brandon Boyer

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Justonemoregame provides this constructed collage to cheer on King of Kong star Steve Wiebe as he attempts to reclaim the Donkey Kong crown live at E3.

You can watch Wiebe’s attempts streaming live at this link, starting in just a few short hours.

ONE SHOT: CECI N’EST PAS UN SPY

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6.2.2009

Tom Armitage

3 Replies

Game-ism comes up with the goods today: a lovely take on what Magritte might have made out of one of TF2’s spray memes.

[FYI, This is Not a Spy – Game-ism]