E3

I am very tired. 2 days of E3 and lots to take in, but not half as much as I would like to. They have DDR Supernova in all its arcade glory. They have 2 machines, but thats not enough to satisfy all the DDR fans there. They also have 3 different home versions. All of them are yummy but not terribly different. I have spent much time in Konami's booth. People are there to see Metal Gear Solid 4, but (sorry to say) I couldnt care less. Its all about DDR and Castlevania Portrait of Sorrow. Dont get me wrong, MGS4 looks awesome, but its not my thing. I'll tell you what my "thing" is this year. Its not Playstation 3. The PS3 is quite delicious looking indeed, bt it looks just like the XBOX 360 right now. I played Sonic and it was good. I have seen Warhawk, Virtua Tennis 3, and Gran Turismo and they are very nice. The real show stopper is Nintendo Wii.
Lemme go on a quick rant here about E3. Normally if a company has something impressive to show, they usually show it to the press and/or they create a theater of sorts so you have to line up for as much as 4 hours to view their games. In most cases, the wait is worth it. However how do you know for sure. Tommy and I waited 2 hours to see the PS3 last year but it was mostly tech demos and nothing playable. We avoided the 4 hour Zelda Gamecube line like it was the bubonic plague. We heard it was awsome, but hardly worth that long a wait. Imagine the horror on my face when I noticed more than half of Nintendo's booth was sealed off and you had to wait on a 5 hour line to see Wii. Oh dear lord I was pissed. Thankfully Nintendo reserved a 90 minute block for just Gamestop and EB employees. At 430pm today we went and we saw Wii. There were 27 luscious games and demos for all to PLAY. Yes PLAY. Did i play all of them, not even close. I got a kick out of watching people play the games for me. I did try the tennis and Wario Ware games. Very very cool. Zelda and Mario Galaxy were a sight to behold as well. They also set aside 2 Wii systems for Virtual console demos. That is the feature that impressess me most. Playable games included Super Mario Nes, Super Mario SNES, Mario 64, Sonic 1 for Genesis, and Bonk's Adventure. Being a retro gamer, i am looking forward to this feature (no details about games and price were announced). As a special gift to Gamestop, Nintendo gave us a bag of goodies. I was shocked to discover a full copy of New Super Mario Bros for the Nintendo DS with manual. That was sweet! Saves me $35. The game comes out on Tuesday next week. I have played for 30 min and it is classic Nintendo goodness. I also received an E3 pin and a Wii T-shirt. Thanks Nintendo =)
I went to Gametap's booth and played around wtih the Gametap service for awhile. I must say that I was very impressed with the whole service. I am surprised it hasn't take off more than it has. It is a great idea with great great games. It would be nice to play the games in full screen at full resolution, but otherwise all the games were perfect.
XBOX managed to disappoint me. Their booth was nice and filled with sweet games, but where were all the XBOX live Arcade games? Where was Stret Fighter or Ultimate Mortal Kombat? Nobody at Midway knew. They only had a handful on display, but they promise around 50 my the holidays. Konami had Time Pilot, Contra, frogger, and Stinger(or something). Namco had Pacman and Galaga..maybe more but I didnt see it. I was kinda hoping for a little bit more from the big MS. Lumines = Good times though.
PS2 had some nice games. God of War2 looked great and so did FFXII. I had alot of fun with Mortal Kombat Armageddon. Wow. Good times. PS2 is far from dead, Xbox is dying, and Gamecube is already 6 feet under. Nintendo's booth didnt display one GC or GBA product. I was looking for Final Fantasy 5 or 6 for GBA but it must be hidden well in the Square Enix booth.
Blizzard had a nice showing of their expansion to WOW, the Burning Crusade. Nothing to really say about it, but it continues the goodness of WoW with a new level cap, a new tradeskil, and new race, and more.
I got a pic of Tycho and gabe from Penny Arcade, but I didnt wait on line to see them. I also missed Adam West and Rob Van Dam. I did get an autograph from the guy who play Mario's voice. He's a bit diffenent than expected.
Thats about it for now. E3 opens at 9am and I plan on playing some PS3 and 360 games as well as putting some time into SuperNova. Even the home version looks great.