E3 2006 was definitely one of the more memorable years for the event and the three press conferences from Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft did their fair share of revving up expectations. The question is, did they succeed in not only impressing but amazing us? In the case of Sony, the situation is a mixed bag. On the one hand, Sony did what it does best, display numbers on graphs and explain why they had market leadership in the current generation. Even though it all sounded a bit self-indulgent Sony was correct in most respects. The Playstation and Playstation 2 were the leading consoles in their generations and has sold more units than most companies could ever hope for. The variety of games on both of those consoles helped to make the platforms appeal to wide audiences and you could say a few games like Grand Theft Auto and Metal Gear Solid helped "a little" too. With both Microsoft and Nintendo taking on different strategies this time around, it looks like this "next-generation" will be the most challenging for Sony yet. At last year's E3 it was very plausible for one to think that Sony's reign on the console market would be indefinite, but after this year's show, it doesn't seem like that at all.

The Playstation 3 is set to be the most powerful home console available and from the games shown at the press conference and during the show, it wouldn't be wise to doubt it. Many trailers were shown off and quite a few were even playable. Games like Heavenly Sword and Resistance: Fall of Man were quite impressive when they were shown off in live demos during the show, but the amazing looking Eight Days and Final Fantasy XIII are still debated in terms of if they were displayed in real time or not. Heavenly Sword especially showed off some excellent combat animation with action that was reminiscent of what we have come to expect from games like God of War. Sony showed off a few other titles including The Getaway and Afrika which both showed off some pretty impressive life-like environments. On the purely technological side of things, the live demo shown at the conference of The Eye of Judgment was an excellent demonstration of the evolution of the Eye Toy. By placing marked cards onto a game mat, the camera will recognize the card you put down and spawn the beast that corresponds with the card onto the game mat. The ability to manipulate the beast and perform its attacks in real time were especially impressive. Possibly the most significant and "amazing" trailer shown from Sony was that of Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots. The supposedly real time trailer of the new game in massively popular tactical espionage series was often jaw dropping with its immaculately detailed characters, fluid animation and gritty environments. For fans of the series, its hints at some plot points were even more tantalizing. Let’s just say the trailer ends with Snake putting a gun in his mouth. Is that ever good?

Heavenly Sword

Some impressive games aside, the biggest shockers from Sony came when they decided to announce both the price of their console and a little secret of the controller. In a live demo of the flight action game Warhawk, the aircraft was being controlled by a motion sensor built into the Playstation 3 controller. Shocking quite a few hardcore Nintendo fans, this concept clearly mimicked the Nintendo's Wii controller, although the feature isn't as advanced as what Nintendo is offering. The internet was abuzz with jokes about Sony's copycat practices over the years, but nothing garnered more attention than the price of the system. Sony is offering consumers a choice by releasing two different system configurations. The $599 configuration is tailored for high-def junkies and features a 60 GB hard drive. The $499 version of the system only features a 20 GB hard drive but will most likely be the more popular choice among general consumers. Any way you choose to put it, the price is definitely wallet shattering for most and is seen by many as simply being too expensive. While its no doubt that the hardcore fans will be flocking to their local Best Buy's on November 17th to pick up their Playstation 3, the impact the price will have on mainstream consumers won't be witnessed until launch. Putting the price aside, its looking like finding a Playstation 3 will be similarly difficult as the Xbox 360 situation in late 2005 and early 2006. That is of course, unless people stay away because of its price tag.

All in all, the Sony E3 2006 press conference just seemed to be missing something. While a few particularly interesting games were shown off, many of the games were still just shown in video form and the debate over pre-rendered versus real-time is still popping up with a few of the games. Aside from the demonstration of the PSP's PSOne emulation capabilities, the PSP's showing was lacking. Overall it looks like the prices of the Wii, Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 will play as major factors in their respective successes. Multimedia fanatics may find that the Playstation 3's box full of features justifies the $499 and $599 price tags but the general gamers out there are going to have to look for serious reasons to pick up a Playstation 3 over an Xbox 360, because after this showing, it may not be as simple as writing a check. Sony put on a good show, but they probably should have set aside more time to display the games they think will make the system sell. Extended demos of Gran Turismo HD, and a generally unimpressive Genji 2 was time that could have been better spent detailing games like Eight Days and the untitled Naughty Dog game that was premiered with an excellent trailer. Putting the respective next-generation media disc format war aside (Blu-ray and HD-DVD), Metal Gear Solid 4 may not be enough to put the system on top as some hardcore fans declare. The verdict is out; the decision of what to buy may be quite a bit harder than it has been in the past. Price, game exclusivity, graphics, media capabilities and innovations are driving the debate more than ever before.

Resistance: Fall of Man

Warhawk