The Greatest (Trade) Show on Earth

Ok, considering I haven’t been too EVERY trade show on earth, and in fact, I’ve only been to a couple outside the US, my title might be pretty wrong.  But damn, E3 is awesome!  Imagine, if you will, a giant convention center full of massive high definition screens, young enthusiasts, celebrities, booth babes and people in outlandish costumes all set to a bone-jarring clash of music and sounds.  That’s E3.  Sure, it’s not for everyone but for those who love video games and interactive media, it’s pretty much heaven on earth.

If you don’t know, E3 is one of the biggest trade shows for the electronic entertainment industy.  That means video games and computer games plus some other tech that is tangentally related. All the makers of the aforementioned come on out and show off their latest/greatest projects or feature existing games for some extra media attention.  The show is designed to engage all your senses (except for smell and taste, thank god!) and it does it very well by blitzing your eyes and ears with an over the top audio visual experience that would shame most “IMAX” theaters.  And then there’s the whole free to play arcade aspect.  Most publishers have stations where you can play with their newest games to your hearts content, giving a taste of games to come.

It’s really hard to put a show like this into words, so I’m going to focus on a few things that I found to be most cool, either from a fun standpoint, an aesthetic standpoint, or a “cool new hardware” standpoint.  None of this can come close to communicating the experience;  all I can say is, if you like video games, if you like spectacles–find a way to attend, period.  On the other hand, if you hate sound, crowds, loud noises and bright lights, you may not want to be anywhere near LA for the next show.

One of the cooler tech products I saw was from a company called Peregrine. They’ve developed a glove with different hot spots on it that can be mapped to keyboard macros, hotkeys, etc. It’s useful for video games–they were demoing its use on Warcraft 3–but it can be used for just about any other program since the interface uses standard keyboard input software. In a way, it was almost disappointing, not for what it was but for what it could be. Currently, different hotspots on the glove allow you to bend your fingers and touch combinations, allowing up to 30 something unique inputs. What it doesn’t do, and what would be awesome, is if it was motion sensitive and recognized gestures along with the commands. I bet that’s on the drawing board as it seems a natural extension of the technology. That said, it was still very cool especially since it made the keyboard almost unnecessary. A tool like that in combination with a drawing tablet would be awesome for digital illustrators, I think. Here’s a pic of the prototype they were showing at the show:

Protoype of the Peregrine glove

A big highlight for me was watching the newly released Star Wars: The Old Republic trailer at the show. I’m a Star Wars fan, I love Bioware games, and I enjoy MMO’s so this thing is the perfect confluence of everything that is awesome for me. The trailer was played on the huge screen at EA’s booth, and when I say huge, I’m talking ginormous! I have no idea of the actual dimensions, but it was easily as big as an IMAX screen with a kicking sound system that had subwoofers built into the floor. As soon as the music started, i was swooning and as the story played out and the graphics and game play elements started flashing, I almost cried with joy (i know, pathetic, but there it is). And everyone around me seemed to feel the same way, which just made the whole thing cooler. Out of everything I saw, this made me drool the most. I did the have the presence of mind to snap a pic, poor as it may be. I’m sure you can find the trailer online at this point, and if you’re into Star Wars, you should definitely check it out.:

Star Wars: The Old Republic

And here’s a list of other cool stuff in no particular order: Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo had awesome booth presences; giant arcades full of giant screens and playable games. That said, Nintendo’s won, imo, for style: it looked like their booth was designed by Apple. The Ghostbuster game looks totally sweet and made me add the movie to my Netflix queue. Batman: Arkham Asylum: I thought I wouldn’t be interested, but the gameplay and controls are genuinely interesting. Dragon Age: Origins–yet another RPG that I must play, despite my vow to avoid fantasy themed stuff forever–at least there were no obvious elves. From the “WTF!? Department”, Sony’s Fat Princess video game. It actually looks pretty fun/funny. The DC UNiverse online MMO looks super sweet, and all we saw was a pre-Alpha build. I haven’t played many FPS games lately, but if I pick another one up, its going to be Modern Warfare 2. Very cinematic and intense looking. I’m not a Rock Band person, generally speaking, but the Beatles Rock Band demo we saw makes me want to be one.

You know what the best part is? Aside from getting to check out all the cool new stuff, we actually got a lot of work done! When your job and your personal passions coincide, life can be really sweet. Now if I can just figure out how to get them to buy me a Segway, my geeky dream life will be complete!