E3: EA Conference

Electronic Arts had a nice E3 this year with allot of good games on show and little to complain about. Although I was thinking they'd open on Battlefield 3 and end on Mass Effect 3 it was the other way around.

Mass Effect 3 started E3's press conference on a huge high note. Shepperd is fighting a humongous building since reaper with a turret and the games is looking wonderful. It's followed up with an epic trail that could get anyone excited for Mass Effect 3.

EA then announces its new service/site called Origin.com which will house trailers and exclusive content for EA and it's partners.

Need For Speed The Run is shown but with the announcement that this game will feature for the first time in the franchise the ability to leave your car. This had be somewhat excited but let down on the reveal that it was simply quick time events and button mashing. Though maybe you will be able to get out of your car and control the character yourself in the future. The Run is supposed to be using the Frostbite 2 engine but I can't tell and it defiantly isn't using it to it's potential. The Run also appears to be going for less racing and more 'we can be different like Heavy Rain' thing.

Star Wars: The Old Republic was briefly talked about but no new details were revealed, not even a release date. But they did show a new/old trailer that mashed footage from the previous two and some new stuff into one still epic trailer.

A new SSX game featuring the ability to grapple onto a helicopter to cross a gap was shown, unfortunately with no gameplay footage. None the less it also had an epic trailer and if the gameplays anything like the trailer showed count me in. It's also supposed to feature a huge open world and have used NASA tech to scan the entire world and feature every snow slope in the world to ride on. It's somewhat hard to believe but if it's anything close to the truth it'll defiantly be cool.

Finally getting some statistics into the mix EA bragged on the stats of FIFA, how many games played last year, sold ect, though not featuring any graphs (I expect to see some in Sony's Conference.) After opening the show and ripping on using celebrities onstage to hype up games we get a FIFA trailer featuring Lil Wayne but yeah okay EA we'll let that slide. EA Football Club is announced as a free service coming with FIFA 12 and will feature unique challenges and storyline games based of real life for you to play. The service will get you achievements across all platforms and you can even grow levels!

Still in the sports are where everything seems like it should be DLC EA talked about Madden 12 and showed a trailer that featured some old due yelling at you which was scary. Then with the use of the cool music from Inceptions trailer three American Football stars I've never heard of come on stage and yap on about the love and stuff that went right over my head out of simply no interest (I'm from AUS.) Much the same as FIFA, Madden is getting a social tool that also crosses with facebook.

Talking about facebook! The Sims Social was announced after a Farmville pun and it simply looks like a crappy version of the Sims on facebook where you can chat up girls on your friends list and even shower with them! No boring.

A new game called Reckoning is shown that apparently contains hundreds of hours of gameplay and you have the ability to change the fate of every character in the game and the world itself. It looked allot like Elder Scrolls/Fable and you'll be using magic and sword fighting skills in the okay looking combat. Reckoning looked interesting and I want to see more but nothing looked to amazing.

Insomniac makes there way on stage to announce there new multiplatform (previously only PS3 titles Ratchet, Resistance) game which is Overstrike. The plot description of a rogue black ops team hired to save the world seemed like something from the A-Team but I went with it. The art style looks like a more polished Team Fortress 2 but featuring Insomniacs cool weaponry. Insomniacs comedy from the Ratchet games is also featured here, a bit tongue and cheek but still humorous. Overstrike had a great trailer and looks like allot of fun but I'm hoping co-op is announced.

The last thing on EAs agenda was Battlefield 3 with a short but still epic trailer shown that featured great character animation, beautiful looks graphics and the best destructible environments I've seen. They then showed a quick trailer showing of one multiplayer map featuring in Paris that had you in a park, mid city and subway all in one map and featuring the same amount of destruction we saw in the single player. They then announced the beta coming in September and Battlefield Battlelog a Call of Duty Elite type package that is free. Nice job.



That was EAs Conference, I enjoyed it allot more than I did Microsoft's what about you?