Category Archives: Xbox E3 Coverage
Aisha Tyler calls out gamer reaction to her at Ubisoft’s E3 press conference
I wrote about this a few days ago and this is another instance of the Internet Gaming Community displaying sexism and the inability to share their favorite past time with those outside of message boards.
Aisha Tyler, known for playing Lana on the seriously funny TV show Archer, has fired back at gamers on the internet who complained about her hosting Ubisoft’s E3 press conference last week.
For the record I thought Aisha did a great job during the presentation and I’d love to see her do it again. The reaction to her on the internet has brought up the ugly tendency of people to dismiss celebrities and women as “non-gamers”.
Tyler had this to say:
“I’ve played since I was a little kid. Since I begged my dad to buy me a Nintendo LCD Donkey Kong, Jr. Since I blew through three weeks’ allowance playing Defender at the laundromat. Since you were a twinge in the left side of your daddy’s underoos.
I was a voice in not one, but two major video game titles. I hosted the [Halo] Reach Beta tutorial. I was a Gears of War superfan panelist at ComicCon. I hosted the Ubisoft presser at E3 2012.
I didn’t do any of it for the money. For most I got paid next to nothing, and for some, less than that. I did it because I love video games.
To the GAF dicks, Gamespot trolls, to every illiterate racist douchebag on Youtube: flame away. Go nuts. Post every jackass comment your heart desires. I’ll still be playing when your mom’s kicked you out of her basement and you have to sell your old-ass console and get a real job. For now, I say to you respectfully, and I mean this from the bottom of my heart, GFYS.”
I can’t support Aisha Tyler enough in this discussion.
Sacrilegium coming to Wii U as well as 360/PS3/PC
Reality Pump, better known for developing Two Worlds, will be bringing a new survival horror game called Sacrilegium to consoles and PC next year. Previously the game had been announced for 360, PS3 and PC but now we know it’s also heading to the Wii U.
Check out the full press release below.
Sonic All-Stars Racing Transformed footage
Sonic All-Stars Racing Transformed will be shipping later this year on 3DS, Vita, PS3, Xbox 360 and Wii U. Check out this in depth hands on with the game from E3.
Gears of War: Judgment has new smart spawn system
Gears of War: Judgment is going to a more difficult game than past entries in the series. This will be due to Epic’s new S3 system, otherwise known as the smart spawn system.
Epic details S3 this way:
“S3 constantly monitors your performance, from simple stuff like accuracy and your skills, but also like your location in the combat zone. The other thing it can do is run multiple scenarios: you play through a section of the game, from checkpoint-to-checkpoint, and you die at the very end of it. So then you think to yourself, ‘Okay, I know how to fix that; I got this.’ ”
“You replay and suddenly it’s a completely new scenario – new enemies and you have to adapt one more time. Another example would be you choose a higher difficulty level to replay a section and then you encounter an enemy type that you have not encountered before. We kept it in reserves for a higher difficulty level. The big point about S3 is to make sure that you are challenged. We think that the word kind of disappeared from the vocabulary a little and games now actually paint the path for you on the floor, where to go next.”
Sounds like the game is going to be a pain in the ass, but in a good way.
Gears of War: Judgment is expected to ship on Xbox 360 in Spring 2013.
Epic reveals Unreal Engine 4
Epic has finally revealed more details about Unreal Engine 4 to the public.
Epic’s head honcho Mike Capps told Spike TV that they have a couple of next generation games in development right now using Unreal Engine 4. One of them is said to be aimed at the PC.
The most impressive thing about the footage you will see in the video below? It’s running on a PC using one graphics card. The Nvidia GeoForce GTX 680 graphics card powers this technical display.
Now that is a good amount better than current consoles but I don’t think it represents the leap most people thought it would be. I don’t believe that is a bad thing but I know many are sure to be disappointed.
The biggest change in UE4 is it allows better lighting via real-time dynamic global illumination. That was a mouthful.
Capps explains this new lighting method.
“Without [real-time dynamic global illumination] all you see is a circle on the floor where the spotlight hits. With it, you see the pillars on the side and a subtle illumination on the ceiling beyond. One of the tiles is green so there’s a little bit of green bounce to the wall behind it because of that. A major part of the global illumination is that we’re not only hitting things, but we’re inheriting them as we bounce and cast on to the surrounding environment.”
He also makes a small Xbox 360 comparison: “Maybe as a tech demo you could have done it on an Xbox 360 with nothing else going on, but now we have a full engine that has AI, navigation and all that stuff plus full, real-time dynamic global illumination.”
I think everything we’re being shown looks very pretty. And I understand all the small details will be what impresses everyone but I don’t think we’re going to see a leap like we did between the PS2 and PS3 when next generation consoles hit.
Angry Birds HD coming to video game consoles
Activision will be publishing Angry Birds on home consoles and the likely title of the game will be Angry Birds HD. No consoles are confirmed yet but since it’s being called “HD” I’d wager that it will be motion controlled and for download.
An Activision spokesperson said, “We’ll have some news for you in about two weeks,” and followed up with, “Wait until you see Angry Birds on consoles in HD.”
My best guess is Angry Birds HD for download (and probably will cost more than it does on phones) for Kinect on Xbox 360, PS Move on PSN and possibly Nintendo’s next home console, the Wii U.
It’s funny that as more and more people claim cheap games like Angry Birds will destroy traditional console gaming we see the IP branching out to consoles. You can bet they would love to be able to sell you Angry Birds for $20 or $30 more if they could.
Xbox 360 has “a lot more than two years” left says Microsoft
Microsoft studios big wig Phil Spencer has told GameSpot exactly how much life he thinks the Xbox 360 has in it.
He says that the current state of the 360 is “healthy” and that they are committed to it as their home console for the long term.
He goes on to say the Xbox 360 has “a lot more than two years [left].”
I wonder how this impacts the next generation Xbox console. Before E3 I would’ve said it will come out in late 2013 but after seeing the line up of games in 2013 for 360 I can’t see a new console before Christmas 2014.
