Overly Positive

Well, Day 1 of E3 has come and gone, but the fun is just getting started at this year’s PR fest – and by PR, I mean Peen Rating – between many of the big developers and console makers out there.

Like last year, Microsoft was first out of the gate for the consoles out there, and they certainly had an avalanche of information for us geeky types to digest. Now, we all know that there are a ton of cynics out there who have no doubt been burned by the bright light of marketing hype. These folks cling to the security blanket of low expectations and constantly have something detrimental to say about even the most awe-inspiring announcements. Well, not here at Overly Positive, no sir/ma’am!

Here at OP we’ve always been a nice little ray of sunshine on a dew-kissed blade of grass, and E3 is no different. So without further ado, let’s look at just some of the great stuff from Microsoft’s lengthy press conference and subsequent demonstrations, courtesy of Gamespot, Kotaku, Sarcastic Gamer, and Destructoid: 

-Microsoft Announces “Project Natal”, Intros Motion Capture to the 360 – With this announcement, touting full body motion capture and controller-less ability, Microsoft fires an opening salvo at this year’s E3 straight into the heart of Nintendo’s console-selling hotcake, the Wii. The Wii’s innovative motion control and gateway gaming appeal have made it the darling of the NPD numbers since its release, but now, Natal seeks to unseat the Wii’s main advantage. Competition, my friends, can only be a good thing. While I honestly wished Peter Molyneux’s “Milo” interactive child, which used the new tech, would have gone evil in the Fable way and burned down a village, I’ll take that it actually scanned a drawing of a fish and knew it was a fish as decently impressive. The best part about motion capture for the 360? Now when the gamers bust a hole in their flatscreen TV’s, it’ll be because they erroneously thought they could perform a kung fu kick with their out-of-shape frames, only to cause priceless “Natal broke mah TV” Youtube vids to be posted on the Intarwebz. I love online entertainment.

-Metal Gear Solid: Comes to the XBox 360 with new, Raiden-focused action in MGS: Rising – There was some crazy, insane countdown and a bunch of teases on the Kojima Productions website, but now, some of the speculation can come to an end. Microsoft takes another exclusive away from the PS3 with a new, Snake-less Metal Gear Solid game featuring everyone’s favorite “I just wanna be loved” character, Raiden. MGS4 did a number on trying to make Raiden more appealing to gamers, even going so far as to make him kick ass without his arms to try to get people to like him. It sort of worked, so maybe now people are ready for someone to succeed Solid Snake. We’ll see, but for now, 360 owners can rejoice in seeing long-drawn out dialogue scenes in the midst of firefights while PS3 owners can take heart that their precious crown jewel, Metal Gear Solid 4, will stay exclusive to the PS3.

-Left 4 Dead 2 Shows up This November, Promises New Characters, Setting, and Chainsaws – As if Valve was one to rest on their laurels, right? Hot on the heels of everyone’s favorite zombie-killing therapeutic shoot-fest, Left 4 Dead 2 will be hitting shelves this November. This time around, there’s a new cast of characters, a decidedly Southern twang (the stages take place in New Orleans) and most of all, the use of melee weapons that are most certainly NOT the butt end of your gun, from chainsaws, to golf clubs to frying pans. So if you enjoyed stacking yourselves into a corner and frantically spamming your melee button on the undead despite its recent “cooldown” effect, you’ll love to cut them up into zombie sashimi right before Thanksgiving. Yummy.

-Halo: Reach Announced by Bungee, Perfect 10 Scorecards Get Excited – Everyone knew there was another Halo game out there called ODST, which would focus on some decidedly non-Spartan characters. But what almost no one probably expected was yet another Halo game that will probably be mostly Spartan with Halo: Reach, due out Fall of 2010. If you’re getting tired of the same old teabagging you get in Halo multiplayer, or perhaps want to strangle the voice of the haters and the Call of Duty and TF2 fanbois dogging what arguably revitalized the FPS genre of console gaming, then here’s a chance, in a year, to get yours. In recent months, Halo has been the punching bag for a lot of folks to call overhyped and over done, but maybe more of the same, especially if it brings in the moneybags, is just what the Master Chief and Red vs. Blue wannabes ordered.

-Sequel and Series Games Galore – If you like your games with a number in front of them that is greater than or equal to “2″, then you probably had a little geekgasm in your brain (and I don’t want to know where else), because we saw announcements for Crackdown 2, Final Fantasy XIII, the aforementioned Left 4 Dead 2, Assassin’s Creed 2, Modern Warfare 2, Dead Rising 2, Army of Two..err, 2, and much more. Couple these with series continuations like Halo 3 ODST, and of course, the Beatles-endorsed (literally, as Paul and Ringo appeared on stage) Beatles: Rock Band, and you’ll quickly find that if you wanted your games to keep going into new ones, you’re going to get your wish. Just make sure that like with movies, your expectations are realistic, lest you feel like you did on your last “sequel” viewing, where you made faces like someone did something untoward with your theatre popcorn (that’s no butter…).

There was so much more, but that’s the highlights, folks. Stay tuned for our constantly smiling commentary on the next day’s worth of E3 content!