I know I keep saying I want to reboot this blog, and I know I keep putting it off. But I am consistant with my E3 reviews, so I'm going to give another E3 Preview and make some predictions along the way. While I loving watching E3 every year, I have to say this year there is slightly less thrill. What makes that so shocking is that this year 2 new consoles are being introduced this year. I can't say I'm too pleased with the next generation systems. They either seem to be copying a system, or some kind of gimmick, with nothing original. But enough about that. Let's look at the 3 next generation systems as they will be the headliners for each each hardware company's press conference. Let's go in order of console annoucement.
Nintendo WiiU: The Nintendo WiiU was the first on the scene, announced on E3 2011 and released in 2012. It finally got up to 1080p graphics. It finally had a controller with buttons that a hardcore gamer would appreciate. It finally had a bigger hard drive. It finally had 3rd party developers supporting it. It finally had online capabilities. Finally, it seemed like it caught up to its rivals the XBox360 and PS3. But the question would be, "Would it fall behind when Microsoft and Sony caught up?" I don't think it has. Nintendo has put a touchscreen on its controller, and Microsoft and Sony followed with their own touchscreen/touchpad. Nintendo tied Microsoft and Sony with graphics, but neither Microsoft nor Sony really advanced their systems any further. The big advantage Nintedo gave itself was giving the WiiU backwards compability with Wii games. There is none for the GameCube games, but Nintendo made up with that by promising Game Cube games on the Virtual Console. Speaking of Viritual Console, all the Wiiware games and Virtual Consoles can be transferred from Wii to WiiU. Speaking of transferring, your data can be transferred from Wii to WiiU. Both backward compatibility and data transfer are unique to to the WiiU, and it could be what sets the WiiU apart...and above. The games will help set up the WiiU to be the number one system. The top 5 games will be the Super Smash Bros for the WiiU, Mario Kart for the WiiU, the new Super Mario Bros. game, the new Pikmin game, and the Legend of Zelda reboots. These might seem like a cheesy tatic, a ploy to reel in the Nintendo fanboys, but it will work. It will keep Nintendo alive for another year, and it might even put Nintendo up top for 2013.
Sony PlayStation 4: The PlayStation 4 was announced in February 2013, although many people suspected it coming even sooner than that. Naturally, it was named the Play Station 4, or PS4, because it was the fourth line after the PS1, PS2 and PS3. With a lack of a creative, original name comes lack of a creative, original hardware. The PlayStation 4 controller has a touchpad in the middle of its controller, like the WiiU has touchscreen. The PS4 will be getting a smartphone app, just like Microsoft has Smart Glass for its XBox. The new Play Station interface looks much like the XBox 360 dashboard. Its new graphics are only slightly better than the last system. So far nothing original. The PlayStation 4 has no backwards compatability with any PS1, PS2 or PS3, but Play Station is trying to fix the problem with backwards compatibility by putting its old games library on the PlayStation Network to download. This will hopefully solves future backward compatability problems, as when a new system comes out, the downloaded games will simply transfer. If there is any backwards compatability (I use that term loosely), it's the motion controls. The Move controllers used on the PS3 will work on the PS4. So there's no need for PlayStation fans to buy new motion controllers for their motion control gaming. The PS4 has solved a lot of problems that the PS3 had. Blu-Ray might have given amazing graphics, but it was always slow to load. Not only has Sony given the PlayStation 4 a faster Blu-Ray player, it allows for the game to load. While the PlayStation 4 has its faults in comparison to other gaming systems of this generation, it has greatly improved to truly indeed be the best PlayStation so far. How's Sony going to convice its fans of this? It has to focus on the games unique to the PlayStation 4. Unlike Nintendo, Sony doesn't have to rely on its all its old franchises like SlyCooper or God of War, but it does have to focus on other unique games and makes these games look so good that it will look worth buying a PS4 for these games alone. Such games are Infamous: Second Son, Killzone: Shadow Fall and Driveclub. Watch for the PlayStation 4 press conference to focus on those games.
Microsoft XBox One: Microsoft was the last to step on the stage, introducing the XBox One on May 21, 2013, as a teaser to E3. It's odd to think that Microsoft named their 3rd XBox "One," but they did so to make it their all-in-ONE entertainment system. Surely Microsoft still seems jealous that Nintendo can reach use a broad range of people, so Microsoft focuses on a broad range of people to use their system. Already, just like Nintendo, XBox incorporates smart phones and tablets for a touch screen, like the WiiU's game pad already built in. Microsoft was pretty impressed on how the WiiU has TV controls built into the WiiU, so Microsoft decided to up that by putting TV into the XBox, allowing to stream through the XBox. You can even control the TV with your voice. Like the Wii has motion sensing, XBox One has kept the Kinect. This Kinect sensor is truly a 2.0 update. Whereas the first Kinect sensor could only read 2 bodies at one, the new Kinect sensor can read up to 6 people. The second Kinect sensor can also read people better close up and far away. The camera is so good, it can see players in the dark. The camera is so good, it can detect heart rate. XBox One is banking on the Kinect... almost too much. The XBox is banking on Kinect so much that the Kinect sensor is required for the system to work. This upset a lot of XBox fans, who prefer using the controller over Kinect. XBox flaunts its online capabilities with XBox Live, which probably the most popular online gaming server. It allows players to record their gameplay and share it on social media websites. Once again, XBox One might be depending on their online aspect too much. The XBox One is required to be online at least once a day for the system to work properly. If anyone does not have internet access, this might be a problem for them. But the biggest problem that XBox One has created for itself is no backwards compatability for XBox or XBox360 games. They don't even have plans to upload these old games onto the Live Arcade, like PlayStation is doing. The best they are doing is making some of their first XBox One games their last XBox360 games to give the XBox360 a final farewell. While the hardware features are pretty cool, as a gamer, there's nothing that makes me want to buy this. To buy this, I feel the XBox One will turn my plain old TV into a smart TV, but that's about it. To get me to buy this system, XBox One is going to give me games I want to buy. I expect XBox can do this with Forza Motorsport 5, Quantam Break and Ryse. Look out for those games.
Let the 8th round of console wars begin! :)
