• Posted July 31st, 2008 at 03:35 EDT by
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This month sure was a hectic one for PlayStation 3 owners as we all sat and watched E3 unravel. This year’s event happened to bring only a small dose of bad news mixed with a heavy dose of goodness to look forward to. Even though we all watched Square Enix break our hearts during the Microsoft press conference, we were certainly still treated to a world of potential from our beloved console of choice. Not only did Sony roll out their video download service, but they introduced Massive Action Gaming and its 256-player online capability that caused the dropping of many jaws within the theatre. One can't forget witnessing the giant Leviathan in Resistance 2 attempting to destroy Chicago or the very teasing trailer of God of War 3 either.

Overall, Sony delivered an above average conference that left some gamers satisfied, yet left a bunch of others wishing for more. July also happened to bring us a nice handful of titles worth checking out including Civilization Revolution (NA), Siren: Blood Curse, NCAA 09, Soul Calibur IV, and even PixelJunk Eden if you consider yourself a PSN arcade-playing enthusiast. This seventh month also played host to the announcement of Resistance on the PSP, Fat Princess on the PSN and an incredible update from the guys over at Criterion for the ever-expanding world of Burnout Paradise. We’ll have a special Burnout Paradise announcement at the bottom of this feature, so be sure to read to the end!

This is usually the spot where I ask our community members questions in order to get their feedback on the month’s occurrences, however after a draining E3 and preview week, I’ve decided to utilize this space in order to fill you guys in on my E3 experience and the people I met while there.

I’m sure the majority of you think E3 is a cakewalk of checking out the latest titles and getting your hands on a couple of games earlier than the public. The truth of the matter however is that the event is absolutely exhausting and can leave you in a dejected state by Thursday afternoon. While the intense focus of all within the LA convention center could be felt through the first two days, even the companies in attendance were beginning to slow down near the end. During these three days of both bliss and hell, I had the opportunity to not only meet some of the cooler people in the industry, but to simply have a fun time doing something I enjoy.

As I stated before, my favorite moment of the event was getting the chance to play LittleBigPlanet with Alex Evans of Media Molecule, but there was so much more happening that I didn’t really get the chance to fill you guys in through previews alone. I also ran into key figures of the industry like Phil Frazier from EA Sports, EA CEO John Riccitiello and amusingly enough, Cliff Bleszinski from Epic Games. I also had the chance to meet up with a couple of great guys from PlayStationLifestyle.net, Kato from GameInformer, and even the HipHop Gamer himself from thebitbag.com. It was a pleasure meeting all of these guys and, even though some are competitors, it was a great opportunity getting to know other journalists for who they are behind their articles.

As for the titles I didn’t write full-blown previews for, I had the chance to check out Killzone 2, Bionic Commando (with CliffyB), Valhalla Knights 2 (developer interview coming), Guinness World Records (Wii, but the Travellers Tales rep dragged me in, I swear!), and finally a couple of cool Nyko products.

I’ll start off with just some basic impressions of the games I listed above. Killzone 2 displayed some stunning visuals. Frankly, I was blown away by them and I think Guerilla has done a fantastic job with the game. This title is going to make a lot of people happy as they kept pushing it back to refine it. With some of the cool multiplayer features of being able to mix and match your online soldier class, I believe that Killzone 2 may actually be a title I play online for months to come even after release, which is something I don’t do too often.

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