Re: E3 2013

Man, what a week.  E3 had an energy this year that's just been missing; I'm legitimately excited.  There's an electricity in the air from the new consoles and the flood of titles accompanying them.  Here's my run down:

Ubisoft knows how to put on a show - they mostly stuck to videos and actually had a level of zest in their presentations, instead of the usual lie about a live demo being played by person-holding-a-controller on stage (they pulled this trick with The Crew, but I'm still psyched about that one; it's like all the best parts of the Need For Speed franchise turned up to eleven).  They had a lot to show, and gave us just enough of a sample to make us want more.  Now that's how you build hype!

SquareEnix has revived Kingdom Hearts 3 - remember how this was a thing last console cycle?  Final Fantasy vs XIII has become FFXV instead, and it looks shiny - even fun!  Of course, there's also Thief, which we'll see how that goes when it comes out (I'm cautiously optimistic about that one, for I desperately want it to be excellent).

I skipped EA, but I'm happy Mirror's Edge 2 is happening.  I missed the first one, but always had interest.  From what I heard, it wasn't far from the mark.

Nintendo had its share of bad news. It seems delays are the norm, which is not good for the old guard.  The Wii U might pick up steam come October, but it's certainly a dark horse in this race.  However, I have faith.  They have a habit of pulling tricks out of their sleeves in the form of mushrooms and rupees.  The biggest surprise was certainly Mega Man coming to Smash Bros, which makes me stupid excited.  Sorry Jigglypuff, you've been replaced!

Then we hit the Sony power house.  Their exclusive line-up was strong enough to hold the system up, but then they announced that the PS4 is sticking to the way we've done things for years.  You own the disc, can trade and lend it how you want.  This is one of the few announcements about technology staying the same that will earn rousing applause and cheers, and was quite possibly the most smug moment of human history.  When they released the price at $100 less than the Xbox One, you could feel Microsoft double-over.  That's a huge difference.  There's also the ability to self publish on the PS4 (!!!), which is incredible for indies.

Then we hit Microsoft. They're trying to do what Steam does, but their implementation is comparatively sloppy and isn't supported by the current internet infrastructure in the US.  They need to change the daily check in, hands down.  Titanfall is their best exclusive offering, since Halo only showed a teaser (why does he need a cloak, anyway?).  Killer Instinct is now covered in stigma, and they lost most of my interest because of that scene, which is a shame because I still have - and love - my copy of Killer Cuts (the OST that came with the awesome black SNES cartridge).

I had considered, and even tried, writing an entire post on the whole "Just let it happen" issue, but there are a plethora of articles on the subject - better written ones.  However, it is worth a paragraph or two, since all the articles muddle the issue with the speaker, recipient, and what they were doing.

The problem is this, and this alone:  One person says to another, "Just let it happen" for a laugh.  It's not that a man said it to a woman, that they said this at E3, or that it occurred while the woman was getting trounced at a violent video game.  What matters is that one person used language related to rape (Google "Just let it happen meme" for proof - the first result is "rape sloth"), as a joke.  That is the problem in its entirety.  It is not okay to make a joke out of rape, no matter if you are on stage at a public event, playing an online game, or hanging out with your close friends behind closed doors.  It's not okay, and that's that.

 As for Microsoft's responses:
*She wasn't offended.  So? It's still a rape joke.
*We apologize.  This seems insincere, particularly because they passed the buck by saying that wasn't scripted.
*That wasn't scripted.  I call BS.  E3 is too big to leave any part unrehearsed, especially after their reveal fell flat.  Maybe it wasn't written in the script technically, but you can safely bet they rehearsed that bit.  You can hear it in their voices.  Their speech sounds incredibly unnatural, and not due to stage fright - that sounds warbly, like the person is shaken.  Their delivery was just too flat to be off-the-cuff.

All in all, Microsoft has done a fine job convincing me not to get their console.  Some of their system sounds neat, but too much is just not ready (or out of their control) for me to be comfortable with it.

Aside from that rough start, E3 was great this year.  I'd even say inspiring.  Forcing myself to take a week off from development obligations has gotten me pretty itchy to get back into it, so I expect I'll get back on the horse soon.

See you next week.