E3 2011 Message Board older than one year ago

The Giant Bomb crew keeps its eyes out for incoming surprises as we near the close of the show.

We received a hands-on tour with the latest products from Power A today. You'll hear about those soon enough, but there is one peripheral that will not wait. Lurking in the shadows, its LED lights illuminating the night, was the official Batman: Arkham City batarang controller.

Power A's John Moore was sure to let me know that these were not the final models, adding that the LEDs will be much brighter and more uniform in the final build. That said, even these hand-tooled builds have some pretty neat features. Check it out after the break.

According to CVG, Activision CEO wandered by the E3 booth of Battlefield 3, the regicidal threat to his company's own Call of Duty franchise, for a friendly look at the competition. He was denied. More »

The largest issue with reporting on what Skyrim is like is I’ve only watched someone else play it. While that’s the norm for the vast majority of what’s shown behind closed doors at E3, in this particular case – a vast, elaborate game with an enormous non-linear world, watching someone else play it is a bit like being on one of those kid’s cars at a themepark. There’s a steering wheel on the front, but it’s going to stick to the track. Short of heckingly, “GO LEFT, NOT RIGHT!” in front of an impromptu theatre of journalists (Bethesda always have the most elaborate booths), we were along for a prescribed ride. But a damned fine looking one.

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Remedy is known for Alan Wake and Max Payne, but the studio also recently helped produce Death Rally for iOS, a game that has been very successful for the studio. Remedy Managing Director Matias Myllyrinne told us during E3 that the game recouped its development costs in three days on the App Store and took a mere eight months to develop.

"A lot of the credit goes to Mountain Sheep for developing a great fun game. We produced it, took it forward and helped - but the heavy lifting is with the dev team as always," Myllyrinne said.

We asked if the success of Death Rally has shifted the studio's priorities. "I think in terms of priorities, Remedy will continue to do what we do best. We love our big movie-like story driven action games - but it is also about applying these strengths in new ways too. There are awesome things happening with digital stuff like XBLA, Steam, iPhones etc. Where you can build a killer value and fun at a low price point and still make money."

No comment on Alan Wake's Night Springs.

This was an interesting one. We were shown the most extraordinary demo of the game, that was pretty much unrepresentative of how the final game will play. Because showing a man creeping along a dank tunnel, scared out of his life, with one bullet and little hope, isn’t going to thrill the men in ties, or the excitable kiddies. But I was solemnly promised that the game is emphatically honouring the atmosphere and style of the original, while improving in every respect.

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The Entertainment Software Association (ESA) announced today that E3 2011 welcomed 46,800 attendees and will return June 5-7, 2012, to the Los Angeles Convention Center.

Despite rumors that there is a possibility E3 could leave LA, sources close to the subject tell Joystiq that the LACC venue is locked for at least the next several years and even moving the show would require a venue that very few cities can provide. Officially, the ESA estimated that E3 2011 contributed more than $25 million in revenue to the city of Los Angeles.

#watchthis Another Olympics, another Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games. This time, it's the 2012 London Olympics. More »

How would you like to play Left 4 Dead, only instead of killing zombies you’re killing a building robbing a building? Do you think that’s something you’d enjoy?

That’s what download-only multiplayer FPS PayDay: The Heist is going to offer. This game’s name surfaced about a week back, but now we have a debut trailer and footage of some people playing the game at E3. It’s all after the jump.(more…)

Last year, developer Denki was forced to cut staff when it couldn't find a publisher for Quarrel, an XBLA word game that combines anagram-searching with very light Risk-style territory battles. But over a year later, the developer finally did find the right partner for Quarrel, one who "values good games," as a frustrated Denki blog post put it last year: Ignition.

It was the XBLA version of Quarrel that Ignition showed off in its E3 booth, but Ignition's Shane Bettenhausen explained that the word game will actually launch on iOS first this summer, followed by console versions later in the year.

Quarrel pits two players against one another as they attempt to capture each discrete chunk of territory on a map. To do so, players must challenge the opponent to, essentially, a word jumble. Eight letters appear on screen, and the number of those letters that can be used is determined by the number of soldiers in the particular group you're controlling. So, for example, if a regiment of four soldiers attacks a territory manned by six, the attacking player can only make up to four-letter words, and the defender can make six-letter words. Each letter has a point value, like Scrabble, and the player with the highest score wins.

Proving its implied commitment to value -- "good games" -- Denki added some interesting educational extras. At the end of every match, the best possible word, one that uses all eight letters, is presented on screen, and even defined. When it comes to games that increase our word power, there'll be no contention from us.

Of all the things I wasn't expecting at this year's E3, Driver: San Francisco's multiplayer turning out to be the "have you tried that yet?" game is definitely in the top three. The genius "shift" system brings a whole new dimension to driving games and delivers the "still in the race" feel whether you're a veteran of the genre or dabble in it from time to time.

I played the multiplayer "Tag" mode, essentially it's "keep away" as the "it" driver puts the pedal to the metal in San Francisco traffic as the other players try to smash into him and start the cycle of tag all over again. What the shift system does is allow player who are far away from the target (or who just want a new vehicle) to disembody themselves from the car and instantly snap to an aerial view and plop into a car closer to the target. The best example I can think of is the highway scene in Matrix: Reloaded where the Smiths and The Twins keep taking over other drivers.

Shifting allows you to always feel like you're still a contender as the "it" person gains point. The strategies available also elevate what is a simple game of "keep away" into something you can see playing and laughing about with friends for hours. You don't have to be into driving games to enjoy this type of mode.

Bioware have released the six minute intro cinematic that’ll be featured in Star Wars: The Old Republic. Critics (alright, me) are describing the video as “long”, and “a bit like it was written using a flow chart of scenes from previous Star Wars cinematics”.

Ah, look at me being negative in the face of lightsabers and smugglers and a pseudo-R2D2 in a budget Millenium Falcon piloted by a pretend Han Solo. But some of you lot have got to feel the same way, right? In giving gamers environments, characters and attiudes that we recognise, these games make the universe seem thinner and more boring than it really is.(more…)

Few things in the game industry make me happier than over-the-top dedication to a random classic franchise. Another thing that makes me happy: Magical Drop games. So when I rolled up to Ignition Entertainment and saw a new Magical Drop game, I was pleased. And then I played it, and that "pleased" status was upgraded to "delighted."

Magical Drop, for the uninitiated, is a color-matching puzzle game series by Data East in which players grab gems from the top of the screen, and then shoot them into different locations to match three or more. All the while, more gems come in from the top and drop the whole arrangement toward the bottom of the screen. Of course, there are several selectable characters (named after tarot cards), and different patterns of blocks can be sent to the opponent's side in multiplayer matches.

We seem to be doing this backwards. On Monday we kicked off E3 week with an action-packed in-engine trailer for Mass Effect 3 featuring such bravado-soaked one-liners as “We need a plan to stop them!” “WE FIGHT OR WE DIE. THAT’S THE PLAN.” Captain Shepherd that’s a terrible plan and you are a bad captain.

Anyway, today we’ve got a live action trailer showing various humans acting all shocked at the imminent invasion of Earth. You know, the same invasion that’ll form the backdrop of Mass Effect 3. You can watch it after the jump.(more…)

A grimacing man who appears to be partly made of stone, faces off with a portly, glowing-eyed man in the desert. "YOU DON'T BELONG HEEEEEERE," the large gentleman (Wyzen) exclaims, launching into a fistfight with his more muscular interloper (Asura). In the ensuing scuffle, Wyzen ends up thrown off a cliff, then rises up, 100 times his previous size. He explains that he got this power from Asura's daughter.

"WHAT HAVE YOU DONE WITH HER," Asura asks before catching one of the missiles thrown by Wyzen (did I mention Wyzen was shooting missiles?) and throwing it back. Firing projectiles of his own and reflecting Wyzen's back, Asura prevails again.

And then Wyzen grows to the size of the planet and attempts to smush Asura with his index finger. Asura pushes back against the glacial finger, and then peppers it with punches, eventually launching Wyzen into space.

For the next thrilling episode of this Asura's Wrath preview, hit the break.

This could well be the single weirdest E3 announcement. 1980s action-movie “star” Sybil Danning is making a “cloud-based” action shooter. It’s called Ruger, and will be loosely based on the 1989 movie L.A. Bounty. The baffling press release states: “While it is still early in the development cycle, Ruger will be a highly stylized, almost comic book styled shooter. The story, written by Sybil is being held close to the vest but watching LA Bounty is sure to shed at least some light to what it’s all about. There is definitely room in the faux-retro market for more names than Tarrantino and Rodriguez, and Sybil Danning certainly has the pedigree to be credible. Incredibly the game and a Ruger film are being developed simultaneously.”

They’re right, that is incredible.

Carrier Command is being remade by Bohemia Interactive. I know! I’ve even been playing it, and I’ll be putting up a hands-on preview, as well as interview with BIS boss Marek Spanel, on Monday. In the meantime you can take a look at the trailer they’ve released for the E3 reveal of the game. It’s an all-new engine, not the Arma 2 engine, as we’d previously thought, and it’s really not much like BIS’ other games. Intriguing indeed! More on that next week.(more…)

#e32011 With the major press conferences done and dusted, E3's second day (well, third) let us get on with what we came here to do: kick some ass and play some games. More »

If Saints Row 1 was a GTA “tribute”, and Saints Row 2 was Volition discovering how the wanted to approach the genre for themselves, then Saints Row: The Third is the complete rejection of anything that originally influenced it. It is the most anarchic, vile, hilarious and puerile approach anyone has taken to a sandbox game. It’s the silliest and foulest game of E3. It’s the one I’ve enjoyed seeing the most.

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Ace dev team ACE Team have released a new trailer for their boulder-rolling history-of-art puzzle game, Rock Of Ages, and it shows the ball in action, doing funnies. Previously we saw power ups which embue your happy rolling rock with temporary powers, such as being tough, or being on fire, and there’s some of these here, too. If only life had temporary power ups beyond “mild stimulant drink” and “illegal nose treat”. I want to absorb a glowy thing and be able to double-jump.

The game should arrive this summer.(more…)

We'd gotten in the habit of letting the ongoing Sherlock Holmes game series fall into our proverbial blindspots, perhaps because of the lackluster production values or PC-centric game design. That said, we got a sneak peek at the sixth game in the series, The Testament of Sherlock Holmes, and we may have to revise our policy of ignoring any and all residents of 221B Baker Street.

Developer Frogwares have seriously upped the budget for this 360, PS3 and PC release, providing a big bump in graphical fidelity, as you can see for yourself after the break. With a new hint system and a more controller-friendly interface, it's also the first Sherlock game made specifically with console gamers in mind.

Also, Sherlock Holmes dies in it. It's right in the trailer. Go figure.

Old baldygrumps is back, and we’ve finally seen him slinking about the place. The level we saw of Hitman Absolution may have been a bit gloomy, but where it captured attention was with the atmosphere it generated.

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And they thought DmC: Devil May Cry was gonna change just because Dante got a haircut -- and a dye job when the devil trigger goes off. SHAME ON THEM!

Blimey, here’s a surprise. Dusting off our podcasting tools, John and special guest Dan Griliopoulos gather in a noisy restaurant to discuss what they’ve seen at E3 so far. Not only do you get to hear about Skyrim, Battlefield 3, Tomb Raider, Hitman, Deus Ex, Serious Sam 3, Payday, Torchlight 2, Saints Row: The Third, DUST 514, Dead Island, Batman: Arkham City, and many more, but also find out what they order, and then hear how long it takes to arrive! Hear the conversations of the neighbouring tables. Hear when Dan drops a knife on the dictaphone. Never hear anything else again.

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#e32011 Easy question, Kotaku readers! With the big press conferences and the little press conferences all wound up, we've seen every game there is to see at this year's Electronic Entertainment Expo. Begging the question: what's your GOTS? More »

#stillalive You can never take vague executive statements to the bank, especially during E3, but what EA Games' Frank Gibeau said earlier today about Mirror's Edge is at least cause for cautious optimism. More »

#lookatthis @V_Jump [Twitpic] More »

#mystery They're making a portable Silent Hill game for Sony's Vita (you know...Sony's next handheld... the PSP2, the NGP). And it's a multiplayer game. More »

#itsnotavideogame There are many games at E3. But only one of them is the non-video-game Ninja. More »