I’m not at E3. I read about it on blogs like a normal person. While I am doing so the only thing I really care about is the trailers. So I’m going to paste all the major trailers together into one post and say things about them. Because I care.
First up: The Sims 3.
Yeah. I still don’t get it.
And here are two Halo Wars videos, one a kind of pre-rendered mood-piece, one actual gameplay:
I find myself strangely unmoved by these. I love Halo. And the last RTS Bungie was connected with, Myth, is probably, literally, my all-time favorite game, ever. Or at least the one into which I have poured the most hours. But this? I just feel like I’m watching somebody play Halo…from really far away. In terms of gameplay balance, it’s just not clear to me that the units were conceived for strategic richness, rather than for close-up first-person combat. But I’ve been wrong before. In fact I almost always am.
Finally, Final Fantasy XIII. Coming to Xbox 360. Truly, these are the end times.
Wow, that’s beautiful. I mean, heart-stopping. I never, ever want to play that game. But it’s really pretty.
And two more random E3 reactions:
I’m disappointed to see XBox Live going avatar-based. It’s hard not to see this as Microsoft sheathing their ‘blades’ and trying to play catch-up with Sony’s still-vaporous Home service. But Microsoft had it right before! Nobody wants avatars! For a service like this, 2D and text-based are what you want in an interface. You fools.
Also, there’s some insane dealyo whereby you’re going to be able to watch any NetFlix movie on your 360. This may turn out to be the buried lede of the whole shooting match. Bill Gates has now successfully smuggled a Microsoft movie- and music-playing, photo-displaying device into your living room and attached it to your TV on one end and the Internet on the other. The trap is sprung. God help us all.
