E3 day three: It's over!

E3 2008 has come and gone and it's finally time to say goodbye to one of the most memorable shows in recent history. The specific nature of the show this year may be questionable, however, as there was so much wrong that it begs the question of whether or not the show will even return next year.

In E3's past, there would typically be a sign with the dates for the next E3—last year there was no such sign, and this year had a sign, but no dates, leaving the door wide open for wild speculation and discussion on whether E3 is still relevant to the industry.


E3 2008 registration was late this year. It was only in May that invitations went out and it gave less than two months for outlets, and presumably companies, to prepare. This turnaround was very apparent in the show this year, as even though the best parts of last year were retained, it was still very much a headache trying to figure out which companies were where, and which room you had to be in for your appointments. Companies like Ubisoft had more than one meeting area which made it difficult to accurately attend the correct meetings on time.

The show floor itself was an interesting evolution of last year's Barker Hangar, but it seemed like it was in an even smaller venue (the concourse as opposed to an entire hall, typical of past E3s), which made finding the exhibitors even more difficult than last year.

I didn't mention this in my first day's article, but the idea of E3 returning to the Los Angeles Convention Center was intriguing, as numerous exhibitors and attendees I spoke with expected a slight return to form, but we saw none of it this year. There were no banners or signage at all signifying E3, other than that when you actually get inside the Convention Center. If you were driving by the LACC, you wouldn't know that two other exhibitions were taking place at the same time as E3 this week.

Gone were sponsored staircases, the E3 Daily magazine, and the atmosphere that E3 was, you know, actually happening. I get the feeling that the companies that did choose to attend were almost deliberately trying to destroy E3 once and for all. There was very little effort from a lot of the companies, and the ones who did put a little something extra into their meeting rooms were unfortunately under-appreciated by the majority of attendees.

I'm inclined to agree that E3 is starting to lose its relevance. Last year all eyes were focused on what the event would be like, and after all the problems and complaints, I half-expected this year to be leaps and bounds better than what we got in 2007. What happened instead was a half-assed attempt, largely by both the exhibitors and the ESA itself, and it very much reflected that sentiment in the press conferences that occurred before the show even began. I'm curious as to what Leipzig and TGS will hold in store for us in the coming months.

With that said, I was able to check out a few of the third party Wii games and amongst all the titles, I found a few diamonds in the rough.


Ubisoft had the third installment of Raving Rabbids available for us to play in their booth, and I don't think I have to tell you that this game is every bit as awesome as the first two incarnations in the series. Rayman was absent in the E3 build, but we were told that he would be making some appearances within the game.


The story is that the Rabbids have taken over TV and have seven days of programming that you run through, playing each "show" that you come across, and there will be 50+ mini-games in the final product.

Raving Rabbids: TV Party allows for eight players to play (using four Wii Remotes), and a large portion of the games will also make use of the Wii Balance Board. The humor and charm of the Rabbids return in such a way that you don't feel bad for torturing those little devils to the point that any other animal representation would appear to be cruel.


MySims: Kingdom is the latest in the Sims series from EA, with massive upgrades in gameplay over the original title. The game is much more fun to play because of them.

All the core mechanics of the game are there, you're still collecting essences (you get more at once though, thankfully), and you're still building things for people, but there is an added story layer applied to the game. The kingdom is a "kingdom" in the sense of Disney's "Magical Kingdom", where there are different islands that are in different themes. EA demoed two islands, a futuristic one and a western-themed one.

Each island has different essences and returning characters (albeit in new roles) from the first game. The art style remains constant (one of my personal favorites about the series), and from what I saw the story definitely adds a new dimension to the game, making it worth playing due to some very real and achievable goals.

MySims: Kingdom is a nice upgrade over the original, and hopefully when it lands in stores this fall, there will be plenty of more surprises and additions to the MySims experience.


It's not third party, but I did get a chance to check out the latest incarnation of the Animal Crossing series. While nothing much has changed here, there are some noticeable upgrades in the visuals (the screen shots do not do the game justice at all). The textures and models are much cleaner, and things just seem to have slightly more polish over any of the game's predecessors.


Nintendo was demoing the game on the show floor with the microphone attachment seemingly missing (as mentioned yesterday, Charles was running around in-game with you voicing as Mario or other characters). I understand why there was no microphone on the show floor as it was still very loud, but the point was definitely gotten across while listening to Charles chat as the Nintendo representative typed away on the USB keyboard plugged into the Wii.

I didn't get a chance to ask about censorship or possible problems with custom text chat, but I imagine there will be some extremely strong filters in the game when it ships.

The game plays largely like any Animal Crossing. This time though, there is the titular city that serves as a central hub for the animals that would typically come visit your town on certain days—but seemingly nothing more. There is also a "theatre" where you can catch a comedy show (they never showed us this, so I can only assume it wasn't ready for E3), but here's hoping K.K. Slider makes a return appearance in some capacity.


This was the first E3 that I attended without any other N-Sider staff members; usually we have a team of at least three or four people get together for the show and it helps our coverage immensely. When we were planning E3 (on such short notice, thanks ESA...), my fellow staff members were somehow clairvoyant about how this year's show was going to turn out, and opted not to attend.

I can't express how disappointing this show actually ended up being, and if not for the fact that I ran into old friends (and new), E3 2008 would have been a massive waste of money and time on my part.

People are beginning to look towards Lepzig as the replacement for E3, but rumblings from EA, Ubisoft, and even the ESA have indicated that E3 (if it survives) may return to form next year, still not as big, but at least have some of that spectacle that makes E3 be the magical event it has ceased to be over these past two years.

Perhaps one of the most chilling and out-of-place moments at this year's show was the Microsoft press conference being held in the West Hall, which was typically where the show floor was in previous years. There was an element of surrealism to the whole debacle, and considering that was the first true event of E3 2008, it kicked it off on the wrong foot.


There were a handful of non-Nintendo games that I got to check out, namely Rock Band 2 and Fallout 3, and these two games were definitely highlights of the show for me, as they are some of my most anticipated games in the coming months. Being able to rock out on the Ion Drum set for Rock Band 2 has solidified my reasoning for budgeting 299 bucks this fall just for some insanely awesome pieces of plastic and rubber.

Little Big Planet was also a nice treat to finally play—ever since it was first shown I've wanted to get my hands on it, and being able to play two levels before the show was out more than made up for some of the other disappointments. All in all, E3 2008 was pretty terrible, but just like Nintendo's press conference, there were some needles in the haystack.

I hope that the ESA reverses some of its changes of the past two years, and I'm really looking forward to hearing more about how the once again "new" E3 will play out. No one seems to know when the show may happen next year, but a return to May would be a welcome announcement, as July certainly is too late in the year to make any significant announcements.

That's it for my time here at E3 2008, and as underwhelming as the show itself was, I've still walked away with some really great memories and the chance to play a few of my most anticipated games of the season. I was hoping there would be more games for me to look forward to that I hadn't known about before coming to Los Angeles, but hey, there's always a bad E3 in every generation... it just turns out that this was it.