The rest of the Microsoft Xbox 360 conference was unbelievable. In my 10 years covering this kind of stuff, this was BY FAR the most impressive conference I have ever attended. As a budding young game designer, I can honestly say that Microsoft had every angle covered. Just about everything they showed made me want to push my imagination farther than I ever have before, to rethink what was possible, because nearly everything they demonstrated had at the very least a practical application (Natal, interactive functionality, Netflix, Zune, Facebook, etc.) or a big fat WOW factor (Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2, the Molyneux demo, Forza 3, Kojima, Final Fantasy XIII, etc.). Then just to rub it in our faces, they drag out people like Steven Fucking Spielberg to scpiel about the 360? Overkill, perhaps, but inch for inch the most incredible showcase I have yet seen, and the first time I got a lump in my throat since the Nintendo conference when they first unveiled Smash Brothers for GameCube. I seriously don't know how Nintendo or Sony can top this tomorrow. Nintendo could announce 5 Mario games, 5 new Zelda games, 15 new Metroid games tomorrow and it just couldn't compare. Sony could announce God of War games and Team Ico games til they're blue in the face tomorrow, and there's no way they match today's show.
It won't be enough to match this. New paradigms have been opened up, a comprehensive approach to the Xbox Live service was on full display, and a shitload of exclusive or semi-exclusive games were revealed, of distinctive quality (even Epic's Rolling Thunder clone with sick-ass graphics was wicked). Even without the surprise guests, Microsoft's showcase was pie chart-free (take THAT, Kaz!) and full of real, genuine content. To top this, Nintendo would have to show that they care about more than soccer moms and weight loss and do something to inspire the people that came before the Wii Fit craze, and Sony would have to drop some serious megatons for two straight hours to gain parity. In short, both Nintendo and Sony would have to surpass what was shown today, and to be honest, Miyamoto or no Miyamoto, Gran Turismo or not, I don't think either of them can do it. No, I wasn't handed a fat check by Microsoft to say this. I was look at today's conference through a developer's eyes and was thinking about controller-free games that make you go 'wow.' I thought about how each year I show up at E3 I don't expect much out of Microsoft because they must have blown their whole wad on Q4 of the previous year, and subsequently, about how wrong I was. The fact that this conference revealed not one, but two Halo games, a detailed look at Alan Wake, and how they were just a handful of so many other delights (Raiden, I love you, man!) was to me, as a gamer, simply inspiring. In my next career, which I'll hopefully be able to announce soon enough, I am being forced to think outside of the box along with my colleagues, about how to design things that are fresh and new, and the challenge is invigorating. The sky is the limit. Today's conference showed me the way.
