May 21, 2005




  • So I got a chance to go to the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3)
    this year, thanks to a friend of mine. The last time I got to go was in
    1999, back when the Dreamcast was going into it's first year, and the
    PS2 was just showing demos at that point.  Now, I get to go again
    on the dawn of the next generation in gaming of the xbox 360,
    PlayStation3, and the Nintendo Revolution (and the Gameboy Micro too).

    But here's the thing...
    Because of work, and E3 being weekdays only this year, I only get to
    attend Friday; which is the last day.  So that's one bummer. 
    Another would be because of work, I don't even get to take advantage of
    all of Friday and only have about five hours available to me. Not to
    mention that I only got three hours of sleep just so I can get those
    five hours in the first place.  To top it off, parking is
    $20!  Alright, those are pretty much the only real negatives of
    the whole thing.

    At E3 itself, I went straight to the main hall that has the majority of
    booths.  For whatever reason, I was quickly drawn to the Sega
    booth, and ended up in line to see some behind the door footage of
    future next-gen Sega games    . The presentation was awesome and really
    showed off what's to come     in the next-gen consoles.  Some of those
    graphics look practically CG as it is. After that, I decided that it's
    best for me to just roam around and try to get as much of the exhibit
    halls in my five hours there.

    To rundown the things I experienced...
    1) Booth babes - I didn't see that much, and there weren't that many I liked to have taken pictures of.  Tecmo provided some popular girls though.
    2) With that in mind... the ratio of guys to girls is ridiculously
    lopsided. Heck, the Anime Expo and the Comic-Con had a MUCH better
    ratio of guys to girls. The only girls that were at E3 where either
    exhibitors, booth babes, and girlfriends of the boyfriends that took
    them there.
    3) There's also soo many people with video cameras geekily taking video
    shots of the latest games on display.  Personally, I'd rather just
    wait for the official high quality releases than watch a video camera
    capture of a game.
    4) The best games on the exhibit halls were behind closed doors! 
    This is primarily true to several xbox 360 games, where it seems that
    the best games to represent this upcoming console weren't even being
    shown outside on the floor. The PS3 and the Revolution weren't even on
    the floor.  Ridiculous.
    5) Speaking of behind closed doors, the lines to get in them were hella
    long.  The Sega booth and the xbox 360 ones were the only ones
    that I had time to get in.  I didn't have time to get in Sony's
    and Nintendo's presentation at all.
    6) Since I got to experience the xbox 360 the most in the show, I'll
    say this... The games for it are very promising and good (especially
    the stuff behind closed doors).  The console itself is smaller
    than I thought, and the controller is remarkably well made (smaller
    than Controller-S).  Microsoft just dropped the ball in their
    pre-E3 press conferrence, because they didn't show their best games.
    7) While Microsoft had a huge presence in the main hall, Sony &
    Nintendo were relegated to fighting each other in the secondary hall.
    8) General consensus of the people I talked to over there:
    a) Microsoft's xbox 360 is GOOD
    b) Lots of skepticism with Sony's PlayStation3
    c) Huge disappointment with the lack of info on Nintendo's Revolution.

    At the end of the show, I hang around the G4TV live broadcast.  In
    fact, I made somewhat of an attempt to try and get shot on camera one
    way or the other.  Well, just watching the first ten minutes of
    the show that I had recorded, I definitely see myself. It's funny too, because at that exact same shot, I was taking a picture
    of them from there with my zoom lens    . If you know what you're looking
    at, you can even see me raise my camera up and all.

    So that's E3 2005 for me.  It could have been a lot better, but I did have some fun.

    oh... gamers who wanted to get into this event will probably hate me
    for this, but I only made an attempt to play ONE single game on the
    show floor.  I'm more of a spectator anyway, but I'm sure some
    people will think I just wasted a good opportunity.

    - links -
    E3 Insider
    IGN E3 central
    Microsoft xbox 360 faq
    Sony PlayStation3 faq
    Nintendo Revolution faq
    comparing the hardware of the xbox360 & the PS3

    - pics -
    scenery shots One, Two, Three, Four, Five
    some booth character/babes One, Two, Three
    The xbox 360
    The PS3
    The Revolution
    Gameboy Micro
    ...and booth babes pics I didn't take.
    and here's some more booth babes pics.

    - video -
    E3 booth babes




    edit: .... okay, I was browsing through the E3 2002 Tecmo booth babe pics, and
    YOWZA, I noticed that one of those girls is an acquaintance of mine at work. hhmmm, I
    wonder if I should mention this to her.