games convention 2008
Everybody Do the Leipzig Rush!
11:00AM Adam Barenblat | There were tons of people running to get into Games Convention in Leipzig, no literally, tons of em’. Right as they opened the doors hoards of people stampeded through the halls hoping to be the first to get hands on time with the exhibits. James Bonti, Associate Producer for Activision Blizzard took this video footage and was nearly trampled himself. You can also see Crash Bandicoot leading the pack. For your courage, we salute you! More »
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X-Blades Impressions – Touching Ayumi
5:00AM Mike Fahey | I’ve been following the the game X-Blades ever since it was the Russian hack and slash title Oniblade, and not just for the adorable, barely-dressed anime-girl protagonist Ayumi. I was enthralled by…okay, I’m completely lying here. It was all about Ayumi, with her flowing blonde hair and her long legs that go all the way up to her oversized head. With the amount of information I had, she pretty much was the game as far as I was concerned. Well I finally got my hands on her X-Blades at the Games Convention and Leipzig in order to see if there was any substance behind all that style. Before I got my turn playing the game, the TopWare Interactive rep manning the booth explained to me that X-Blades had added story and RPG elements to the original game, but the hands on time I spent was all about the action. After waiting what seemed like an eternity the guy before me finished playing, cleaned up his area, and left me to my own devices. More »
Resistance 2 Goes Berserk
3:20AM Michael McWhertor | Insomniac Games’ Ryan Schneider walked us through an extremely informative PowerPoint presentation on the developer’s next game Resistance 2 at the Leipzig Games Convention. While we had foreknowledge of the majority of what Mr. Schneider talked about at the Con — 60-person multiplayer, 8-player coop, Resistance 2’s campaign storyline and its focus on bigger, badder battles — he also touched on some of the first-person shooter’s finer details. A deep-dive, if we’re going for hip PowerPoint lingo. Most interesting was the new Berserk features that Insomniac will be integrating into multiplayer. If you’ve played Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, the new system is similar to that game’s “Perks” feature. More »
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Legendary Hands On – Epic Moments
3:00AM Mike Fahey | My first real “wow” moment at the Games Convention in Leipzig came when a griffin threw a taxi at me. Mind you it could have been a roc – I’m not exactly up to date on my mythical birds, but whatever it was it was impressive. It was exactly the sort of epic moment you’d expect from a game called Legendary, and after playing through a good 15 minutes of the beginning of the PC version I can see why they decided to remove “The Box” from the title. The box is nice and all, but what comes out of it is much more impressive. The game starts out with the protagonist Charles Deckard at a museum, about to insert a mystical key into a mystical box…well, the magical box. The one you don’t want to open? Yeah, he opens it, and in return it brands his hand with a mystic rune and unleashes doom upon the human race as we know it. It’s a damn good thing that box came with that branding featuring, allowing the bearer to absorb mystical energy in order to heal himself, hurt mythical beasts, and solve puzzles, because otherwise we’d be completely screwed. Let’s hear it for escape clauses! More »
Here’s How Heavy Rain’s Controls Work
1:00AM Michael McWhertor | Quantic Dream’s David Cage walked us through a Heavy Rain demo at Games Convention last week, giving us a taste of how the game actually plays. While much of the presentation touched on facets of Heavy Rain’s “rubber band” storyline and little things, like motion captured eye movement, Cage paused often to talk up the PlayStation 3 game’s control scheme. We’ve already written about the driving game inspired character control — the R2 button moves her forward, with the left analogue steering her head and shoulders — so let’s focus on how everything else is done.
Sacred 2 Impressions Shatter The Language Barrier
10:20AM Mike Fahey | The main problem with seeing a game on the show floor at a consumer-friendly gaming convention in Germany, is that everyone speaks German. It makes sense, considering 99% of the people coming through to play their games are German, but boy does being in that 1% other bracket suck. Case in point, Ascaron’s Sacred 2: Fallen Angel. I’ve been dying to get my hands on the isometric action RPG for more than a year now, and when I finally have it cornered it turns out to be the German language version. Rather than let the fact that I couldn’t read any of the text get me down, I decided to pretend that I could instead. With a cheery grunt-nagen I got my 10 minutes of Sacred 2 on. When the demo kicks off, you get to choose between five different characters, the Seraphim, Shadow Warrior, High Elf, Dryad, and Temple Guardian. While three of them are relatively attractive women, I instead went with the Temple Guardian, since he looked a bit like an undead robot Anubis, Egyptian god of the living impaired. More »
Leipzig Games Convention Dated For 2009… And That’s Final!
8:00AM Michael McWhertor | With another successful Games Convention under its belt, the folks from the Leipziger Messe, where the con throws down each year, have dated next year’s show. Games Convention 2009 returns to Leipzig from August 19 to 23. Wolfgang Marzin, CEO at the Leipziger Messe GmbH, has said that “The industry and visitors are giving us their clear support to continue with the fair in Leipzig”, dropping positive support data for the show to stay right where it is. According to a new release from the Games Convention hosts, the vast majority of those surveyed at the show think the show should stay in Leipzig. A competing show, known as Games Con, is planned to hit Cologne (Köln) around the same time, making for a very confusing split. Regardless of who’s doing what and where, we’ll be there… somewhere next Summer covering the sausage beat (and maybe playing a game or two). Final report: Games Industry Staying in Leipzig for 2009 [Leipziger Messe] More »
And Then They Started Breakdancing…
7:40AM Mike Fahey | I can’t recall the exact moment I finally decided to stop trying to make sense of everything that was going on at the Games Convention in Leipzig, but if I had to guess I would say it was somewhere between discovering the cosplayer hive and when these guys started breakdancing. More »
Don’t Worry, Red Alert Fans, Jenny McCarthy Is Apparently A ‘Badass’ Tanya
7:00AM Michael McWhertor | The announcement of Jenny McCarthy as Tanya in Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3 may have drawn a “uergh” or two from fans of the series. “She’s no fucking Kari Wührer”, some said, which… well, we’re not sure if that’s a compliment or an insult. But the guys at EA sure like Jenny. Chris Corey, executive producer for Red Alert 3, says that McCarthy is a “badarse” Tanya, that’s she’s more than capable to tackle the role of the special ops commando. After co-piloting a two-player coop demo of the PC version of the real-time strategy game, Corey tried to allay fan fears that the former Playboy Playmate wasn’t ready to fill the tank top. Corey sounded pretty enthused to have her on board. Hey, if they’re happy, I’m happy. More »
