That’s right ladies and gentlemen it’s time for the big show and New Gamer Nation is covering it for you. We just got done watching the Microsoft Press Conference live and here are our impressions so sound off and let us know if you feel the same way we do.

Conference starts with a demo of Call of Duty Modern Warfare 3
Pilot’s Impressions – We knew this game was coming and since Call of Duty: Black Ops was shown at the Microsoft Press Conference last year, this is no surprise. The game was announced and trailered before E3 so this gets no points from me.
Slacker’s Impressions – Agreed. This isn’t really much of a splash. However, Modern Warfare 3 looks amazing.

Tomb Raider reboot reveal
 Pilot’s Impressions – The game looks awesome and it should because this is just like Uncharted with Lara Croft thrown in. This was the problem with Crystal Dynamics not keeping up with the franchise. Either way I’m sure the game is going to be awesome even though we knew this was coming out.
Slacker’s Impressions – Tomb Raider does look awesome, and I’m excited for this release too. However, I’m a little skeptical. Since Crystal Dynamics has been in charge of the franchise the Tomb Raider games have been a mixed bag. I’m hoping this is a good game. It really seems to have a lot of potential.

EA Sports Kinect Annoucements
 Pilot’s Impressions – This was more of the same from EA. They announced that they would be incorporating more Kinect based elements in FIFA, Madden and Tiger Woods golf. I don’t know if the Kinect is ready for this but it’s coming. Either way it’s not very exciting.
Slacker’s Impressions – Kinect support for EA’s titles is pretty predictable. I’m more interested than excited. I’m curious to see how games like Madden and FIFA will play with the Kinect.

Mass Effect 3 Kinect Integration
 Pilot’s Impressions – Mass Effect 3 is going to be an incredibly awesome game but I’m still not sold with the Kinect integration. So you can speak the lines instead of choosing them off a menu, big deal. I also didn’t see enough squad voice commands to pique my interest. Lame.
Slacker’s Impressions – In general, I prefer to play FPS with people rather than with AI controlled bots. The voice commands will make it easier and faster to issue commands, but outside of that I’m not too impressed.

Tom Clancy: Future Solider Kinect Integration
 Pilot’s Impressions – Now this is what I’m talking about, this is brilliant use of the Kinect and this is going to make me want to get a Kinect. I really liked the “Gunsmith” options to customize your weapons but just saying it or building your own variants. This was the highlight of the conference for me.
Slacker’s Impressions – Admittedly, this does sound pretty cool. I like being able to upgrade guns with a voice command or gesture, and the Virtual Firing Range does sound interesting.

XBLA New Additions with YouTube, Live Television and Bing
 Pilot’s Impressions – Personally I don’t think I need to watch YouTube on my Xbox so for me this wasn’t anything to get excited over especially since most mobile phones do YouTube and that is a better way to go. Live TV is very interesting though the networks they have partnered with are all European / Australian TV stations and doesn’t do much for Americans where Xbox is most popular. Until they get Fox, ABC, NBC, etc. I’m not too excited about this. Lastly I hate Bing and having Bing take over my Xbox is not a welcomed thought for me. The search capability is ok but I don’t think Bing is the answer.
Slacker’s Impressions – Watching youtube from my xbox is cool, but hardly cool enough for an E3 announcement.

UFC through your Xbox
 Pilot’s Impressions – This will allow you to watch the UFC fights with stats and some social networking features. It seemed cool but they didn’t show me anything that I was jumping up and down for.
Slacker’s Impressions – I’m not that big a fan of UFC, so this didn’t excite me. However, for those that are I imagine seeing weigh ins and calling fights is another way to get into UFC, but it’s not really E3 worthy.

Gears of War 3
 Pilot’s Impressions – The game looks great and this should be a strong title for the Xbox this year. They showed us some new game play from the campaign so this was a high point for Epic and Xbox.
Slacker’s Impressions – The new demo showed a previously unseen portion of the campaign, so that’s cool. Gears of War should be a major hit, but this really isn’t a surprise.

Ryse
 Pilot’s Impressions – They really didn’t show much on this title but it was a cool trailer and it could be a good game. I am worried about the lag with Kinect and having an FPS completely controlled by the Kinect may be difficult to control. I’ll reserve judgement when I see more about this.
Slacker’s Impressions – I’m definitely interested in the concept. Being able to headbutt, stab and throw weapons all via the kinect sounds like fun.

Halo HD Remake
 Pilot’s Impressions – This was rumored to be in production and now it is officially coming out on 11/15/11. Everyone that has an Xbox played the crap out of this so it’s something that’s really cool but nothing to get too crazy for.
Slacker’s Impressions – The way things are in the gaming industry, this is no big surprise. Everything is getting HD remakes. I’m sure plenty of people will buy it, especially with the new maps, but I’m not really surprised.

Forza 4 Trailer
 Pilot’s Impressions – We knew this game was coming and frankly they showed us more last year. I was disappointed by this and Forza fans should be too. They just gave us a generic trailer with no game play and all for one of Microsoft’s best exclusives.
Slacker’s Impressions – I definitely would’ve liked to see more of Forza. Gameplay would’ve been nice.

New Fable Game: Fable the Journey
 Pilot’s Impressions – Seems like a cool game and to me seemed like Children of Eden meets Fable. I like the gesture based spell casting but again the Kinect’s lag worries me. Overall it was a high point.
Slacker’s Impressions – Pretty interested to see how the Kinect will work with this game. I’m an RPG nut, so this also excites me.

Minecraft Exclusive to Xbox
 Pilot’s Impressions – I am surprised that more people didn’t freak out about this but I think this is a big deal. With tons of more money Minecraft is going to become Microsoft’s answer to LittleBigPlanet. Big move by Xbox and my 2nd place exciting moment for Xbox.
Slacker’s Impressions – Another interesting use of the Kinect. Details weren’t released regarding the online features (if any) of the game. It’d be a lot of fun to build with friends.

Disneyland Adventures
 Pilot’s Impressions – Should be a solid kid’s game with the Disney themed Kinect Adventures mash up. I though it was cool that they re-created Disneyland in the game so that was good. Not overly impressed but I’m sure parents like the new games they can play with their kids.
Slacker’s Impressions – I’ll probably skip this title. Then again, it probably wasn’t intended for my age group. Touring a virtual DisneyLand does seem pretty cool. It should be a fun Kinect game parents can play with their kids.

Star Wars for Kinect
 Pilot’s Impressions – I don’t know about you guys but I’m done with Star Wars games and this game didn’t really seem that great to me. The controls weren’t polished and it seems like its just going to be super repetitive. I’m sure Star Wars Fans are going to be happy but I was just disappointed.
Slacker’s Impressions – I don’t own any of the games in the Star Wars Franchise, but this does seem like a fun title. Being able to deflect lasers with the wave of a hand or engage in light saber combat by waving the kinect like a light saber seem fun. It seems like a fun, interesting concept. Let’s see if that translates to the game.

Sesame Street: Once Upon a Monster
 Pilot’s Impressions – Seems like a good kids game and good use of the license. It’s not trying to be more than a kids IP and that’s a good thing. Parents will be happy everyone else will just move along. Well done Double Fine.
Slacker’s Impressions – Clearly, the early childhood age group is being targetted by Microsoft. This falls in the same realm as DisneyLand adventures. I’m sure it’s a fun game for parents to play with kids, but I’ll probably skip this one.

Kinect Fun Labs
 Pilot’s Impressions – This is really awesome because it highlights what people are doing with the Kinect outside of game labs and they are doing some awesome things. I really liked the Avatar Creator and the Finger Tracking 3D drawing tools. Very cool stuff and another reason to get a Kinect. This was my 3rd place exciting moment for the conference.
Slacker’s Impressions – Definitely cool. I like the possibility of taking photos of 3D objects and putting them into games. Taking a picture of myself, and turning it into an avatar is also fun.

Kinect Sports 2
 Pilot’s Impressions – Nothing really exciting to speak of and it really looked like crap with very laggy controls. This isn’t anything that hasn’t been done a million times better already.
Slacker’s Impressions – I’ve played the original Kinect Sports and find it incredibly addicting and easy to control. I’m sure Kinect Sports 2 will be just as much fun, but I’m not really wowwed by this.

Dance Central 2
 Pilot’s Impressions – This is a huge franchise for Kinect and they just announced the sequel. I think it’s too soon and this is going to go the way of Guitar Hero and Rock Band if they keep releasing games a year apart. I didn’t see or hear anything new coming to the franchise so I was disappointed. It’s nice that they will put in a campaign and the ability to bring over all your DLC and songs from the first game but it’s not enough for a new sequel.

The big finish: Halo 4
 Pilot’s Impressions – Too soon Microsoft, way too soon. This game isn’t coming out till Holiday 2012!! That’s over a year away and people are going to get exhausted talking about this. Sure its going to be awesome but I don’t think now was the time to talk about this. I get that it’s E3 but there wasn’t really anything to see with this so it was just a promo. Exciting but not super exciting.

Pilot’s Final Thoughts
 Overall this was a very disappointing E3 Conference from Microsoft. They didn’t have anything new and exciting to share with everyone aside from a few high points. I was really hoping Microsoft was going to sneak in and blow us away with something completely fresh. They set themselves up to have the lowest ranking conference this year. Okay Sony and Nintendo, the show is in your hands, blow us away.

Rating: ★★★☆☆☆☆☆☆☆ 

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About The Author

Joe Marchese is the founder / Editor in Chief of New Gamer Nation. He has been a gamer for his whole life but has been focusing on his passion to deliver the industry's new to New Gamer Nation. He is an expert of video game culture and has been featured on Fox News Online. Don't be shy to reach out and let him know what you think!

  • Jose

    As I was taking notes during the conference I couldn’t help but just wait for something huge. However not having the X-Box 360, I was watching it as a gamer that wanted them to give me a reasons to want and X-Box. They didn’t provide all that much, they had minor things like the UFC thing and Gears of War 3 (I’ve gone on record saying “the only reason I would get a 360 is for Gears of War”).

    Call of Duty was to be expected, as a gamer who doesn’t play First Person Shooters, much less Call of Duty, I watched it and thought that this is the kind of game I’d watch my brother play. It looks like a Call of Duty game. It’s not a knock against it, it is what it is.

    Tomb Raider got me interested to see more of it. I’m very on the fence about picking this one up still.

    EA Sports and Kinect announcements were there…I just expect more from EA’s conference.

    Mass Effect 3 got me interested in testing out the series to see if I like it. The Kinect integration was something that was mildly interesting, but it doesn’t look like that can’t be done with a bluetooth headset.

    Tom Clancy Ghost Recon Future Soldier blew me away for the first time with the Kinect. It was something that the core gamers can use a Kinect for.

    X-Box Live annoucments felt like they had done this last year only more polished. The UFC thing is definitely for that hardcore fan base with the Kinect. I would like to see if Microsoft can get a cable package with comparable to a cable company to really blow everyone away with their live TV deal.

    Ryse was an interesting looking game, but still looked more like a first person rail fighter

    I would’ve loved to seen more out of Forza 4 other than a trailer

    Mincraft I can see as a big deal, but I don’t think people will be leaving their computers to play it on the X-Box

    Disneyland and Sesame Street were the standard kid audience games.

    Star Wars again, like Ryse is a rail fighter. I don’t understand the point of doing everything else if the game moves for you.

    Fun Labs is an interesting addition to the Kinect, and I don’t know if it’s a system seller, but it’s a nice addition.

    Halo 4 being confirmed is a kind of big deal to their fans, but not being a fan I’m going to pass it up

    Overall though Microsoft played way too safe this year in their conference. I thought they really should’ve had more games on the Kinect for the core gamer. It was a good effort, but other than Halo 4, there wasn’t much in the way of surprises which they should’ve been primed for. With that said, I’m a little surprised they didn’t take a shot at the PS3 being down. And who uses Bing as a search engine?

    • Pilot

      Yeah I was taking notes too and I have to agree that Microsoft playing things way too safe and it felt like a blown opportunity to really get people excited. Instead this was like a repeat of last year with all the stress on Kinect.

      • Jose

        I wouldn’t have had a problem with them pushing the Kinect if they pushed more games for the “core” gamer. Instead more child actors, more “family” oriented games. I think Halo was the only big surprise, but it wasn’t like that’s coming out this year

        • Pilot

          Yeah overall it was a weak show for Microsoft, very disappointing.