E3 1996 Report
E3 - Thursday 5/16
Sony PlayStation Now $199, Psygnosis Hits with 2 New Wipeouts, Williams Readies MK Trilogy, Bandai World Pippin Launch, and Much More.
IG at E3 - Thursday 5/16/96
10:15 AM, Sony added a "Press Conference" slip to their press kit. It was this time that Sony announced a big price drop, effective immediately, reducing the price of the PlayStation to $199, making Sony priced lower than Sega, as well as Nintendo's targeted $249.95. It is worth noting that there has been no mention yet of a Sega price drop.
In other news, Psygnosis was prepared for E3 with Wipeout XL for PlayStation. This sequel to the original hit is significantly faster than the original with higher resolution graphics to complement. Also shown by Psygnosis was VFX Wipeout, running on a PC using new 3DFX technology. This version runs at a full 640 x 480, 30fps. However it is worth noting that this was running on a Pentium 166 high end system.
Other titles shown by Psygnosis on the show floor include F1, previewed in FUSiON #3, complete with great graphics and sound effects, Tenka, a doom-style shooter with hi-res graphics, The Adventures of Lomas in Lemming World, a 2-D side scrolling shooter reminiscent of Rayman, and Adidas Power Soccer, a polygon-based soccer game.
Next stop was Capcom, who was showcasing Street Fighter Alpha 2, adding new characters and backgrounds to the Street Fighter engine. Another 2-D fighter shown, Marvel Super Heroes was early, but looked to be a great conversion. Also shown was Star Gladiators, Capcom's 3-D fighter. Unlike Tekken, the actual hardware running in the Star Gladiators arcade machine is 100% PlayStation, so the port should theoretically be easy. This game looked nice for a PlayStation game, but was questionable as an arcade game, as it was a tad bit on the slow side. Major Damage is a new twist on the 2-D action genre, with multi-plane fighting and lots ofa action. Buster Brothers Collection is a good conversion of 5+ year old games, and Fox Hunt is Full Motion Video. Also shown (albeit early), was Werewolf. Released titles included Darkstalkers, and Night Warriors.
Namco's showed nothing really new this year's E3. The main games showed were Tekken 2, Ridge Racer Revolution, and Namco Museum Collection, volume 2. Cutie-Q was removed in the U.S. version, and replaced with Super PacMan. Tekken 2 was strategically placed next to its arcade counterpoint to show off how close of a conversion it is.
JVC was showing Deadly Skies, a dogfight style plane action game, which is a cross between simulation and action. Also shown was Impact Racing, a Megarace style action driving shoot-em-up game. Varuna's Forces was also there, however only as a FMV demo.
Acclaim had a nice showing this year. Some of the best games shown were NBA Jam Extreme, an arcade 3-D version of NBA Jam, Killing Zone, a PlayStation 3-D fighter with very large graphics, yet boring play mechanics Batman Forever, an arcade side scroller similar to Batman Returns on SNES, Big Hurt Baseball, Acclaim's Next Gen Baseball Game, and a conversion for PS of the arcade hit Bust-A-Move 2. Other games shown in earlier form were Bubble Bobble for PS, V Tennis, the Saturn version of WWF The Arcade Game, identical to the PS version, Iron and Blood another 3D fighter, as well as conversions of the 3DO hits Killing Time, Battlesport and Starfighter, although Killing Time was running on a 3DO machine. The PS version of X-Men, Children of the Atom was surprising absent.
Top Gun : Fire At Will, from Microprose, is a fantastic new entry from the company. The PC version, already released, is nearly identical to that of the PlayStation, in all it's graphical glory. The game being a dog fight simulator, has a lot to offer the player, and is sure to be a hit when it's released.
GTE's lone entry was, a 3-D, first flying game similar to Wipeout. This one has a long ways to go though.
EA Sports had 6 kiosks set up, although only 4 games were playable. Madden '97 was only a video of John Madden explaining what this game will deliver when complete. NHL '97 showed some game footage, however what was shown was highly unimpressive, with extremely blocky polygon graphics. However, the other games were nice. Among NBA Live, was FIFA Soccer '97, Mario Andretti Racing, a rather speedy NASCAR style racing game with nice graphics, and Triple Play '96, EA's polygon based entry into the next-generation baseball market.
Last on the agenda for Thursday was Williams Entertainment, with its barrage of soon-to-be arcade hits and home conversions. The biggest surprise was a playable versoin of MK Trilogy with characters and backgrounds from all previous versions of MK. This one is for PlayStation and Nintendo 64. Also noteworthy was NBA Hangtime, very similar to NBA Jam (but different from NBA Jam Extreme shown by Acclaim), Wayne Gretzky Hockey for Nintendo 64, War Gods, a 3-D shooter, and Robotron X, the modern sequel to this arcade classic, available also for PlayStation.
Also launched at E3 is Bandai's World Pippin Player. To be launched this fall at an MSRP of $599, the Pippin will be positioned as TV set top internet box, rather than a dedicated. game machine. For $599, you get the unit, a controller, a keyboard, and a 28.8 modem. One of the initial products to be released will be a version of Netscape specifically designed for Pippin.
Since it is PowerPC based, it has somewhat compatibilty with current MacOS software. Bungie Software was running Marathon 2, 100% screen, low-res, at approximately 20 fps. The system comes with 5 Megabytes of RAM, one of these dedicated to the system software. Bandai is ready to compete with Sega for the TV-top internet box market.
E3 - Friday May 17
Sega Matches Sony Price, 3DO?, Atari?, Playmates Readies Burning Road, Crystal Dynamics' Pandemonium, and Much More
Walking in the doors of the convention center on Friday, we were quick to notice Sega employees holding $199 Saturn signs. Yes, Sega has officially lowered their price to match Sony. However, the unit will remain black, unlike its Japanese counterpart.
In addition to the Psygnosis stuff previewed yesterday, it is worth mentioning that Destruction Derby 2 was accidentally omitted. Although early, this one promises to deliver better control, multiple terrains, more realistic cars, and improved Physics models, allowing more realistic crashes.
3DO had four kiosks at the Panasonic booth, showing Lucienne's Quest, an RPG, Two US Gold Olympic Games, and a 25% complete version of Ultimate MK3, which if what was shown was actually game footage, will not be able to compete with the Saturn and PS versions, as the framerate was painfully low.
Atari was absent from the floor, although they were supposed to have a booth.
Closing out third parties today, the first stop was Playmates. It was hard not to notice Burning Road, Playmates answer to Saturn Daytona for PS. Graphically the games are quite similar, with Burning Road easily getting the nod, as the popup was less severe (it was present though), and the game was full screen. Featuring a two player link mode, this game is sure to be a hit when released. Other games shown by Playmates were Earthworm Jim 2, a more colorful version of the Genesis game with CD music, Skeleton Warriors, VMX Racing, a motocross dirt bike racer, and Battle Arena Toshinden 2.
Next stop was Vic Tokai, showcasing many projects like Abuse, a side scrolling shooter featuring 360 degrees full freedom, and Dark Rift, Vic Tokai's entry into the 3-D genre. The most impressive game shown by Vic Tokai was Corpse, a 3-D game similar to Resident Evil for Saturn.
EIDOS, the newly formed alliance between US Gold, Core, and Domark, was showcasing there Olympic suite, featuring Olympic Soccer, Dream Team Basketball, and Olympic Summer Games, the most impressive of the three, featuring polygon based sports action. Also shown were Hulk, and Tomb Raider, which were very early and needed work.
ASCII showcased, along with the typical suite of controllers, Kings Field II, the sequel to Kings Field, reviewed in a previous version of IGF. We can say it stays true to its predecessor.
Sunsoft had three games shown, Albert Gaiden, an RPG for Saturn, Kart Duel, and Galaxy Fight, a well-animated 2-D fighter for Neo Geo CD and Saturn.
Crystal Dynamics' Pandemonium for PS was one of the best games at the show. Featuring a rendered 3-D environment with a rotating camera, this game featured great animation and action. Supposedly HBO Comics are being used for the voices in the game. Also shown were Titan Wars, a 3-D space flying game, 3-D Baseball, one of seemingly a thousand unimpressive baseball games at the show, Blood Omen, Legacy of Kain, a dark gothic Zelda game.
Virgin announced the future release of Command and Conquer for the Saturn and Macintosh CD. NHL Powerplay was showcased, and as previewed in the new issue of Intelligent Gamer was quite impressive. Like all other companies, Virgin had Grand Slam '96, its own next generation baseball title. Spot Goes to Hollywood was further along in development. Nanotek Warrior was a first person flying shooter, similar in several respects to the Tempest games. Also shown were Black Dawn, a flight sim, F1 Challenge, a Saturn F1 racer with excellent graphics similar to the old Super Monaco GP arcade hit, Hyper 3-D Pinball, and Grid Runner, a head to head 3-D platformer.
Last for the day was Konami. Titles shown were Project Overkill, Contra, Policenauts, a video demo of Kumite, and NFL Full Contact. Konami's main focus seemed to be the sports titles as there were more sports titles present than any other.
On a side note, IG would like to congratulate Next Generation's Christian Svensson for his well deserved victory in Nintendo's Press Tetris Attack competition.
Welp, thats all for the third parties. Be sure to check out today's Sony and Nintendo reports.
E3 - Friday May 17
Sony PlayStation Set To Become "Mass-Market" Item
Having shipped 5 million units worldwide, with 1.2 million in the US alone, and 7 million total software units sold, Sony is set with its 199 dollar price point to mass market the PlayStation. Sony is set big with 50 million dollars set aside solely for the purpose of advertising.
Tucked away underneath the steps in a box was the Black PlayStation, sold in Japan as the hobby development system. The focus of this release is to provide a development system for those people (in Japan only for now) who would like to develop PS games in their spare time.
Another surprising, yet much anticipated announcement was Sony's switch to normal jewel-sized casings for their games. No longer will Sony use those bulky and large Sega-style cases for their games.
Gamewise, Sony came on strong. Sony's main focus was Crash Bandicoot. Featuring 25 levels plus bonus levels, and hollywood style animation, Crash was little more than hype. Incredible 3-D graphics and animation masked otherwise mediocre and uninteresting play mechanics. Hopefully, Universal will remedy this problem before bringing the game to market in September.
Jumping Flash 2 was essentially Jumping Flash 1 with minor cosmetic changes and interface adjustments, as well as new levels. The changes are for the better though, as the game now plays much easier.
NCAA Gamebreaker featured college football on an improved GameDay engine. Thus it plays well, has excellent sound effects, and can be quite fun.
Sony's first RPG scheduled to be released in the U.S. mid summer is Beyond the Beyond. Next on schedule will be Arc The Lad, coming this winter.
Epidemic, the U.S. version of Kileak 2, features new textures, a higher framerate, more weapons, and a much more detailed 3-D engine. The game is a vast improvement over its predecessor.
Jet Moto is set to be a realistically playing Jet Ski game, with similar play mechanics to Twisted Metal, featuring multiple physics models to create a lifelike experience.
Now only if the graphics could be as realistic. It does have a split screen a link mode for multiple player action though.
Square's first U.S. distributed title, Tobal #1 was early, had promising play potential. Graphically however, this game was not up to snuff with most 3-D fighters like Tekken, with flat shaded, blocky, polygons.
Twisted Metal 2 was early but featured several gameplay improvements over the original. Bogey Dead 6 was a somewhat decent flight simulator style flying game. Tunnel B-1 was an underground version of Quarantine, featuring first person driving/shooting action.
SNK conversions were present for PS. The first two were Samurai Shodown 3, at 25% and King of Fighters 95, at 80%. Both games were almost perfect conversions graphically. The gameplay is still being tweaked however, and there was a slight problem with loading time.
Horned Owl, Sony's Virtua Cop style shooter, will be released in America in the coming months. Blast Chaser was a 4-player competitive action game.
Mario Andretti Racing, at 80% completion, featuring excellent graphics in its F1 style racing engine, but as of the alpha version shown, lacked in the gameplay area to other established games like Daytona.
Disruptor was a 3-D style maze shooter in the doom genre. Bubsy 3D was early, but promised to bring Bubsy to the next level.
2Xtreme was the sequel to ESPN Extreme, with a pumped up framerate to make the action better.
