The Time Ben Had A Wee Next To Kaz Hirai

Ok, well we’re reaching the point now where we are covering so much stuff between the four of us that actually trying to find the time to write it up is starting to become a problem. It’s not actually a problem yet but I’m getting worried it might be; today alone I got to see/play previews of Saints Row: The Third, From Dust, Batman Arkham City, Bastion, Bodycount, Need For Speed: The Run, Deux Ex and more. You’ll have to wait for the various previews and interviews though; I’ve not done them yet.  I just don’t have the time to give you full run down on Monday’s press conferences, I do, however, know of two very good writers who have covered them, which can be read here along with all our other antics from the show floor.

Personally I really enjoyed the Microsoft Xbox Conference; looking back through my twitter feed and from the replies the @GamingLives account, a lot of people seemed to be complaining that it was just another Kinect heavy flappy-arms-a-thon, but I didn’t mind it if I’m honest. I’m just glad that Kinect is starting to be used in a non shovelware way and after seeing that Mass Effect 3 demo, I don’t mind saying it but, I’m sold.  I’ll be ordering one on pay day. Yeah that’s right I’m buying a Kinect, oh I better buy some curtains too, oh man then I’ll have to put them up as well… let’s change that to I might be buying a Kinect, I’m now sold on the idea of owning one. EA’s was a good show too, shame that it didn’t have much in the way of new game announcements and everything we seem to have seen was stuff we already knew about.  Not having a date for Star Wars: The Old Republic was just rude. Sony put on a huge show. It was just massive, I’m not sure any photo or video will ever be able to convey that. The Sony Conference was much more of an event than the others on the day; that could of been because they were on last so they had more time to play with, but it really was a spectacle of an event. Oh yeah and Ubisoft’s… I’ve not got a fucking clue what was going on there, those guys are round the hat rack.

We decided that it would be cool to do a little podcast when we got back from Sony last night, but because I was too busy pissing about in David Jaffe’s Twisted Metal ice cream truck we we’re late getting back. I’ll be honest, I’m not sure what happened as soon as we got back, I must have slipped into a coma or something as the next thing I remember hearing was someone’s alarm clock. Thankfully we just had time to cram a quick podcast in (have a listen here) before heading out to the expo. The place was buzzing when we arrived, with gamers everywhere patiently waiting for the doors to be cast open so we could enter the halls. Me and Ben split off from Mark, Lorna and our L.A. based writer Adam who all somehow managed to get in before us by a good ten minutes. I tried to start civil unrest by suggesting to a few of the people around me that we could get in quicker if we all just walked up the steps that they wouldn’t let us walk up, after all there was a good 20,000 of us and only about eight of them. It worked for Egypt right?

The first thing you notice is the carpets once you’re on the show floor, yeah I know it’s stupid not to notice things like the flashing lights and pretty girls in not much clothing or the games first, but the carpets are like walking on clouds, they are so thick.  My mum would threw a shit fit if she knew I didn’t take my shoes off before walking on carpet like that. It was the thickest, comfiest carpet in the world. Ben and I had an hour before our first appointment and decided to pick up the closest consoles to us which just happened to be Ubisoft’s upcoming Xbox Live Arcade title ‘From Dust’, while Ben picked up the pad and played Bastion – a game I adored at PAX East and, so far, is probably my game of the year despite the fact that it’s not even out yet. I had an interesting chat with a guy from Ubisoft about the development of the game while getting to give it a good solid play through, so keep an eye out for my preview piece. From there we had our first meeting of the day at THQ’s booth where we got to see Saints Row: The Third… which is one of the most over the top stupidly brilliant games in the world; the amount of crazy shit you can do in that game is beyond belief. Ben then went off to take a look at Metro 2 and Warhammer: Space Marine while I popped around the corner to play Codemasters’ latest entry into the OTTFPS (Over The Top First Person Shooter) genre – BodyCount.

From the THQ booth it was time for our next meeting at Warner Bros’ stand for a chance to see Batman: Arkham City, which is amazing looking.  Playing as Catwoman is incredible, it’s like its two different games in one. While on the Warner booth I also got the chance to have a chat with Greg and Jen from SuperGiant Games about what they had been up to since we last spoke. I showed Jen my Bastion wallpaper which I have on my phone; she seemed to be really flattered by it which seemed odd as a piece of her artwork was hanging up outside the entrance to the south hall, right above the door. After speaking with the guys from SuperGiant games we split up again and Ben and I went for an adventure outside to the Marriott for a meeting with EA Interactive who were going to show us their mobile games (round up of everything Ben and I looked at is coming soon).

We weren’t sure which building we needed to be heading to, so when we asked for directions on the way out the lovely lady on the information desk described it as the big shiny glass building up the street. “OK, sounds easy enough,” I thought to myself. Not quite… you see every other building in this part of Los Angeles is a big shiny glass building. We managed to make it in and out of that one pretty easily and on time in the end.  My theory was to just head for the biggest shiniest building and that thankfully paid off. While inside and making our way up the rather expensive looking lobby, Ben spotted Kaz Hirai from Sony heading towards us.   Ben decided to just pop to the bathroom, but I decided I didn’t need to go and waited outside… then Kaz wandered in after Ben. I wanted to go in, even if it was just to pretend so that I could say I seen Kaz from Sony take a whizz, but I think he heard me declare I didn’t need to go, so following him might have been a bit weird. What am I saying?  “Might have been.”  Following a Japanese executive into the bathroom so I could say I’d seen him take a whizz is definitely weird and is a badge of honour now reserved exclusively for Ben.

Back down town to the Expo and we ended up on EA games main stand just milling around like everybody else before our next meeting. We tried to get into the Mass Effect 3 showing, but it was pretty busy and it didn’t look like we’d make it back out in time for our last meeting at Square-Enix to see Deux EX, so we decided to have a race on Need for Speed: The Run. They had a challenge to beat a three minute time on one track which I managed to pull off by less than half a second.  Ben was rubbish at it though and overshot the mark by a good 13 seconds. Time to then move on to our last meeting of the day and I’ll be honest, I was very impressed by what I saw of Deux Ex, a game I’d wrongly shrugged off in the past as not being a big deal but, after seeing it working, I’ve changed my mind.

That was it for Day two of our E3 adventure.  Time to get back and record the second episode of our E3 podcast which you can listen to here. All of that in just half a day! We’ve got a full  day at the expo tomorrow too, I better go get some sleep.




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5 Comments

  1. Chris Toffer says:

    Sounds like an Awesome time Lee. Loving the fact you noticed a carpet over everything else.

  2. Knikitta says:

    What I love best about time zones, is that when I wake up in the morning, no matter how terrible a night I have had, I can always open the GL site and read some one’s piece from across the water!

    Fantastic write up yet again Lee, I am so glad you are all doing this. Not only does it up to date us all on what is happening at E3, but it lets us some times step inside GLHQ:LA to see what happens behind closed doors.

  3. Lee Lee says:

    Don’t get too used to it we’re back next week.

  4. Similar story told to me by a friend of mine apparently all true.

    When he worked at Gamestation his manager was invited to one of those games promotional event things held by Nintendo. At the show was one Charles Martinet, otherwise known as the voice of Mario. The manager at some point goes to the toilets for a leak. Whilst standing at the cubical a man comes up next to him to leak and out of the corner of his eye he thinks he saw that it was Charles Martinet himself. He slowly looks up at which point Charles, in his full on Mario voice goes “Itsa me Mario!”, finishes peeing and walks off leaving my friends manager quite stunned.

  5. Edward Edward says:

    Darnit, sounds still totally awesome and I’m sad I wasn’t there.

    Still, looks like a lot to take in from the conferences, especially if you’re all struggling to keep up with it!

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