Lawrence.com

Matt

**Sony**Pros: EA technology demo was interesting (although not exclusive). Excellent pre-show food and bar. Heavenly Sword and Resistance: Fall of Man look to have decent potential.Cons: Long, boring speeches full of hyperbole that didn't even begin to be backed up. Outside of a select few, most every game looked like slightly sharper PS2 games. Two price scheme. $499 version does not have HDMI, wi-fi or flash memory card support. The real PS3's $599 starting price is too much to ask for the casual gamer. The new controller with six degrees of movement was not only unrefined, but an obvious attempt to rain on Nintendo's parade. It didn't work**Nintendo** Pros: Exquisite demonstrations of Wii functionality. Twilight Princess is a launch title fully taking advantage of the Wii controller. Great franchises coming to the DS in Yoshi's Island, Diddy Kong Racing and Starfox. Most confident and prepared of conferences. New motto "Playing = Believing" is a smartly conceived marketing tool. Connect 24 allows developers to update games without the Wii being on.Cons: No Super Smash Bros. No Virtual Console details. No mention of Game Boy Advance games. Missed opportunity to announce the low price point.**Microsoft** Pros: Slick presentation. Bill Gates talked. Gears of War live game demonstration was awe-inspiring. Halo 3 looks to rebuild the mystery of the original juggernaut. Live Anywhere service will seamlessly connect PCs, 360s and Cell phones. Lost Planet. Viva Pinata. Post-show party. Overall, games looked much better than the displayed PS3 games. Wireless wheel. Wireless headset. Camera.Cons: Bill gates talked:too much. There wasn't a consistent "awe" factor that kept the show alive. PC games didn't look as sharp as the 360 games. No prices announced for new accessories.**Final Thoughts** **_No matter what you hear from the shallow nimrods over at G4, Sony completely blew their chance to solidify their dominance over the game market with the PS3. _** Everything was lackluster and boring. I came away wanting to play nothing largely because we were shown nothing but higher resolution titles that otherwise could be pulled off on a PS2 with more video memory. The "motion sensing" controller was a paltry last-second rip-off of Nintendo's Wii and just made the night more embarrassing for them. Microsoft had some interesting things, but Nintendo hit it out of the park. The Wii presentation was convincing and enthralling. And even though we didn't get to hear much about the Virtual Console or Smash Bros., **_I am more excited to play a "crappy" looking tennis game with the Wii controller than I am to play almost any 360/PS3 title boasting "bleeding edge" graphics._**

Dan

**Sony**Pros:Some very promising graphics in terms of facial expression and realism (Tiger Woods especially). Getting rid of the Batarang is a fantastic decision. Metal Gear Solid 4 has now become my most anticipated game of all time.Cons:Dry, stale presenters and information. I'm tired of bar graphs and sales figures. Graphics on most titles weren't nearly what they tried to pass off as real last year. The price will make it out of affordability for tons of families. The controller reeks of "let's rip off Nintendo but make it way worse" decision-making. The statement "We're not interested in gimmicks," followed later by the Eyetoy card game. Wayyyy too much unimpressive Gran Turismo footage. The "around the world" interviews with "Sony fans" was absolutely painful and embarrassing to watch ("I heard da graphics was ka-razzzy!").**Nintendo**Pros:Genuine enthusiasm and excitement was obvious from Reggie, Shiggy and Iwata. Showed that a true effort is being made to bring gaming to non-gamers. The speaker might have some interesting utilizations. Wii promo videos got me sufficiently hyped. Shiggy opening with the conducting act was great. Reggie proved again why he's one of the best PR guys in the business. Diddy Kong, Yoshi's Island 2 and Starfox DS will certainly be awesome. Zelda keeps looking better and better. Mario Galaxy looks great. The Wii-mote looks to be every bit as responsive as I hoped it would.Cons:No announced release date or price. Iwata was hard to understand.**Microsoft**Pros:Gears of War looks incredible. The graphics on the Halo 3 trailer looked absolutely great. Grand Theft Auto 4 being available on the 360 is a bombshell of an announcement. The new Xbox Live Arcade titles are numerous and of very good quality.Cons:Gates was stale. I don't see the real appeal of XBL on my phone. The Halo 3 trailer showed nothing interesting outside of the impressive visuals. He just stands there and then looks at some crap coming out of the ground. Yay.**Final Thoughts **Wii won. Honestly, that's what the conferences boiled down to. Sony showed us graphs and a lame attempt to include limited motion sensitivity. Microsoft showed a couple games that looked good, but no real surprises. Nintendo, on the other hand, had the entire audience of the Kodak Theatre in the palm of their hand as they showed us videos and demonstrations. **_ I'm especially disappointed with Sony for their weak showing. Granted, I'd spend the whole $600 and more for MGS4 alone, but I highly doubt your average GTA and Madden fan that make up a lot of Sony's user base will do the same. _**Microsoft wasn't terrible, but there weren't any surprises outside of the GTA4 announcement. **_At the end of the two days of conferences, I'm more convinced than ever that the Wii will be the best next-generation system._**

Kevin

**Sony**Pros: Declared release date and price for the PS3. Showed some actual gameplay footage for PS3. Introduced new controller dynamic: "six degrees". Metal Gear Solid 4 trailer.Cons: Declared PS3 price at $499 and $599. $499 version of PS3 lacking significant features present in the $599 version including: no HDMI output, no memory card support, and no Wi-Fi capability. All gameplay shown was completely underwhelming compared to pre-rendered footage shown last year at E3. Still showed pre-rendered trailers and tried to pass it off as gameplay. New controller dynamic seems completely tacked on at the last minute, gimmicky, and stolen from Nintendo. PSP support seems incredibly barren. Ridiculously complex Eye-toy demo shown. Gran Turismo HD.**Nintendo**Pros: Showed actual gameplay using the Wii-mote. Zelda: Twilight Princess announced as both Gamecube and Wii versions to be released at Wii launch. Announced a new Mario title in Super Mario Galaxy. Wii-mote seems easy-to-use and incredibly intuitive. Brings a completely new way to play videogames to the market. Great Nintendo franchise games announced for Nintendo DS.Cons: No firm date or price announced for the Wii. The name of the console is still the "Wii". No next-gen Gameboy announced. Super Smash Bros. for the Wii was completely absent. Graphics for Wii games didn't match the 360 or PS3 games. No real details given for the virtual console service or how the Nintendo Wi-Fi connection service would work with the Wii.**Microsoft**Pros: Halo 3 officially announced with an amazing trailer. Many gameplay trailers shown with incredible graphics. Numerous Xbox Live Arcade games announced, including Contra and Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3. Grand Theft Auto 4 announced for Xbox 360 to launch alongside PS3 version, with exclusive episodic content on top of it. New Xbox 360 peripherals announced, including a wireless headset, wireless steering wheel, and camera. Cons: HD-DVD drive for 360 announced with no specific date or price. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, The Simpsons, and Sunset Riders still not announced for Xbox Live Arcade. Bill Gates delivered part of the media brief himself.**Final Thoughts** Contrary to what certain "dedicated gaming" television channels might say about them, Sony completely dropped the ball with their press conference. The PS3 they revealed was shown for what it really was, not what Sony hoped it would be. **_The games shown for PS3 were completely underwhelming, especially when compared to the "target-renders" that Sony tried to pass off as "in-game" last year._** I honestly think that Nintendo had the strongest showing of all three companies, and I truly want to get my hands on a Wii (ha ha) this week to see just how incredibly revolutionary the Wii-mote controller really is. I also believe that Microsoft really showed that the Xbox 360 will be able to hold its own against the PS3 in the coming console war and that many of their games coming in the next few months will be completely worth a purchase of the system alone. **_Overall, I'd have to say that Sony handed over all of their momentum to Nintendo and Microsoft, with Nintendo having the most steam going into the actual floor show of E3. _**

Chris

**Sony**Pros: Several new game properties (Resistance: Fall of Man & Heavenly Sword) that show promise. New eye-toy camera game has potential. Price point is lower than many industry analysts had predicted.Cons: Lack of major PSP games to look forward to. Embarrassingly poor looking PS3 titles. Last minute addition of motion sensing technology in the controller wowed no one. Rumble feature removed from the controller. Still too expensive. Gran Turismo HD: what were they thinking?!**Nintendo**Pros: The innovative new controller features explained in detail and in full display. Zelda will launch with the hardware in this year. 27 games playable on show floor. Slew of awesome looking DS titles.Cons: In light of Sony's PS3 Price and Date announcement, Nintendo's silence on the issue was a bit of a surprise. Not much in the way of surprises. Technical difficulties with the Red Steel demonstration. No word on promised Smash Bros. sequel. **Microsoft**Pros: GTA IV secured for a simultaneous launch with the PS3 version. Halo 3 teaser was absolutely fantastic. Xbox Live Anywhere could be impressive down the road. Xbox Camera finally shown with intent to actually begin selling this year. Gears of War, Mass Effect and Too Human looked incredible.Cons: With X360 already on store shelves, MS didn't have as much to show as Sony and Nintendo. Peter Moore revealed another tattoo. No Halo 3 gameplay video. **Final Thoughts**Staged at their own studios lot in Culver City, Sony came into this E3 with the biggest hype to live up to and the most to lose as a result of their own sky high promises. What they showed was less than impressive and at times downright embarrassing. Last minute hardware additions (motion sensing tech in the controller) and previous gen looking tech demos (Gran Turismo HD) are the kinds of things that should have been left behind closed doors... with chains on the door so that no one can get in. The dual hardware launch was a stupid move for Microsoft last fall and it is an absolute shock that Sony has decided to repeat their mistake and is made even worse by the fact that the $500 console will be a waste of money with all the features that have been removed from it. Lastly, if they can't show us anything good in the way of game demonstrations, then they shouldn't show us anything at all.**_Microsoft would have needed something huge to introduce in order to take the attention away from the Nintendo and Sony camps, and that simply did not occur. _** Honestly however, no one expected too much in the way of surprises to come out of Microsoft this year and with that said, they performed just fine. We expected Halo 3 and we got Halo 3. Despite the lack of actual gameplay video, the Halo 3 teaser trailer was the highlight of the presentation. Overall, you can't be too disappointed with Microsoft's showing. Par for the course really. Nintendo however, as of this writing, stole the show. Their presentation wowed the audience with every announcement, video and demonstration. Though we knew what to expect, we did not know how they would pull it off or how it would all work together. Zelda and Mario looked amazing and their new slogan, "Playing is Believing" fits perfectly. **_ When all was said and done we were all left with the firm belief that Nintendo knows exactly what they're doing this time around and it's about damn time. Hands down, this is Nintendo's show to lose._**