Hasta La Gadget!

Last week’s E3 show was pretty wild. All the major players upped their game quite a bit — pun intended. Here’s my breakdown of the show.

Microsoft: The folks in Redmond led the way with an intro launch party featuring a custom performance from Cirque de Soleil. That was just to warm things up — when it came to actual announcements, Microsoft took a two-tiered approach. On one hand it’s building on the success of long established titles like Gears of War, Fable and of course, Halo. On the other it’s taking the time to re-boot the Xbox 360 with Kinect, which brings controller-free gaming to the platform, as well as adding voice and gesture controls. I think Kinect is a major leap forward in the gaming experience that will appeal to both mainstream and casual gamers. With a streamlined new Xbox 360 and an impressive set of launch titles debuting alongside, Kinect is more akin to a console launch than a peripheral. Overall, I’d say Microsoft is in the lead post-E3 and very well positioned for holiday.

Continue reading Entelligence: The aftermath of E3

Entelligence: The aftermath of E3 originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 19 Jun 2010 18:01:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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E3’s biggest loser? It’s Sony. They’ve been lagging behind for years overall, but to lose at hardware, their strongest suit? What a pity. More »

So, we got shuffled past a 3DS at a rapid pace this morning on our way out of the Nintendo keynote, but we’ve just had an opportunity to play some titles and really get a feel for the thing… and we’re pretty impressed. Before we were only shown a technical demo, but at Nintendo’s booth there are games, games, games. The booth was about evenly split between playable tech demos, non-playable live-rendered trailers, and regular 3D movies. Nintendo clearly is hard at work on titles for its system, and there’s plenty of third party clout getting into the mix. Still, what impressed us more than the quantity was the quality. Most of the games are pretty easily on the level of iPhone 3GS graphics, and the 3D effect “just worked” on most all of them. Follow after the break for our full thoughts.

Update: We’ve also got partial tech specs on the handheld — find them after the break, too.

Update 2: We added a video of nintendogs + cats gameplay. It’s very adorable, we assure you.

Continue reading Nintendo 3DS in-depth preview: it works!

Nintendo 3DS in-depth preview: it works! originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 15 Jun 2010 21:40:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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That Nintendo announced the 3DS was not a surprise — that they had a couple-dozen of these things to try out, that was. We elbowed our way to the front of the line to try one out, and the effect is actually not bad. It’s not great, but the 3.5-inch screen on top certainly gives a firm illusion of depth without resorting to glasses — or eye crossing. The feel is definitely reminiscent of those 3D cereal box prints, and as soon as you turn the device from left to right to try to look around anything the effect is immediately lost. You need to stare at the screen for a moment for your eyes to adjust and then not move around too much. If you do you’ll need to adjust again. But, stay reasonably still and it’s a compelling effect.

The new analog slider on the left feels a lot like the PSP’s analog nub, but larger and without the texture. It’s a bit easier on the fingers, and comfortable. Overall the device feels just like a current DS or DSi, though we couldn’t get a good feel for the weight thanks to a bulky tether attached on one end to the device, and on the other end to the row of ladies who were surely told to not let the gadgets out of their hands or face certain doom. The only thing we could do here is rotate along a still frame — Pikmin in a field, for example — and play with the 3D slider. It is a pretty convincing effect, but it’s hard to tell at this point if it’s at all compelling — it wasn’t anything more than novelty in this demo, and we still don’t know how it stands up to fast-moving footage. Actual games were promised to us for the show floor, so we’ll hit that up later today. We snagged a few pics before getting elbowed out of the way, so check ’em out!

Continue reading Nintendo 3DS in the flesh and hands-on! (updated with video!)

Nintendo 3DS in the flesh and hands-on! (updated with video!) originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 15 Jun 2010 14:30:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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This is the Nintendo 3DS. It has two screens: a 3.5-inch widescreen on top, and a standard screen on the bottom. It also has a Slide-Pad, and it has a two-tone color scheme. Best of all, no glasses. More »