[E3] Show Floor Report!The following is just a small overview of what some of the companies are showing at E3. More will follow in the coming days.Ubi Soft showed up with Grandia II (see our recent news coverage) and Evolution 2, which is nearly complete. This was accompanied by an adventure RPG Dragon Riders, which has similarities to Drakan on the PC, as well as a Dreamcast port of the PC RPG Heroes of Might & Magic 3. Finally, Ubi Soft showed another PC to Dreamcast port called Arcatera. It has a Dungeons and Dragons style to it, but it puts a lot of emphasis on the story line and everything moves in a time frame ala Shen Mue (but when you're not playing, time does not progress). You may have to meet someone at a certain time and if you're late, the person might be gone! Square made a rather large presence by showcasing their summer/fall lineup of games such as Parasite Eve 2, Chrono Cross, Legend of Mana, and Threads of Fate. Inside the Square theater, they also showed their upcoming games, which included about 20 seconds of footage from Final Fantasy IX. However, the main emphasis of the theater was to present their online plans for PlayStation 2 and how Final Fantasy XI will be played completely online. They did this through a tactfully done video presentation, which shows a girl in the U.S. using her PlayStation 2 to talk to her online friends. She sends a message to all her friends that asks, "Hey! It's Ellie, wanna continue where we left off?" Then it shows a man in England accessing his PlayStation 2 and noticing Ellie's message. He says he's ready to play and then footage of FFXI is shown of the two playing the game together as a party with some CG clips thrown in. Then, they go into a cave and the girl says that they need help so she thinks a bit and decides to call another guy. She sends the message and a guy from California in a leather jacket goes into some kind of arcade and a PlayStation 2 station is there so he sits down and sees the message from Ellie and then he responds to her. He acts all macho and does the big "hero" routine with sappy lines. He asks where they are and the girl says "Sydius Caves" (or something like that) so the guy says he'll need three minutes. Then you see the other two waiting for him to arrive. The guy goes into an interface and watches some manga in there, then chooses a music option and he inserts a little Sony card. I'm not sure what it is but I think it's a new music format from Sony for playing music (instead of CDs). He puts it in the PS2 and the music starts playing. In the meantime, the girl is browsing through all kinds of information about FFXI either in the game itself or from the "Internet" on the PlayStation 2 and figures out a plan to beat the boss in the cave. Then, the guy finally gets to the cave and you see his character arriving and the other characters have bubbles that indicate that they are idle and doing something else on their PlayStation 2. So, he knocks on them and then the bubbles pop off as they come back to the game. They all finally go into the cave and the presentation ends. Anyway, I guess they're trying to show off the PlayStation 2 as the console that does EVERYTHING in this little demonstration. Enix displayed Valkyrie Profile, Torneko: The Last Hope, and Dragon Warrior I & II along with a video-only demo of Dragon Quest VII. The biggest attraction was probably Valkyrie Profile, which (at least what was shown) was already dubbed and translated into English. Atlus had soon-to-be-released Rhapsody, playable in English, while recently-announced Persona 2: Eternal Punishment was still in Japanese. Ogre Battle 64 was also there and it looks to be a treat for RPG-hungry Nintendo 64 gamers. Working Designs was showing off Lunar 2: Eternal Blue Complete (in English) and Arc the Lad Collection. The only RPG Capcom had on display was none other than Breath of Fire IV. Nothing new shown from this title, but this is a sure sign it's U.S. bound! From what we have heard earlier this morning, our staff has been extremely busy capturing media, talking with company reps, and ultimately enjoying themselves quite a bit. Since today is the final day of E3, they should be finishing up their coverage and we will bring it straight to you in a constant stream of news and media that will no doubt make you smile! |
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