Fine, Let's Talk About E3 Press Events

So how about those press conferences yesterday, huh? Seems as though Microsoft brought a bunch of games and Sony came packing with Everything Everyone Wanted to Hear Ever. I've always thought that Jack Tretton was a class act, to be honest, but I can't shake the image out of my head that he was watching the Microsoft press event yesterday, checklist in hand, chuckling to himself how much he can make the XBONE look like it was made by crowds of dickheads. In fact, I'm surprised that, in his glee last evening, he didn't let the term slip out. That would have made for a bonafide E3 surprise.

Outside of that, though, I've never heard so many people SO PSYCHED to pay $400 for anything in my entire life. Still, the PlayStation 4 looks to begin with an impressive good will lead over the XBONE. This is swell. I keep telling myself, though, that the PS3 staggered punch drunk off of the assembly line looking like the most expensive unnecessary hobbyist machinery this side of the 3DO and it, somehow, clawed it's way back to being competitive. Microsoft has just shown how dumb they are at this E3, but that doesn't mean that they can't wise up sooner rather than later. For now, a PS4 is in my future and a XBONE still looks like an expensive cable box. A year from now, who knows?

In other news, Square Enix is consistently cagey, but Final Fantasy Versus XIII is now (to the surprise of nobody) Final Fantasy XV. Sony has proven that some people can learn from their mistakes, but E3 hasn't been clear this year if that record can go two-for-two. Since no release date has been posted for the next "officially" numbered entry in the series, I'm not holding my breath. After all, VXIII has only been in development for close to ten years.

Image also from Kotaku, mostly because I was just reading the article about 5 minutes ago

Wait, E3 is Today?

Today, the E3 mothership will descend upon the west coast mecca of clean living we call LA. Potentially, this is the most interesting one in many years, too. Why is that? Hey, there are two new consoles coming out in the next few months (we hope), so we are guaranteed at least a handful of game announcements, and game announcements are fun. Most of them we see coming a mile off; everyone knows that the Xbox One and PS4 will have a Call of Duty and Assassin's Creed game this year. But the potential for there to be surprises during press conferences compared to the last several years of samey stuff is pretty high because of the new machines, so that should make it worth it to at least follow Sony and Microsoft's press events all the way through.

That's not what I'm getting at, though. This year's E3 has an odd feeling of foreboding importance. It has something to prove as an event now that we're seven years removed from the last round of new hardware, and the industry is a completely different place. Mobile and PC gaming has a much stronger foothold now than anyone thought they would back then, and I have a feeling that if the trade show doesn't make a serious splash this year (and, by extension, the new consoles when they come out) then we'll probably see it limp toward an inevitable, unceremonious death sooner rather than later. The last two or three years of the show have been a little on the rough side already, and many games media folks were wondering about its continued relevancy going forward. I'm one of them. I suppose I'd miss it if it didn't exist, but the survival-of-the-fittest nature of technology isn't as sentimental as I am.

After a weekend away, the continued adventures of Tomb Dater will return. Your homework today is to check out USGamer when it finally launches (the new home for games writing hepcats like Jeremy Parish and Frank Cifaldi EDIT: Nope, Cifaldi doesn't work there, sadly), as well as to lose your cool anonymously on message boards when Microsoft, Nintendo and Sony do things that you don't like at the LA Convention Center.