News > Liveblogging the Sony Press Conference
July 11, 2007
Yet another one! In a few minutes the Sony Press Conference will be kicking off and I'll be there to give you the news and a healthy dose of smack-talk, so stay tuned. Times are, once again, PDT. Add 3 if you're east coast. Let's hope this thing is a little more eventful than the Nintendo conference. I managed to restrain my endless impatience and rage and everybody made it out unharmed, but if I have to go through another set of random videos featuring news segments and snippets of interviews with website owners flying all over the place like somebody's copy of Adobe Premiere video editing software vomited all over the place, I may not make it.
That being said, what can we expect here? I'm hoping for info about the possible PSP redesign, and maybe something addressing Sony's online strategy a bit more, like info on Home.
11:40 - Things getting off to a slow start... This is the day the internet stood still.
11:45 - Lalalaaaa. Waiting for something to happen. Phil Harrison, give me a sign!
11:52 - This is going slower than Half-Life 2 on an NES.
11:54 - Woo, it's moving. Star Wars Battlefront for the PSP.
11:57 - Phil Harrison coming out to talk about the Playstation Network. He's talking some exec-speak, what makes the Network stand out so much... too bad it isn't really as good as XBLA. Let's see the new titles for it.
11:59 - A new puzzle game: Echo Chrome - a game promising "the least graphics and the most gameplay of any title at E3." Wow, It's awesome. It's like playing inside an MC Escher painting! A wooden man walking around simple geometric landscapes that allow him to traverse the map by rotating the perspective and making impossible configurations! I can't wait to play this!
12:01 - Wipeout HD, Pain, Warhawk, and the new Socom game. All with online play. Wipeout HD looks cool. It's Wipeout, basically, but sharper. Pain is a sort of rag-doll physics game, just launching characters into traffic and things. Warhawk appears to be bringing the player to every level of the war now, on foot and in land-based vehicles. Socom is still Socom, lots of urban environments it appears, this time around. Full online play, just like before, on the PSP.
12:05 - Ahhh, it begins. Playstation Home. On track for the Fall release. Wow, running on a cellphone... You can run the community features, such as chat, but not the full-3d aspects. Harrison is taking a pic of everybody.
12:07 - Harrison in Home looks like playing Hitman. All he needs is a barcode on the back of his neck. Same stuff as before, you can get your own home, customize things and make purchases for different items online, such as clothes. This is sort of like a graphically better Second Life, but with less customization ability and fewer furries.
12:09 - Singstar will have downloadable songs and allow you to use the Eyetoy to record videos of your singing to post online in Home. The pic from Harrison's cellphone is on the wall in his house now in Home. Cool, now he's taking a pic within game and it's outputting to a social networking site. This is cool, this is something that should've been happening for awhile. Everything is integrating.
12:12 - Awesome, you can launch any PS3 game within Home and your friends can join in, straight from your room in your place in Home to the game. They're playing Motorstorm online. Haha, never let Harrison drive...
12:14 - Interesting. The eventual goal will be for developers to make their own personal lounges for players to assemble to jump into various games.
12:15 - Jack Tretton: "first goal is to broaden the PS3 installed base." For REAL. The new 80GB PS3 model, with Motorstorm, will be $599.
12:16 - The price drop.
12:17 - Still trying to justify Blu-Ray's inclusion in the PS3. Tretton is talking about the Blockbuster deal, where Blockbuster only decided to carry Blu-Ray, and not HD DVD. Apparently, there will be 120 new Blu-Ray games for the PS3.
12:19 - NCSoft, the MMO publisher, is going to be bringing games exclusively to the PS3. That's a pretty big deal. Some new MMOs on the Playstation Network.
12:20 - A bunch of 3rd-party titles for the PS3, exclusive. Haze. Futuristic-looking soldier bad-assery. This is what I like. Things blowing up, vehicles you can drive, and machine-gunning things from helicopters! PS3 exclusive, from Ubisoft.
12:24 - The Unreal 3 engine being ported to the PS3, for use in many games. Unreal Tournament 3 from Epic will be exclusive to the PS3 for this year. Interesting, will allow mods from the PC version to be used on the PS3 version.
12:25 - UT3 is looking GREAT. November 2007.
12:26 - Showing some other upcoming games now: Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare footage. Modern as in NOT World War 2. The radio chatter sounds awesome. Ahhh, Assassin's Creed. Some laid-back techno kicked in, and Altair is running across buildings in front of a setting sun and kicking ass in slow motion, that was cool. Kane & Lynch: Dead Men... and RE5! Burnout Paradise, racing, crashing, you know the drill. Madden NFL 08. I wonder if that will have online play. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. I wonder if THAT will have online play. Haha, duels would kick ass, or a sort of magical GTA set in Hogwarts, where you could take quests from your faction... Haha, and kill Dumbledore. The Simpsons Game. Interesting... Guitar Hero 3: Legends of Rock. Medal of Honor: Airborne. The guy's parachuting in, looks cool enough. Rock Band, some multiplay Guitar Hero action, I really want to give this one a play.
12:32 - Ooh, a big 3rd-Party exclusive... what could this be? MGS4. Looks like the rumors turned out to be false! No MGS4 on 360, at least initially.
12:33 - Hideo Kojima is out on stage, talking.
12:34 - This will be the last MGS in the series! This is the end of Snake's story :( However, all of the plotlines will be completed. I'm guessing we'll meet the Patriots.
12:35 - Nice, a new trailer, running entirely in-game. Ahhh, the Colonel's voice, good to hear it again. Snake is sounding more gruff than usual. He's being sent to kill Liquid! Ocelot's been taken over completely via Liquid's arm. Meryl is looking a lot sharper. Genome shoulders are dieing to FoxDie en masse. Ah, and the Metal Gear robots, they look freaking awesome. Snake is fighting his way through the thrashing crowd, his black armor is looking amazing. Raiden is fighting somebody else, an unarmored ninja type guy, throwing blades all over the place. And he's immortal, apparently. They appear to be having a breakdancing battle. Damn, they're doing some amazing stuff with their weapons. And Raiden just did the stab himself in the gut attack to hit the guy... This is the game I'm looking forward to more than anything else. And all in realtime.
12:43 - A playable MGS4 demo next week, but only in Tokyo.
12:44 - Nope, I spoke too soon. Harrison is back with Home, and he's dressed as a furry. His character in Home is in the Ratchet suit from Ratchet and Clank. They're playing a trailer of Ratchet and Clank: Future. It looks pretty decent, some skitching gameplay down a pipe a la Sonic.
12:46 - A video preview of Folklore. I like this a lot. Things look dark, the music is sufficiently spooky, and there's a lot of soul-wrestling going on, something I'm always in favor of.
12:47 - Heavenly Sword. Nice, a girl with a god-sword on a quest for revenge. That's a good premise. Massive battles and the main character leaping from falling rock to falling rock, Final Fantasy: Advent Children-style.
12:49 - NBA 08, in full 1080p, and weekly content updates from real stats and events in the NBA. Also, the ability to make custom characters and play with them online against others.
12:50 - Little Big Planet. Still looks unique and beautiful, but they're going more into the creation aspect. Players can make things and then share them over the Playstation Network. They're talking as if the world itself will expand with player creations... that could be interesting.
12:52 - Uncharted: Drake's Fortune, from Naughty Dog. A sort of Indiana Jones archeology action-adventure. Lots of combat and gunplay, interspersed with some jumping and block manipulating.
12:54 - Interesting, a sandbox game where you play as a character with powers, giving you the ability to be either a superhero or supervillain. It's Infamous, by Sucker Punch. A superhero game that looks gritty and realistic, not shiny and simplistic. The guy is flipping cars and things around. I'm into that.
12:56 - Gran Turismo 5: Prologue. It has full online play and it looks pretty good. I have to admit, the Sony Press Conference is kicking the Nintendo Press Conference's ass so far. Will the PS3 finally get into gear this year? I would sacrifice a child for MGS4 right now.
12:58 - Wait, what's this... Killzone 2! Is it going to be the ONE picture from before? Well, so far it's the new trailer again. It looks good, they said it's real-time, but what happened to the events from the first trailer? Ah... this is like candy for me. Apocalyptic cityscapes, lightning everywhere, futuristic armor and weapons, and guys with glowy eyes that you have to wipe out as you progress from cover to cover. This is much more extended than the trailer that was available before. Damn, there's a guy giving a speech in the background, this is powerful. Everything is turbulent and insane. Somebody put this game in my hands right now.
12:04 - Tretton is back out, wrapping things up.
Well, the PS3 got off to a pretty tough start, but this press conference hit all the right buttons, at least with me. MGS4 looks ridiculously epic. Killzone 2 might actually live up to that trailer from 2005, and a lot of other new events. Some of the features from the Playstation Network are seeming pretty appealing, especially the ability to play mods from the PC on your PS# with Unreal Tournament 3. There were a couple big exclusives as well, but whether this is enough to make the PS3 the console to own is not yet totally clear. Also, Phil Harrison is TALL. Like, Goliath-level tall. I'd love to see him and Reggie Fils-Aime in a fight. Anyway, this is your faithful GW associate editor, signing out.
*Brian Schulman - Associate Editor, GameWad.com
