Electronic Entertainment Expo and Konami's Pre-Show

Hey guys, E3 is right around the corner (it really is, again), so I figured that I'd try and cover some of the exciting gaming news that is bound to drop from the 5 big Press Conferences and maybe from the show floor as well. No promises though, I may accidentally forget about it and play Diablo 3 instead.

The Press Conferences start rolling out on the 4th of June with Microsoft (9:30am-11:00am PT), followed by EA (1:00pm- 2:00pm), Ubisoft (3:00pm-4:00pm) and Sony (6:00pm-7:30pm). On the next day the only conference is by Nintendo (9:am-10:00am), after which the show floor opens. Or something like that. I think that's accurate, more or less. In any case, Microsoft starts the show in just about 3 days. Here's a GameSpot link for you guys who want to catch it all live. I'm sure other gaming sites have their own live streams of all the things as well, if GameSpot is not your bag.

However, Konami kind of officially got the ball rolling with E3 this year (again, the same was true last year) with their pre-recorded E3 pre-show, called Konami Pimp Reel from here on out. You can watch it yourself from here if you want, but if your time is precious and don't have 30 minutes to spare, here's what you need to know.

They start the pimp reel with social games for Facebook and mobile platforms, by introducing their fairly fresh US based studio for that stuff. It's located right at the heart of all the first party social nonsense with Apple, Google and Facebook right across the street, basically. So far they've made Frogger Pinball and Twilight Chronicle on Facebook, Frogger Pinball on iOS, and have an upcoming Frogger Frenzy. All this nonsense is published by Zynga (groan). Yes, despite all the shit that Zynga is regularly up to, other companies still strike deals with them.

Next up, Pro Evolution Soccer 2013. I haven't cared much about sports games since International SuperStar Soccer on the SNES, so uh... Better ball control, better individualized and unique top players (Christiano Ronaldo as an example, because he runs funny), better dribble control, improved passing, all the good stuff like you'd expect from an evolution of their previous game. Evolution, right? Get it? Yeah.

Zone of The Enders HD collection is next, again. They announced this at last years pre-show thing, and now it's getting closer to release, they promise its arrival for Fall 2012. I have to hand it to Konami with this one, they are definitely doing the work, the quality of the HD conversion looks more in line with the excellence of Metal Gear HD Collection, and not that shitshow that the Silent Hill HD Collection ended up being. They also created a new anime opening for the HD collection with Sunrise, apparently they are some kind of great robot anime studio. Looks pretty good. You can check out the opening over here.

Metal Gear 25 year anniversary stuff was next. Some b-roll of the Smithsonian's The Art of Video Games Exhibition. Followed by Metal Gear Rising trailer. That game looks bananas. It appears to be sufficiently Japanese with its storytelling (at least based on the trailer) and should feel right at home with the MGS fans. It's being developed by Platinum Games (this is old news, I know), which is kind of perfect match. They pin the release on early 2013, so there's still some ways to go. Also, Mega64 is back for another Konami thing, nothing to say about that really. You should probably watch that part yourself.

Lastly, some Castlevania.
Castlevania: Lords of Shadow 2 CG trailer looks pretty boss, but doesn't really reveal anything about the game. If you haven't played LoS and its DLC yet, spoilers ahead, you have been warned. Gabriel is tearing shit up as the "new Dracula", takes a drink from a soldier, turns into a smoke bat and takes on some kind of big-ass golem, and then is faced with some white haired swordsman whose face we don't see. The game is probably more of that style of gameplay they had in LoS. Though, assuming Gabriel is now the bad guy, and the white haired dude is the protagonist, sword play instead of whip play. So Devil May Cry instead of God of War. tongue
And then there's also a small teaser for a 3DS Castlevania game, which shows even less than the LoS2 trailer.

And that was that. You know, briefly thinking back to last year, they had a Contra teaser at the end of that. I wonder if anything came out of it. Maybe the Hard Corps: Uprising was that game. Hard to say. Anyways, I'm definitely excited to see more of LoS2 at least, if nothing else.