Published July 15, 2008
If there's one thing I took home from the Electronic Arts press conference at E3 2008, it's that I wish I could play Xbox 360® games on a 25-foot tall screen with The Orpheum Theater's sound system. It's a testament to how "next-gen" today's graphics are that the games looked as amazing as they did projected on such a huge screen.
New Heights
That was especially evident during the demo of Mirror's Edge, the upcoming game from DICE. As the character jumped between skyscraper rooftops in this first-person action/adventure game, I was literally gripping the arm of my seat up in the Orpheum's mezzanine. The city in this game is stunning in its realism (and it's nice and bright and clean, too, a welcome change from the gray desolation in more apocalyptic games).
Games like Left 4 Dead blew away the audience.
I thought climbing the Agency Tower in Crackdown™ was vertigo-inducing, but that game had cartoonish, cel-shaded graphics. With the realism in Mirror's Edge, this game might be a tool to help people combat acrophobia.
You're a courier in a futuristic world where communications are highly monitored—likely why you're jumping around skyscraper rooftops instead of using Fed Ex. The gameplay features a lot of platform jumping, with some hand-to-hand combat as well (you can also pick up dropped guns and just shoot enemies, but there's actually an achievement for winning the game without firing a gun). You can slow time for the big jumps or to elaborate combat moves, slide under obstacles to make a quick escape, and even perform moves like jumping onto a helicopter's landing gear as you attempt to solve the game's puzzles.
Scary Stuff
On the much darker side of the scale, we got a new look at Dead Space, a creepy sci-fi shooter that looks to have captured the tension you felt the first time you watched the movie Aliens. Isaac, the hero, has run across a dark, drifting ship, where the crew is all quite dead—but there are definite signs of life. Scary alien attacks ensue.
Explore a derelict spaceship teeming with vicious aliens.
The game is frighteningly immersive, with no onscreen text or other distractions as you explore the decimated ship. Even when you do pop up your inventory, it appears as a projected HUD that the character views. As EA's Glen Schofield fought back a huge, carapaced alien that kept on coming even after his rear limbs had been blasted away, he told the audience that the core gameplay is "strategic dismemberment." This unabashedly MA15+ rated game will be in stores late 2008.
Zombies on the Loose
Also in the scary vein was Valve's Left 4 Dead, a co-op, first-person zombie horror game. Gabe Newell demoed the game, which pushes Valve's Source engine to new levels. He said the goal was to combine the narrative from the Half-Life series with the social features of CounterStrike and Team Fortress 2. Perhaps the most interesting aspect of the game is the "Left 4 Dead Director," A.I. code that makes the game play out differently every time, depending on how your team plays.
Left 4 Dead adapts to your gameplay style and success.
Newell showed a demo where the players were fighting a zombie horde at a gas station. The first time through, the players were beat up, playing poorly, and low on health and ammo, so the Director responded by making the mission fairly easy and sending just a few zombies after them. The second time, the team was well-coordinated, with lots of health, so Director not only sent a more challenging horde of enemies after them, it also delivered a greater payoff when the players won, with huge pyrotechnics as the gas station's tanks exploded. Left 4 Dead will feature Xbox LIVE® play and two-player split-screen, and will ship on November 4.
More from Moore
Our old friend Peter Moore, now heading up EA SPORTS, was on his game as an audience member shouted "Where's your tattoo?" and he responded, "I've run out of arms and legs!" He came on stage with NBA great Bill Walton to demo NBA Live 09. Now, as you'd expect, the game looks even better than previous years, but the most interesting addition for hardcore hoops fans is the new Dynamic DNA feature.
NBA Live 09 updates player data on a daily basis.
Using the same data and analytics that real NBA teams use to analyze their performance, NBA Live 09 will update players on a daily basis during the season. It's more than just stats. The system tracks player tendencies, such as whether they're going to drive to the right, to the left, or take a shot; player DNA, such as how they score and how their gameplay changes as they sync with their team; and team DNA, tracking how the teams play together as a unit. There are some slick features that tie into this, such as Hot Zones individualized for each player, showing where on the court the player is most likely to be successful in taking a shot.
Wrapping Up
EA had plenty of other goodness on display, including a quick teaser from John Carmack for Rage, id Software's upcoming driving-and-shooting game. Be sure to check the E3 Blog over the course of the show for our close-up impressions on these and other EA titles.
Article by Denny Atkin
