Sony and Nintendo Keynote Reviews:

More ‘Buck for your Bang’? Did Nintendo & Sony deliver?

by GrathiusXR

© 2010 Arthur Kotsopoulos

Without further ado I declare Microsoft did not deliver a keynote anywhere near last year’s E3 Keynote (see my review of Microsoft’s 2010 presentation here

Without further ado I declare Microsoft did not deliver a keynote anywhere near last year’s E3 Keynote but Nintendo and Sony did deliver by addressing all their fan’s interests, from the hardcore gamers to the casual gamers, from the handheld gamers to new gamers.

Both keynotes offered a great deal more ‘buck-for-your-bang’ (if you pardon the reversal of the saying) than what Microsoft had to offer and show with their elaborate blockbuster ‘big bang- but little substance’ presentation.

I’ll get started with Nintendo seeing as their keynote was prior to Sony’s and I’ll address the positives and the negatives in a non-fanboy fashion to please everyone because we at OXCGN are open-minded gamers despite using the 360 as our platform of choice. (Thanks Kevin Butler for the inspiration!)

Nintendo Media Briefing:

The Positives:

• Miyamoto opened the show with the debut of The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword and showed off quite a tasty amount of gameplay using the Wii MotionPlus (apart from the wireless interference problems that did seem to plague the demo, the game was looking good for Zelda fans!)

• Reggie unveiled what every XBOX 360 fan has always been wanting on XBLA but now know will never happen: a new Goldeneye 007 title exclusive to the WII with Daniel Craig now the lead character and not Pierce Brosnan. How that all works when Rare (who are firmly in Microsoft’s fold) were the original creators of the game, I have no idea.

• EPIC (see what I did there?) Mickey seems to be looking, well, epic. It’s unique and fresh in terms of gameplay and c’mon the hub worlds when traveling features scenery from the classics- Steamboat Willy anyone?

• Reggie announced another beloved Nintendo mascot coming back to life after so many years of absence: Kirby! I remember Kirby 64 on the N64 great game!
‘Metroid: Other M’, which if previous Metroid games are anything to go buy this will be amazing for the Wii.

A brand new Donkey Kong Country, and I’ll tell you now I am absolutely pumped for this title! Why? It’s the Donkey Kong we all know and love and it actually looked impressive. It didn’t look like a Wii title but instead like a high end XBLA title.

• The new Nintendo 3DS which apparently features 3D you don’t need special glasses to enjoy? This includes 3D photo taking and movie watching and you can adjust the 3D level.

It is about the size of the DSi but has a wide-screen at the top and an analogue stick (oddly only 1 of them and it’s sitting on the same side as the D-pad, like Sony’s PSP, which is just wrong).

It will be able to play other DS games too. Graphics and gameplay capability apparently has been boosted over other DS models.

• Strange, yet intrigued overall.  Some good titles announced for it as well, including old classics games like Starfox 64 and new ones like BloodRayne: the Shroud, Driver Renegade, Puss in Boots, Assassin’s Creed: Lost Legacy, and de Blob 2.

• Nintendo catered for their WHOLE fanbase, from the hardcore and casual Wii titles, to plenty of new titles for the DS as well as the 3DS. No one was left out.
Hot girls + Nintendo 3DS on stage = epic win! This was the end of Nintendo’s keynote and very hard to top!

The Negatives:

• Skyward Sword, whilst a mix between Wind Waker and Twilight Princess, wasn’t impressive to me. It’s a new Zelda- yes, but graphically didn’t pull me in and the gameplay with MotionPlus looked dull and average even before the interference looked unresponsive.

• GoldenEye 007 graphically looked hopeless. I’ve never seen that many jaggies in my life, it really hurt my eyes as it doesn’t do the game any justice. (2IC comment: though it is a reworking of the N64 game and not nearly as primitive-looking as that.  I too would rather have seen it on 360 for the better look it would probably have had and the use of the wireless controller over the Wiimote or wired Nintendo controllers).

• Kirbys Epic Yarn was not was I expecting at all in terms of the gameplay and the graphics. I loved Kirby 64 but this is just not what I wanted and it certainly wouldn’t make me WANT to buy a Wii just for this game.

• Reggie once again blabbed on about the Wii’s success stats they’ve sold this much and have that much of this and that. I don’t care about how much your console has sold Reggie I just want the announcement of new games, existing franchises and new stuff.

• The Nintendo 3DS surpasses the tech of the Nintendo Wii apparently. That’s a bit depressing for the Wii to know that a handheld can do that. Also pretty disappointing for those who JUST bought a DS, DSi, or DSi XL to announce another DS.

• (2IC comment: The only thing I would add here is that there still is that Nintendo reliance on old characters and franchises reworked.  But if it works….)

These are relatively minor negatives that came out of the Nintendo Keynote Briefing. I mean they announced new entries into existing franchises we all knew were coming, announced new titles in franchises we haven’t seen for a long time and didn’t focus much at all on kids games or titles that focused solely on motion controls such as Kinect as at the Microsoft Keynote. It was straight to the point of addressing all their fan’s interest and giving us what we wanted with a few surprises we didn’t know were coming.

“8.5/10

Sony Media Briefing:

The Positives:

• Game Montage!! Kicked off the keynote with an impressive game montage with Kevin Butler poking some cheap jabs at Microsoft’s Kinect.

It was cheap, funny and exactly what I love about the gaming industry, especially with Jack Tretton poking fun at the Kinect/Cirque De Soleil event where MS had everyone wear white ponchos!

• Killzone 3 was shown off and it does 3D as well as use Move motion controls and it looks very impressive seeing as Killzone 2 looked graphically amazing!

• Many titles after Killzone 3 were announced as being 3D capable: Mortal Kombat, Gran Turismo 5, The Sly Collection, Crysis 2 etc…As well as titles already out being updated to take advantage of 3D. Especially with other games using Move + 3D- sounds impressive!

• Playstation Move demo actually impressed me with their Wii-Controller replica. Their demo of the tech sold me more than Microsoft’s demo with all their child games. U.S. pricing and release dates were also announced.  The Harry Potter-like Move game Sorcery demonstration was interesting in a way that the Kinect Star Wars video wasn’t.

• Little Big Planet 2 was shown off as well as the new features of being able to make games within the game which is awesome!

• New titles such as God of War: Ghost of Sparta, Fat Princess, etc. for the PSP shown. Continual support for the PSP is great but they are still missing new information on the Resident Evil title for PSP from last E3.

• Gabe from Valve announces Portal 2 on the PS3?! NOT what anyone was remotely expecting yet guess what? It happened! This is what a keynote needs a major announcement like this and what’s better is that the PS3 version will apparently be superior to the 360.

• Medal of Honor, Dead Space 2, Assassins Creed: Brotherhood & Mafia II will all have exclusive content only for the PS3 whether it may be an exclusive BETA, Collectors Edition or DLC. Exclusives is a big thing this year and Sony is strong in that regard.

• Gran Turismo 5 finally gets a solid release date after continually being pushed back, which is a good thing for long-suffering fans of the franchise looking at something to finally throw in the face of Forza fanboys.

• Sony continually throwing cheap jabs at their competition and main rival Microsoft and Kinect. It was great I mean they’re not afraid to throw the jabs because they believe their tech will be superior. They didn’t over do it which was great and it made me laugh and got me excited and made the keynote much more fun to enjoy.

• Last but not least, possibly one of the worst kept secrets over the past 6 months- David Jaffe announcing a new Twisted Metal game for the PS3. I mean we all knew it was happening yet he kept on denying it.

The Negatives:

• Tretton talking about statistics again: I hate it. Everyone knows every console is doing extremely well and no matter what stats you throw at us they won’t change our mind on what to buy and what to support.

• PSN Plus. Yeah, there are a lot of people who hate XBOX LIVE’s Gold Subscription and love Playstation’s free online gaming, but now that they have introduced a payment service that whilst optional is concerning because PSN users enjoyed free online gaming but now to get extra stuff you have to pay. What struck me as odd is whatever you download only works for the duration of your PSN+ contract… odd indeed, and not in a good way.

• Just a bit to much on multiplatform games. I’m looking forward to Dead Space 2, Medal of Honor and Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood, but this is Sony and Playstation 3. I want to see more exclusives and new stuff not games coming out on other consoles which will virtually be the same.

• Too much talking and not enough gaming. I’m all for hearing about new stuff but Jack just spoke way to0 much and at times lost my interest because of what he was blabbing on about. If he had cut down his speech just a bit I feel the Sony keynote wouldn’t of been as long winded as it was.

• (2IC’s comment: I would add that personally I was hoping for a secret redesign of the Move motion controller which looks like a cross between a portable nightlight of some sort and a fake-looking lightsabre hilt. It does go well with that Sorcery game though...).

• Sony in my opinion this year performed and, if you take the babble out, did everything almost perfectly. They didn’t focus too much on the Move, only giving us a taste of it and had some big bombshells with Portal 2 and Twisted Metal.

Portal 2 came out of left field and is exactly what I look for in a keynote to impress, because that’s what these keynote are for. To show us gamers and journalists exactly what big guns the companies have coming up.

It had everything: the games, the cheap jokes and comedy relief, major announcements and exciting news in regards to 3D and Playstation Move.

Sony for me won the battle of the keynotes this year because they focused on what they knew was going to work with plenty of substance over showmanship. The majority of gamers who aren’t there don’t really care about all that fancy stuff.

“9.5/10

© 2010 Arthur Kotsopoulos

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Filed under: Console gaming, E3 2010, Editorial, Game Industry News, Handhelds, Hardware News, Industry News, Software News & Updates, Wii News Tagged: | 3DS, Donkey Kong Country, E3 2010 news, E3 2010 reports, Epic Mickey, Goldeneye 007, Goldeneye 007 Wii, Gran Turismo 5, Keynote, Killzone 3, Kirby, Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword, Metroid, Microsoft Keynote, Move, Movies, nintendo, Nintendo 3DS, Nintendo Keynote, Portal 2, PSN Plus, Sony, Sony keynote, Sony Move, Sorcery, Twisted Metal, Wii, Wii motion plus