Another year and another awards season. E3 was packed with exciting memories you have all seen (some still to be posted), and rooms filled with the hottest and most anticipated titles to date. It was certainly a great time, and now that time is over. It’s time to look forward, ahead to newer and better releases, and to ennoble titles in this year’s WhatIfGaming’s Best Of E3 Awards 2008.

Criteria: The Best of E3 Awards, a subcategory for the WhatIfGaming Prizes, are given solely to those video games that demonstrate a pure excellence in the field for which they are not only nominated but also chosen. These awards only apply to playable games at E3 given a few exceptional categories.

Nomination & Selection Process: Compared with other site awards, the WhatIfGaming Prize nomination and selection process is long and extremely rigorous. This is the sole reason why WhatIfGaming Prizes have grown in importance over the years to become the most important prizes in their field. Forms, which amount to a personal and exclusive invitation, are sent to about over 1,000 selected individuals to invite them to submit nominations months in advance from the latest builds per video game. Self-nominations are disqualified. For WhatIfGaming Prizes, inquiries are sent to such people as developers, industry experts, analysts, freelance journalists among others. After our deadline passes, the nominations are chosen by permanent committee of 5 selected individuals and only the final stage of nominees remain per category. From all of these, a winner is chosen.

The names of the nominees are not publicly announced, and neither are they told that they have been considered for the WhatIfGaming Prize. Some are announced publicly by practice. Nomination records are revealed approximately 2 years after each respective award year.

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Final Fantasy XIII is finally coming to the Xbox 360 in North America and Europe that had all of us buzzing the moment it was announced. Now the problem with this is that there grew some concerns as to why a seemingly PlayStation 3 exclusive went multiplatform with the announcement of Star Ocean IV also a 360 exclusive. At least for the time being anyways. We heard a lot of buzz everywhere and from all the analysts and top notch guys at the conference and most were convinced something bigger is occurring between Square Enix and Sony. Something very seven-ish. To elucidate, Final Fantasy VII-ish for the PlayStation 3 only. After our preview of Heavy Rain for the PS3 behind closed doors, we caught up with Shinji Hashimoto for an interview of all things Final Fantasy XIII and any fallaciousness behind exclusivity in general and that of Square Enix titles.

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We had a chance to catch up with a very cool industry analyst Michael Pachter who wanted to reveal what he thought about the Microsoft vs Sony conference debacle.

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As you all can tell from our preview, the Resident Evil 5 controls we played with at an invite-only Capcom session were as horrific as the zombies themselves. Why? You see, when deadly and rotting zombies are chasing you it should be a flight and fight mechanism to run the hell away. What does Chris Redfield do in our previews? He stands there holding his gun and shooting. No. Our chiseled man cannot run while shooting. He’s bad at multitasking. To find out more, we interviewed Capcom PR recently on the controls.

WhatIfGaming: A lot of people have been asking if the controls will suck just like Resident Evil 4. We know we know, we said suck. We mean to say they just aren’t practical at the moment. Will they change?

Jason Allen, Capcom PR: Haha, it’s okay. But um, yeah. The controls seen here are definitely pending and will eventually change. This is in no way finalized. It will definitely be different and listen to what people are saying.

WhatIfGaming: Okay, great. But does that mean that Chris will be able to finally comprehend the meaning of multitasking and be able to run and shoot at all?

JA: The controls will definitely changed, and these are not finalized. As for the answer to that directly, I can’t confirm that at this time but will say most likely.

WhatIfGaming: Hopefully soon (laughs). As for PC gamers, will Resident Evil 5 be headed to PC?

JA: As for the PC, that is not in development and there are no plans for this.

There you have it. Bad Resident Evil 4 controls are no longer a plague to us all. Keep here for more E3 stuff to come.

Here’s some footage we recorded for you guys. We don’t believe in generic stand and capture every time. We like to capture moments. This is one out of many to come. Flash Version Now Available For All Upcoming Videos Due To Popular Request

So apparently, on my way to lunch I spot that a bunch of SCEA people are gathering outside those same doors we took footage of for the inFamous gameplay (unshown on video) as seen in this video here.

I asked a woman named Mary M (something) of SCEA, and she told me it’s a completely different meeting from the one they did yesterday (which we were not allowed to film). I saw a bit of this game as the room opened for the set up crew. It’s a man in a black suit…Crysis like…flying? No clue.

A whole new game…why the hell didn’t they just show this during the E3 conference? I peer upon the names of some of the exclusive people who are seeing it. Some are barely sites at all and most are from radio or newspapers. Go figure.

Whatever this mysterious game is, we’ll find out and have our ninjas ready.

Constantly murmers are everywhere regarding which console leaders conference was the best in terms of presentation and pure content. Everyone downright agrees that Nintendo was “the worst” and there’s a whole lot of jumble about Microsoft and Sony.

Microsoft recently announced the multiplatform version of Final Fantasy XIII for North America and Europe,  but it just isn’t enough to get blood boiling. Microsoft has sold literally 19 million Xbox 360’s and it’s a number that’s hard to refuse. The placement of titles from Square Enix are numerous with Star Ocean 4 as a more than likely timed exclusive for the Xbox 360 console, and a general shift in more production towards the 360’s database. This increased relationship goes hand in hand with the unexpected, which is why some people were left far from surprised.

Sony’s conference didn’t have the best in its arsenal either. The conference began almost rather as a marketing pitch than anything worthwhile about the games themselves. We get it. “Playstation 3 is the next big thing,” “2008 is the year of the Playstation 3,” but that progress just seemed to regurgitated. Instead, how about feeding us something new? Something other than LittleBigPlanet, which we know is simply marvelous and full of effulgence. Show the public demonstrations of the games for the closed door conference held on July 15th, 2008. Same as Microsoft’s condition, Sony takes the liberty to flash us Kratos within minutes of the presentation, and things couldn’t be more obvious. Some of the Underground members even started yelling out “God of War III.” But hey, they tried.

As for Nintendo…well, we know about that.

Through the hordes that are these 3 conferences, we see that each and every one has their flaws and overall ups and down. There isn’t always 1 winner, and sometimes being a little bit better just doesn’t cut it.

Outside just momentarily before eating our sandwiches, we ask the man standing with 2 big boxes in front of us what will be showing to this severely limited and exclusive closed door event held by SCEA. He replies, “I just have inFamous and Heavy Rain in these boxes here. Just waiting for them to open it up.”

We quickly finish up our sandwiches. Afterwards, the door opens for the attendees. Everyone specially invited gathers. The main gameplay in Heavy Rain is heart-trenching. The scene shown is of a garage quarrel. There’s a ton of interactivity and unmatched presence of this game that leaves hearts pounding. We really can’t divulge any specific details, but that general scene synopsis should be enough.

As for some video, we did manage to get our hands on a SHORT clip of gameplay before NDA’s were signed…we mean short. Like 5 seconds, but hey that’s something right? Unfortunately, no access to release it. Also I’ve been speaking to Sony PR, and it seems Heavy Rain is making a confirmed appearance at Leipzig. Heavy Rain wasn’t technically a “part” of E3, but it was definitely there and we basically can’t say anything more than that.

We can just say that ESA’s 2,500 people invite-only model of the E3 Media and Business Summit as of 2007 is a digression to the dreams and happiness of that gamer who saves up everything for games, and has nothing more forward to look to during that time of the year than a massive event. The problem is that it isn’t true. In fact, the ESA’s decision to make E3 invite-only is one of the best decisions they could have ever made apart from catching pirates in the Northern regions of Seattle or some place like that. People have become tuned to the idea that the downsize is the worst possible thing that simply could have happened. The newest model of E3 has brought a sense of eventual prejudice and mostly misdirection from all fields that makes it apparent that many people are far from the realities of it.

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Yahoo! today announced that Yahoo! Games will offer ad-supported downloadable games from the top casual games publishers. With more than 400 ad-supported games available to users by the end of the year, Yahoo! Games solidifies its commitment to providing the Internet’s best gaming experience, and is creating new opportunities for advertisers to reach an engaged audience. The announcement brings the industry’s largest collection of ad-supported games to the biggest gaming audience on the web and reinforces Yahoo! Games’ overall strategy to be the most comprehensive distribution point for games online.

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Sony Computer Entertainment America (SCEA) and Sony Computer Entertainment Europe (SCEE) today announced a partnership with Double Fusion to deliver dynamic in-game advertising on PLAYSTATION®3 (PS3™). Double Fusion will leverage its expertise, technology and sales force, working with publishers and advertisers to create effective marketing programs for brands targeting PS3’s coveted gamer demographic.

PS3 is open for the ad business. We are very excited about hosting contextually relevant and well-crafted creative advertising on PS3. PlayStation is taking a major role in enabling this fast-developing sector that is positive for the games medium. -Phil Rosenburg, VP SCEE

PS3 provides advertisers with a direct avenue to reach the highly targeted, sought after gaming demographic, and has sold more than 13M units worldwide. DFC Intelligence forecasts that sales for the current generation of game systems including portable devices will pass the 180 million mark by 2011, reiterating the potential for the in-game advertising market. The worldwide in-game advertising industry is expected to grow 1,150 percent to $971.3 million between 2006 and 2011 according to the Yankee Group.

We have already received tremendous support from publishers who want to incorporate ads into their PS3 games, across all of the regions of the world. We are very excited to work with SCE on this and PS3 will add a vast number of players to our already robust network. SCE’s participation strengthens the in-game advertising ecosystem. -” Jonathan Epstein, president and CEO, Double Fusion

Four prestigious development studios and games technology company Geomerics, all based in Cambridge, have been shortlisted as finalists for the Develop Industry Excellence Awards, due to take place on Wednesday July 25th 2007 at the Hilton Metropole, Brighton.
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