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E3 Draws Close, Companies Reveal Games Ahead Of Time

Posted by simoniker on from the nothing-left-for-the-show dept.

Thanks to Planet GameCube for reprinting data revealing the amount and diversity of games to be shown at next week's E3 Expo in Los Angeles. It's noted: "Approximately 1,000 of the nearly 5,000 computer and video game products to be displayed at the 2004 Electronic Entertainment Expo... have never been seen before... survey results indicate that about 40% of products displayed will be for video game consoles, while about one-third will be for personal computers." Many companies are revealing titles before E3, though, with some highlights including most of Sega's line-up (including "SPIKEOUT: Battle Street... and Virtua Quest"), a list of 23 new EA titles, including new Timesplitters 3 details and a first look at Catwoman, THQ's new info on Destroy All Humans!, Rockstar's announcement of Midnight Club 3:DUB Edition, Activision's showing of X-Men Legends, and UbiSoft's announcement of Prince Of Persia 2.

18 of 55 comments (clear)

  1. I Almost RTFAd by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    Well, I was going to read the article, but I stopped when I got to this line:

    100% of the people that click this news link will read the survey

    Maybe that shows something about my personality ;)

  2. Vivendi Mystery Game by Spiffae · · Score: 2, Interesting

    This is from Vivendi Universal Games' list. (after Half-Life 2, Men Of Valor, Blizzard's titles, etc.

    Unnamed secret title, behind closed doors only, a FPS that can be described as "The Matrix meets The Ring" and developed by Monolith.
    (Got that from Voodoo Extreme)

    What the hell does that mean? Is the Matrix crossed with the Ring even a good thing?

  3. Units by bluesnowmonkey · · Score: 5, Funny

    Over the past decade, E3Expo has hosted exhibitors in a total of more than 4.5 million square feet of floor space, approximately 520 times the length of the Golden Gate Bridge.

    Um, did that author just compare feet to square feet?

    1. Re:Units by NeuroKoan · · Score: 3, Interesting

      It boggles the mind.

      Well, the Golden Gate bridge is 8,981 across (counting the approaches, and I think the author was) and 90 feet wide for a grand total of 808,290 square feet.

      So, E3 Expo has had roughly 5.57 Golden Gate Bridges filled with tech booths in the past decade.

      Impressive! (but not quite as much as 520 times)

      --

      "However," replied the universe, "The fact has not created in me A sense of obligation."
  4. Re:E3 Passes by linzeal · · Score: 2, Funny
    Might just be cheaper to buy a nice dress, tape your dick back, and learn to walk in high heels. Might be fun too!

    --
    An Education is the Font of All Liberty
  5. Market saturation.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

    1,000 of the nearly 5,000 computer and video game products

    5,000 video games. Five thousand. Assuming that this is an entire year's supply of games, this means that 14 games a *day* will be coming out over the next year. Does anyone else think that this might be a stupid number? (and odds are that less than 50% of the coming year's games are going to be showing at E3).

    I might buy six games a year. 6/5000 = 0.12 percent. I like games, but how the hell is *anyone* supposed to keep up with this market?

    1. Re:Market saturation.. by NiceGeek · · Score: 2, Insightful

      May not be all that unreasonable. Note the use of the word "products" perhaps not all the 5K are actual games but game controllers...etc. Also consider that this probably includes all the games for the PC,Mac,PS2,GC,GBA and Xbox.

    2. Re:Market saturation.. by DarkZero · · Score: 2, Insightful

      5,000 video games. Five thousand. Assuming that this is an entire year's supply of games, this means that 14 games a *day* will be coming out over the next year. Does anyone else think that this might be a stupid number? (and odds are that less than 50% of the coming year's games are going to be showing at E3).

      I might buy six games a year. 6/5000 = 0.12 percent. I like games, but how the hell is *anyone* supposed to keep up with this market?

      Even if it really was 5,000 games, which, as an Anonymous Coward pointed out, is not correct, it still wouldn't be a ridiculous number. E3 generally covers more than one year of games (Full Spectrum Warrior and Fable, at least, are from E3 2003) and this year will cover at least eight major platforms: PS2, GameCube, XBox, GBA, PSP, PC, and cell phones.

      Obviously, no single gamer is meant to play all of those games, or even a small percentage of those games, in a year or two. Instead, they're aimed at a very broad range of gamers. Kids that only play E-rated GameCube and GBA games, teens who only play crime and FPS games, RPG gamers who are going to support various small niche companies (Atlus, Nihon Falcom, etc.), businessmen who play games on their cellphone when they're bored, PC gamers eagerly awaiting Doom 3 and Half-Life 2, etc.

      When we think of gaming, we generally don't take into account things like cell phone games, crappy licensed GBA games, obscure niche titles like The King of Fighters or Ys VI, or just genres that we're not very interested in. But E3 takes all of that into account.

  6. E3 will rock this year by incubusnb · · Score: 3, Interesting
    i'm hoping to hear more from Rockstar about about GTA: San Andreas and NARC, specifically screenshots and Videos, i'm also really interested in seeing if we can Finally get a confirmed car list for GT4(nobody post that list thats been passed around for the past 6 months, its not real, its just a Wishlist), maybe even some news about Ferarri and Lambourgini's Licenses.

    other than that, i'm hoping for a Fallout 3 Announcement, news about Jade Empire, Fable, KOTOR2, and maybe a few more Details about FFXII.

    i just hope this isn't just the year of Sequels and remakes, i'd like to see some good Honest Original Material, Jade Empire and Fable sound like a good start but i really hope some more devs start jumping into the unknown more this year.

    oh, and there better be a Gran Turismo for the PSP, that would make me a Garanteed PSP Customer

    --
    /. is overrun by bed-wetting elitist nerds
    let it be known, for anything other than servers, a *nix OS sucks
  7. I prefer the classics... by cyro · · Score: 2, Insightful

    A good game for me has to be easy to learn and difficult to master. You can just pick up the classics and start having fun right away instead of reading a freaking 40 page manual first!

    Not that all newer games are bad (Halo, Far Cry rocked) but the classics will always hold a special place in my heart!

    -CyRo

    http://www.nwcge.org

    1. Re:I prefer the classics... by incubusnb · · Score: 2, Interesting
      name one game that has a Manual that you actually have to read... or even look at nowadays. most manuals have the buttons and maybe a short back-story thats usually explained in the game intro anyways.

      as a matter of fact, The Classics are the ones with textbook manuals (namely 688 Attack Sub, F117, Civilization, etc.)

      --
      /. is overrun by bed-wetting elitist nerds
      let it be known, for anything other than servers, a *nix OS sucks
  8. Re:E3 Passes by incubusnb · · Score: 2, Interesting
    there are exceptions, but its Rare. Ziff-Davis usually bring along about a 1/2 dozen Contest winners every year and alot of other news Companies do the same.

    but seriously, whats to stop me from spending 10 minutes registering a domain name and putting a short blurb on it about how its a gaming news site, and then register for E3 as Part of the Media?

    --
    /. is overrun by bed-wetting elitist nerds
    let it be known, for anything other than servers, a *nix OS sucks
  9. Re:E3 Passes by gasaraki · · Score: 3, Funny

    Tried telling the bouncer you're Carmack's physician and there's a medical emergency going on RIGHT NOW in the mens' lavatory?

  10. Re:E3 Passes by MMaestro · · Score: 4, Insightful
    The problem with getting into E3 is you have to either be in the media or be in the gaming industry itself (in which case your company would probably send you anyway).

    -rant- Alllll the news you get will pretty much be focused on 'the big names'. You won't have any Mike Medium's Game Review Webpage reports of E3. You won't have adventureous gamers who spend the whole weekend looking at the indie games and shunning games like MGS3, Doom 3, HL2, and Halo 2. The end result is a lotta money being wasted on flashy events news sites won't report on. A public which has to read/search 4 different sources to find all the screenshots released on a certain game. And a hardcore community is left sitting on the sidelines groaning over the fact that they still can't go. -endrant-

  11. Re:E3 Passes by linzeal · · Score: 2, Funny
    After going to enough tech expos I have seen that any female journalist can skank her way into any situation her little cold heart desires that an uber geek may have trouble gaining privy to. Most people on the floor are male geeks like us, tempt some bush and a little caveman makes a fire in our loins that all of creation would be hard put to quench.

    --
    An Education is the Font of All Liberty
  12. Prince of Persia *two*? by Teddy+Beartuzzi · · Score: 2, Informative

    Sands of Time was already POP 3. They going back in time now?

  13. Guild Wars - E3 for everyone! by feidaykin · · Score: 2, Informative

    Over at the Guild Wars website you'll be able to download a pre-alpha build of the game on Wednesday, May 12! E3 for everyone, yay!

    --

    "To confine our attention to terrestrial matters would be to limit the human spirit." -Stephen Hawking

    1. Re:Guild Wars - E3 for everyone! by C0rinthian · · Score: 2, Insightful

      You can download it now and register a beta account. I run the game every couple of days to get any streaming content thats new. I suggest others do the same, so that way you're not fighting for bandwidth just to get to the login screen come May 12th.

      It will be interesting to see if the servers can survive the thousands of players this early on. Supposedly, there have already been well over 10,000 copies of the client downloaded off Fileplanet. Add in copies distributed to friends, and copies from PC Gamer, theres going to be a LOT of people trying this out.