E3 Sony Press Conference 2009

At 11 AM, I ventured to the Shrine Auditorium to attend Sony’s E3 Press Conference.

While a lot of the games shown were already known, or secrets leaked (PSP Go), it was an informative and interesting presentation. It’s safe to say that alternative controllers are the new fad among the big three.

President Jack Tretton walked out, commenting that over 300 games would be released this fiscal year. And 2009 as the “best year ever.” PlayStation products accounted for 30% of all retail sales in fiscal year 2008. For the upcoming year, the PlayStation 2 would be getting 100 new titles.

The first video Sony showed was an introduction to Sony Computer Entertainment Products

The second video was a demo of Uncharted 2’s single player campaign. The draw distance in the video was stunning and the detail that the South American city.

After Uncharted 2, Tretton showed a live demo of MAG or Massive Action Game, it showed promise, it’s unknown whether the servers that Sony will be using will be able to handle the load. It sounded good, looked nice, but the animations appeared a little stiff.

From MAG lead to the PSP. There are 400 titles in the US, and the content bundles (Rock Band Unplugged, Final Fantasy Dissidia, Assassin’s Creed: Bloodlines, and a Hannah Montana Lilac PSP bundle).

Kaz Hirai walked onto the stage to “officially” announce the PSP Go, which he dubbed “the worst kept secret of E3.” It’s not to replace the PSP-3000 though is 50% smalller and 40% lighter than the PSP-3000.

Hirai mentioned more franchise titles on the PSP, and a new PC browser called Media Go, which will simplify access of the PSP to the PlayStation Store over the PC. A new mood-based playlist creator called Sense Me was also mentioned.

Another big mention was a 80% reduction in price for the PSP Toolkit for developers. The price drop was designed to bring more new content.

Hirai mentioned that all new PSP titles would be digitally distributed.

The PSP Go is going to be priced at $249.99, released on 10/01/09 in North America and Europe, and 11/01/09 in Japan.

After these announcements came Gran Turismo PSP, a title which was originally announced when the PlayStation Portable was released. A video of that was shown as well along with the “official” debut of the PlayStation Portable Go.

There are going to be 800 cars, 35 tracks with variations, with the single player containing standard races, time trials and drift trials.

Adhoc of up to 4 players and the ability to trade cars between player’s garages. Gran Turismo PSP will be released the same day as PSP Go.

Next Hideo Kojima showed the first trailer for Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker. Taking place in the 1970s, it is a full sequel in the Metal Gear Solid franchise.

Kojima is writing the script and MGS4 development staff are working on the new title.

Resident Evil Portable was mentioned quickly.

Next up was the PSN. Tretton mentioned that 475 million pieces of content had been downloaded. And Final Fantasy VII was released on the PSN today.

PS Home also got mentioned with 6.5 million users worldwide and 85% were return users. Expansions were going to be in conjunction with publishers.

Finally the PS3 got some attention with Agent, an exclusive title from Rockstar Games.

Assassin’s Creed 2 had a single player demo, which looked amazing and a mention of Leonardo Da Vinci being a helpful NPC.

Final Fantasy XIII was shown in a trailer and in-game footage. But the big secret was the announcement of FFXIV Online. Exclusively for PS3 it’s the next installment of the online franchise.

The next thing was the motion controller tech demo. Created by the same creator as the PlayStation Eye, the demo showed the preciseness of the software.

The end of the conference showed ModNation Racers, a racing game that was heavy on user-created tracks.

The Last Guardian by Team Ico was shown in trailer form and looked amazing. The detail was spectacular.

Finally the last demo was God of War III, shown in playable form. The demo was also on the show floor, but the lines proved too long to play today. I’m going to try and give it a playthrough tomorrow.

Videos were taken of the event and are being uploaded. Check out YouTube as they are being uploaded.