Sony’s big price-drop announcement was leaked a few days before E3, but Sony still had some aces up its sleeve. Sony executives Jack Tretton, Phil Harrison, and Kaz Hirai layed all of the cards on the table at Sony’s E3 press conference Wednesday afternoon. Here are some highlights from the show:
Haze –
Sure it’s another futuristic first-person shooter, but when it comes to shooting bad guys, creating explosions, and driving heavily armed vehicles through combat zones at breakneck speeds, there’s always room for one more. The twist here is that Haze will apparently only be appearing on the PlayStation 3 this year, which means that PS3 owners will get the first crack at this new shooter from Ubisoft. Of course, there was no word about Haze coming to other consoles later on…
Unreal Tournament 3 –
From the recent smash hit Gears of War to the Unreal franchise, nobody knows shooters quite like Epic Games. Until now Epic has developed games primarily for Windows and more recently, the Xbox 360. The company has apparently been getting to know the PlayStation 3 though, and as a result it looks like Sony’s console will be the exclusive home to Unreal Tournament 3…at least for this year. The game will no doubt eventually show up on other platforms, but it’s going to be on PlayStation 3 first. The game looks slick, and with Epic behind it you know it’s going to be good.
Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots –
Hideo Kojima showed up at the Sony press conference to confirm that Metal Gear Solid 4 will indeed be a PlayStation 3 exclusive, despite recent rumors that the game would also show up on the Xbox 360. Kojima also said that this will be the last Metal Gear Solid game, and his last game as a developer. That news made the following trailer somewhat bittersweet, because the in-game footage looks fantastic. Knowing that this will be the end of Solid Snake’s storied series makes this game easily the most anticipated game for the PlayStation 3 right now. You can watch the trailer for yourself and infer what you will about the twisting plotlines and intense exchanges, or just watch it and be impressed by the graphics. It’s up to you.
At E3 2005 Sony showed a breathtaking trailer for Killzone 2 that set the gaming world on fire with rumors of pre-rendered footage and all kinds of other visual trickery. Now, more than two years later, we finally get to take another look at Killzone 2 with a lengthy, in-game demo. The game appears to be a fairly standard, futuristic shooter with team-based combat tactics, the ability to take cover, destructible and interactive environments, and lots of big guns and explosives. On top of that, the game looks absolutely amazing. The level of detail in the environments is beyond anything you’ve seen on the PlayStation 3 thus far, and the lighting, animations, and special effects all look top-notch as well. Do yourself a favor and watch the trailer for this game, and then go ahead watch it again and again. You have plenty of time, because this game won’t be coming out for quite awhile yet.
