Rewind - E3 '02
E3 is upon us again but before E3 2003 comes along I thought I’d finally get around to type up all my notes from last year’s E3 (2002)! This event was huge and compared to be just as great as the Spaceworld event I went to in 2001 (I never told you this?)!
E3 is God’s gift to gamers. Annually, the Electoronic Entertainment Expo offers press and retailers the opportunity to go hands on with the upcoming blockbusters of the gaming industry. E3 also stands as the place to be to find out what each of the gaming giants are up to. This year (2002) was no different, and among the three industry heads, Nintendo stood out as a company with a vision of quality and quantity. Let me explain…
All you eggs in one basket!
As all of you should know Nintendo’s long-time philosophy on game development has been one of quality, in fact, it’s stratergy that stands as the strongest argument Nintendo fans can tout in the school-yard gamign discussions. This year (2002), however, after successful launches worldwide, accompanied by a huge amount of third-party games, Nintendo has announced the debut of not one, not two, not three, but more first and second party released than ever before. Thus meaning, exclusive Nintendo games that will reshape the way we all think about gaming.
While Microsoft and Sony were talking about their online gaming plans and trying to outdo each other in terms of online support for their respective machines, Nintendo quietly showed off their most antipated games. The empahis from Nintendo this year (2002) was ‘Gaming Giants’, that is, Nintendo’s franchise games and characters that have shaped and reshaped most genres in the gaming industry in today’s world.
First up we were treated to Metroid Prime, only the second time any footage of the game in action had been shown in the world (the first time was at Spaceworld 2001 and it was less than 10 seconds of flashes). The game was being pushed as Nintendo’s first step to strenghten it’s position with the older gaming demographic, and while it did this with ease, Metroid was certainly going to need help to reiterate Nintendo’s mature gamign emphasis, so along came Resident Evil 0.
With Nintendo’s renewed relationship with third-party giant Capcom, and the exclusivity deal with the popular Resident Evil franchise, the released of the hotly anticipated prequel to the originial game was always going to be special, but what was shown at Nintendo’s pre-show event was a thing of pure beauty. Encompassing the same pre-rendered backgrounds mixed with real-time lighting and shadow animations as the remake, RE 0 stood as not only a testament to the power of the GameCube, but also to Nintendo’s aggressive new mature strategy. RE 0 pits players on a moving train infested with horrifically realistic zombies all intent on eating that mushy brain of yours, and the bosses this time - thought we only saw an inking of a few - are the scariest I’ve ever seen. The RE 0 viewing was followed by the soon to be released Eternal Darkness, and while not looking anywhere as good as the RE games, its premise is still very adult. All standing as reasons to think twice about calling Nintendo a kiddy company.
With the mature content out of the way, Nintendo ran a compilation video of all their upcoming GameBoy Advanced titles. Metroid Fusion, the Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past, Golden Sun: Lost Ages, Super Mario Advance 3: Yoshi’s Island and Game and Watch Gallery all made up the strongest GBA titles we’ve seen thus far. Talking about the GBA also have Nintendo the floor to open up the official introduction to Animal Crossing. And although presented with the worst possible video, the idea is sound and should create a strong following fr the promising communication game. The most interesting aspect was how the game interacted with your GBA. Using the new E-Reader card peripheral you can upgrade your house with new furniture, your character with new clothes and tons of other upgrades, all available at the swipe of a card. This was a great push for the connectivity between the GBA and GameCube, and showed that Nintendo is really only interested in being innovative with accesible hardware. Thjis isn’t to say Nintendo isn’t thinking online, in fact, at the show they announced that they’d be supplying any interest third-party with the approaite tools to bring their online games to GameCube. Satoru Iwata was confident that online is an exiciting prospect, but the unfortunate truth is that the number of broadband users worldwide is still too low to consider moving directly into that market. Nintendo’s philosophy has always been to tgread carefully around new technology and wait until iot’s profitable enough to exploit and the same applies with their direction of online gaming.
With the cat out of the bag on the shrouded Metroid Prime, Nintendo wasn’t about to stop whetting our appetites as they rolled out the next big game video, this time starring the decidedly furry Fox McCloud. Star Fox Adventures has been in development forever, and while Enternal Darkness has been in the same cycle, Star Fox is carrying with it a level of polish that only Rare (bought out by Microsoft) could be capable of.
There’s not much I can tell you about this title that the site hasn’t told you about already, save to say that (at time of E3 2002) that this is near completion. With two of the big guns gone and the scary Eternal Darkness games out the door, Nintendo unleashed the two most anticipated games on the list- Mario and Zelda.
You won’t believe your eyes!
We’ve come to expect a lot from Nintendo. And we can hardly be blamed for this; after all, their games have always been the most innovative, immerse and fun. We can’t help it if they achieve goals in game development and we can’t be held responsible for expecting the most from the GameCube versions of their flagship titles, Mario and Zelda. So being treated to two of the greatest games ever at E3 was both welcome and expected, what wasn’t expected was that Nintendo made some other people I was with (a group of adults) say that they felt like kids again, and that’s not because any of the titles were kiddy in any way, in fact far from it.
Do you remember how you felt the first time you played Mario 64? That emotion that hit you when you realised that Mario was suddenly closer to you than he’d ever been before, full 3D worlds, huge levels and puzzles and an indescribable charm. I can remember that emotion well. Super Mario Sunshine made me feel like that again, the innovation, the look, the feel, everything, it was all there, Miyamoto’s genuis at work again, and with the direction of Tezuka-san (he’s directed every Mario game since Super Mario Bros. 3), the game was charmed-filled up the wazoo. And while Super Mario Sunshine made me all warm and fuzzy, the Legend of Zelda sent shivers down my spine. Here we have a game that simply oozes style, whether you like the cel-shading or not is completely beside the point, Link is so charismatic this time around that you have t keep telling yourself it’s only a videogame. The game plays much like MM and OoT but delivers a visual treat that simply has to be experienced to believe. New weapons, new gadgets and a charm like no other means the Legend of Zelda, along with Metroid Prime, Star Fox Adventures and Super Mario Sunshine should be on top of everyone’s most wanted lists. And all of these games are promised for this year (though don’t be surprised if one or two slip in early next year [2003]). The bottom line is that you’ll be in the gaming bliss soon.
I hope you enjoyed reading up about last year’s E3 and I do have more notes about the 80 games I played during my time at E3! Enjoy this year and Gamequbed.com will be bringing you the action as it happens as we do have someone going (not me :() and they’ll have a huge report to bring you when they get back.