Highlights from Nintendo's conference

Year after year, Nintendo looks to surprise everyone at E3 with new and surprising technology or simply make everyone go crazy about a new Mario or Zelda game. Was 2008 any different?

To kick off the conference, Nintendo showed off a demo of Shaun White Snowboarding with none other than the man himself: Shaun White. Not only will the game use both Wiimote and Nunchuk controller, but will fully use the Balance Board included with Wii Fit.

Also Iwata briefly mentionned that both Mario and Zelda teams were hard at work to create a new adventure for each character. Of course, no other information was made available at this point.

To the delight of all, Animal Crossing for Wii has now been officialized. Sporting the sub title City Folk, we'll be able to make new friends and decorate our house in an urban environnement.

Nintendo also introduced 2 new accessories: WiiSpeak and WiiMotion. The first new item will actually be a microphone that will allow everyone in the room to speak into. The second new accessory called WiiMotion will allow gamers to move around in 3D simply by connecting an adapter onto the WiiMote. Along with this new gadget, Wii Sports Resort has been announced and will be the first game to fully utilize this new technology. Both of those will come as a bundle in Spring 2009.

On the portable side of things, Nintendo came out of nowhere by announcing Grand Theft Auto Chinatown Wars for the Nintendo DS. This game will take place in Liberty City and include all the free roaming goodness from previous GTA games. And for the younger audience, Pokemons are back! On November 10th, Pokemon Rangers Shadow of Almia will be made available through retailers. Also, if you enjoyed Guitar Hero On Tour, you'll be happy to know that Nintendo and Activision proudly announced a sequel: Guitar Hero On Tour Decades.

Nintendo will also throw their hat into the virtual musical ring. After annoucing Wii Music a few years back and basically never giving new info, Miyamoto and friends came back strong this year by showing off a demo in which Mario's Father performed on stage. The game will include roughly 50 instruments including drums, piano, saxophone, violin, etc...but unlike any other musical games, instead of requesting timing, you'll simply have to mimic the gestures of, let's say a drummer or pianist and voilà! You'll also be able to play with four of your friends.

We hope you enjoy these little highlights on various conferences. Don't forget that Sony and Microsoft's highlights are still available below this one.

Highlights from Sony's conference

After Microsoft took the gaming world by surprise with the announcement that Final Fantasy XIII will see the light of day on the Xbox360, gamers and media around the world wondered what kind of "knockout" announcement Sony could have up their sleeves. Was anything up to par?

They kicked off the conference with a new Resistance 2 trailer that showcased a new level in the game: Twins Fall, Idaho.

Sony also proudly announced the first PS3 games to have the honor of being Greatest Hits: Resistance, Motorstorm, Warhawk, Call of Duty 3, Fight Night, Need for Speed Carbon, Rainbow Six Vegas, Assassin's Creed, The Elder Scrolls IV Oblivion and Ninja Gaiden Sigma. These games will be soon available for a MSRP of 29.99$.

Not only has Sony showed their focus for PS3 Software in 2008, they will not leave the PS2 behind. With an approximate of 130 games coming out for the previous generation, it shows that the PS2 is still going strong. Titles coming out in 2008 include Yakuza 2, Mercenaries 2, Singstar Pop Vol. 2, EA Sports brand, etc...And to celebrate the arrival of Lego Batman on PS2, Sony will make a limited edition PS2 dedicated to the lego shaped Cape Crusader.

One of the most appreciated surprise was the confirmation of a sequel to Ratchet and Clank Future Tools of Destruction. Sub titled Quest for Booty, Ratchet and Clank are coming back to the PS3 only this time in digital format. That's right, the game will only be made available through the PSN at an affordable price of 14.99$ (US) later this year.

And speaking of Insomniac's famous duo, Sony is releasing a new PSP bundle with a silver colored console, Ratchet and Clank Size Matters, National Treasures 2 UMD Movie, a 1 Gig memory stick and a promotional voucher to download the game Echochrome through the PSN. And among the new games announced for PSP, Insomniac's latest franchise is making it's debut on Sony's portable machine: Resistance Retribution should see the light of day in Spring of 2009.

Sony also introduce their "Life with Playstation" philosophy by including options to have access to weather and news through your Playstation 3 following an update which will be made available at the end of the month. And for American gamers, following Sony's press conference, movies were available for download on the PSN. However, a date for the Canadian PSN as yet to be announced.

And to conclude the conference, Sony made official 2 titles: God Of War III and M.A.G. Massive Action Game. We learned of GOW3's official existence through a teaser trailer:



And M.A.G. Massive Action Game promises 256 online players and a squad based combat. However no official release date or timeframe has been revealed.

Highlights of the Microsoft conference

Welcome to this highlight reel of the Microsoft conference that took place on July 14th 2008 during E3 2008. We'll briefly touch on the major annoucements that occured.

First off, Final Fantasy XIII is coming to the Xbox360. This has been an on and off rumor for some time, but has been officialize. This could be seen as a huge blow to Sony since Final Fantasy has always been an important series to the Playstation consoles. It will be coming out at the same time in Europe and North America. Which can lead us to believe it will a stay a PS3 exclusive over in Japan. Square Enix mentionned that once the PS3 version is complete and heads off to Localization (translation of the game), Squenix will begin the developpement for the 360 version.

Also during the conference, Microsoft announced their own karaoke game: Lips. Not much has been divulged. We do know that we'll be able to transfer songs into the game and used them. Which should be interesting and allow longer longevity of the game. This project is actually helmed by the creator of Elite Beat Agents (DS): Keiichi Yano.

We were also treated to official dates of 2 of the most anticipated games: Gears of War 2 will arrive on the shelves on November 7 2008 with a new multiplayer mode called Horde. And on the other hand, a final date has been released for Resident Evil 5: March 13th 2009. And for the first time ever in the series, the game will include a full online co-op mode.

Great news for Fable fans! Peter Molyneux announced that the game is done. However, the anticipated sequel will only land in store on October 2008.

And here are a few tidbits that were announced: Microsoft confirmed the presence of "Avatars". Mii-look-a-likes that will be fully intergrated into certain games like XBLA's upcoming 1 vs 100 or the sequel to Scene It titled Scene It Box Office Smash. In "Rare" news, with upcoming hype for Banjo Kazooie 3, the original will find it's way to Xbox Live Arcade sometime this year. And for the rock fans, Metallica's upcoming album will be available as downloadable content for Guitar Hero III and it's sequel; Guitar Hero World Tour. And in the other corner, Harmonix released it's full setlist for the timed-exclusive Rock Band 2. What's interesting is that they claim that most of the songs of Rock Band will be transferable into RB2.....how you ask? Well only Harmonix knows for now.....

So that's all for now. We hope you appreciated this little highlight reel of Microsoft. We'll do the same for Nintendo and Sony's conference as soon as possible. As usual, feedbacks are welcome!

The Blue Bomber is officially back!

Here is the first official trailer of Mega Man 9. The first true sequel in the Mega Man series since Mega Man 8 was released in 1997. He's back in true 8Bit form! It's a sure way to get in touch with our nostalgic fan deep down. And also, after a few weeks of back and forth, it seems that MM9 will see the light of day on the Playstation Store, Xbox Live Marketplace and WiiWare. A release date is scheduled around Fall 2008 in Japan with a North American "download" date to follow shortly after.

Persona 4

To all RPG fans. It is now official! The newest chapter in the Shin Megami Tensei series is now officially North America bound. Indeed, Persona 4 will see a release date of December 9th 2008. Atlus promises a longer quest than Persona 3 with at least 60+ hours of gameplay. With a quickly approaching release date in Japan (July 10th), the game has already earned Famitsu magazine's Gold Award with a score of 33 out of 40. Much like SMT Persona 3, a soundtrack will be included with the game on purchase. However, be sure to place your pre-orders soon since Atlus' games are quick to become a collector's item!