• Small Talk – Daniel Radcliffe (2 of 2)

    In his latest movie, The Woman In Black, Dan traded his Hogwarts uniform for a totally new role as a Dad.

  • #freshpresslive – feb 10/12

    Natalia brings you the latest news on Adele’s interview with Anderson Cooper, Kristen Bell’s interview on Ellen is auto tuned, Ladyhawke’s latest music video and much more!

  • #freshpresslive – Feb 8/12

    Natalia discusses what’s new with Pharrell Williams and her thoughts on Karl Lagerfeld’s mean comments towards Adele’s weight. She also shows a roster of animals behaving like humans and, wait until you see the new size of coffee available at Starbucks!

  • #freshpresslive – Feb 7/12

    Natalia dishes the latest news on the Juno Awards nominees, the upcoming Spiderman 3D film starring Emma Stone and Andrew Garfield and is Katy Perry hooking up with Tim Tebow? Watch today’s episode to find out.

  • Small Talk – The Kooks (2 of 2)

    When The Kooks are in the studio they’re focused and most importantly, sober. Watch Hugh and Luke explain their reasoning below.

  • Small Talk – The Kooks (1 of 2)

    The Kooks released a new album called “Junk of the Heart,” and you would think Hugh and Luke would be very excited about it. Well, they seemed rather indifferent to be honest. We spoke about that and why they don’t care about critics.

  • #freshpresslive – Feb 2/12

    Natalia dishes the latest in entertainment news on Joan Rivers, Lana Del Rey and a brand new trailer for the movie Hunger Games.

  • #freshpresslive – Feb 1/12

    Natalia talks about how Snooki might be pregnant, Nicolas Cage’s Cage Rage, Elisabetta Canalis is dating Steve-O and more for Feb 1, 2012.

  • #freshpresslive – Jan 31/12

    Natalia dishes the news on Miley Cyrus breaking her tailbone, a 100 year old woman who plays the Nintendo DS to stay young and Houston, Texas contemplating a statute of Beyonce.

  • #freshpresslive – Jan 30/12

    David Beckham debuts a new line of underwear, the worst dressed celebrity – Shy’m and Matthew Broderick is back as Ferris Bueller with a brand new commercial airing during the Super Bowl on Feb 5th 2012.

  • Small Talk – Daniel Radcliffe (1 of 2)

    Daniel Radcliffe is back with his new movie The Woman In Black. It’s a bone chilling remake of a film from the ’80s. Ironically, Daniel actually scares very easily but he’s not afraid of ghosts. In this interview he tells us what really gives him the creeps.

  • Small Talk – Graffiti6 (2 of 3)

    Next time you’re struggling to make conversation, try asking this question: “If you could invite anyone (living or dead) to the perfect house party, who would it be?”

  • Small Talk – Graffiti6 (1 of 3)

    Graffiti6 is starting to make their North American invasion, and they are hitting up the Tonight Show. Does this sound familiar? Well the Beatles made the exact same journey over 40 years ago. Naturally, @jordans_life had to make some comparisons.

  • Small Talk – Nick Carter (3 of 3)

    Nick plays World of Warcraft. Not only that, he’s the head of his guild, demonstrating that it IS possible to juggle being a hardcore gamer with being a top-selling recording artist.

  • Small Talk – Nick Carter (2 of 3)

    During a LIVE interview on andPOP.com Nick Carter gave out a number and took phone calls from his fans. These were real phone calls from real fans who we gave exclusive access to one of the biggest recording artists of our generation.

  • Small Talk – Nick Carter (1 of 3)

    There were great questions about music, fitness, the backstreet boys but the most popular question, however, was about his underwear. In this clip Nick talks about his his ‘Haynes’ and covering his fans with glow in the dark paint.

  • Small Talk – Hedley (2 of 2)

    When releasing new music today, half the battle is online promotion. However, contests, signed merch and giveaways aren’t always the best solutions. When working on their latest album, Hedley came up with a brilliant idea, they decided to make trailers.

  • Small Talk – Hedley (1 of 2)

    It’s hard to prepare for an interview with Hedley. So in this interview, we threw caution to the wind, got a 24 of beer and broadcast the interview live on our USTREAM (andPOP.tv). Eventually Jacob, Dave and @jordans_life ended up talking about hairy legs, their newest music video and more.

  • Small Talk – Marina and The Diamonds (2 of 2)

    Diamandis from Marina and The Diamonds talks to us about her very serious disease. It’s called synaesthetic. And we lied, it’s not a disease. More like a cool condition. Diamandis explains further.

  • Small Talk – Neverest

    Would you be embarrassed if someone scrolled through your iPod? We sit down with Spee and Brendan to talk about the diverse music on their playlist.

 
 


Gamer’s Mind Blog: Game Ranting

Posted by Josh Salem on June 8th, 2009

electronicentertainmentexpoHey andPOPpers, Josh here again and today, I think I’ll rant about the big news of the month, E3. The Electronic Entertainment Expo, the biggest North American video game trade show came and went, and with it, a slew of previews we all expected to see as well as a few big surprises came our way. While I was unable to attend this year, I watched from the comfort of my couch and desk as the news rolled in, and while I got excited for what’s coming our way I couldn’t help but get a little disappointed that while the people there had to deal with crowds, line-ups and costs, they would ultimately be the ones to say they played these games a year or even more before they came out.

So for the past week I’ve been watching the live E3 press releases of the big three: Nintendo, Sony, and Microsoft; and I must say, for the most part I was surprisingly impressed with what was announced and shown at these press conferences.

To start off, let’s take a look at Microsoft. They not only snaked away Final Fantasy 13 as an exclusive from Sony, but to my surprise, they also have the new Metal Gear Solid Rising coming out for Xbox 360 as well as PS3 and PC! Rockband Beatles, Tony Hawk Ride (with skateboard controller) and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare was also all announced as Microsoft held the first press conference, but all these titles were also to be debuting on other systems as well. So what did Microsoft have to show that would make me proud to be an Xbox owner? The announcement of Crackdown 2 perhaps? Left 4 Dead 2?!!! Already? I had no idea! Forza 3 (of course Microsoft needed something to combat GT5), and not only a preview of Halo: ODST but the brand new announcement of an entirely new Halo game altogether called Halo: Reach. Now, as of writing this blog up, we do not know what Reach is, or even what kind of game it will be, but my assumption is that if it is being announced along side ODST, it will not be a first person shooter, but I could be entirely wrong. **EDIT: it IS a first person shooter!** Aside from Alan Wake (we all knew it was coming), that wrapped up what Microsoft had in store with regards to their software, now what about hardware? The introduction of Last.FM for Xbox Live gold members, Sky (like NetFlix) for UK gamers, and oh ya, 1080P NetFlix in 18 countries! Other expansions to Xbox Live include connectivity with Facebook, and what’s this? Project NATAL? Full body motion control? No need for a controller or wand or anything? Voice recognition, facial recognition? This is all too much to handle… or is it? Dun dun dunnnnn.

Moving onto Nintendo, we were shown a lot of the DSi and Wii Motion Plus yada yada yada, they keep talking about what we already know, does Nintendo have nothing new to show this year? They do. And by golly was it a surprise to me at least! Cammie Dunaway first blows my mind with statistics; video games sell more than music and box office movies combined? A few kids games are shown, girl games and BAM we’re whacked in the face with a brand new FOUR player simultaneously Wii Super Mario game! We’re shown Mario, Luigi, and two Toads (Toadaie?) competing for mushrooms and coins. Red Steel 2, Tiger Woods 10, Wii Sports Resort, Mario and Luigi RPG 3 announced… nothing really new for a while during their press conference until bam (again), Final Fantasy: Crystal Bearers for the Wii, Sin and Punishment 2, and Kingdom Hearts for the DS. More ho hum games announced, Mario vs. Donkey Kong and Wario for the DSi with user created content… not my favourite, if I wanted to make my own game, I may just do that. I feel Nintendo is trying to jump on the user created content bandwagon too little too late. Here’s where it gets good, Super Mario Galaxy 2! Sure it looks exactly like the original Galaxy, but this time, you can ride Yoshi, and besides, any new Galaxy game is good enough for me! The big announcement that totally caught me off guard however, Metroid: Other M! a new Metroid title that looks deeper into Samus Aran’s past!!! Oh ya, and a finger sensor for the Wii to check your pulse… what?

Finally Sony’s press conference was coming up. We heard rumors and saw pictures of the new slim PS3 and PSP Go, would they make an appearance? Well, the PSP Go did, and the CEO of Sony kept making jokes about all their secrets being leaked… way to throw us off Mr. CEO! To start off they talk about Uncharted 2, of course, the only real PS3 exclusive anyone has seen more than a few minutes of, let’s just hope Sony didn’t put all their eggs into one basket (or two if you include God of War 3). What’s this? They still think 256 players can play simultaneously in MAG? They must be MAD!!! (see what I did there?) . They go on to talk about PSP titles, Dissidia (the Final Fantasy fighter), Castlevania: Bloodlines, Hannah Montana, and what’s this? Gran Tourismo PSP (with 800 cars), Resident Evil Portable, and what what what? Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker! A PSP MGS title that has Big Boss and what looks like 3 other snakes (Solid, Liquid, and Solidus perhaps?) playing in a true metal gear solid portable sequel taking place 10 years after MGS3. Will it be a four player co-op game? I sure hope so! LittleBigPlanet and Jak and Daxter also coming out on the PSP. They then go on to talk about Final Fantasy 13 and show a new trailer for it followed by… what? An announcement for Final Fantasy 14?!!!? Another MMORPG it seems, but since I just quit FF11 three days ago, I eagerly await more news! Sony goes on to talk about more user created content along the lines of LBP, a new game called Mod Nation Racers, and it’s exactly what you would guess, you create the racer, you create your car, you even create the track you race on, it’s a pretty kart racer, other than creating your own content, nothing really special. The third and final game from the creators of ICO, The Last Guardian has a chicken puppy working with a child to do god knows what, but it is pretty and fairly artistic, what we expected. Following this game preview we were given a glimpse of Gran Tourismo 5. Nothing special here. And finally, a 5 minute demo of God of War 3; now, while we all saw trailers for GOW3 and were expecting something big, right when the demo was getting good, they cut it off and from what I saw, it wasn’t anything revolutionary or special, just more of the same fun God of War gore. Good enough for me, but for how much longer. So, Sony, whom I thought would be the weakest of the three this year came out with a bunch of surprises even after the leak of the PSP Go, but wait, they had one more little thing to show me. What I thought to be the biggest showing so far, Playstation motion control! Using a colour changing wand with buttons, players are given 1:1 tracking along with the Playstation eye which lets your magical wand become anything you want, a golf club, gun, sword, you can even achieve first person views with it! Take two wands and enjoy if you like! All very exciting stuff.

So there you go, the big guns of the big three, I apologize if my writing is very sporadic but I wrote this as I was watching the press conferences, so any hiccups you see can be translated into excitement for myself! I cannot wait to see how these games and features expand and grow and I full heartedly look forward to the next two years of gaming, they’re going to be magical! What I always enjoyed most about E3 was never really the games themselves, the trailers or demos for the games, but rather the excitement of the press releases. Only in these meetings do you get to see old stuffy CEOs in business suits get overly excited about content I find interesting as well. I also greatly enjoy the surprises they throw at us year after year whether it be a great kept secret, or surprise guests, watching these press releases might very well be the most exciting aspect of the video game industry. Yes, I realize this is not really game rant, but hey, my blog, I talk about what I want!

So what were your biggest surprises and letdowns of E3 this year? Leave a comment; let us know what you thought of the revitalized gaming expo?


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Categories: Blogs, Gamer's Mind Blog, Gaming


  • http://www.epinions.com/review/Nintendo_DSi_Black_Console/content_471199485572 Reuben Gathright

    The Nintendo DSI is a definite improvement over the older Nintendo DS because it has bigger dual screens and two integrated 640×480 cameras. You will also like the web browser.

    http://www.epinions.com/review/Nintendo_DSi_Black_Console/content_471199485572

  • sarge-ak47

    You know what! i commend you for telling like it is, I did see tons of wii titles I wanted to own! It wasnt all mario and metriod as most people reported.

    My biggest surprise was Metroid the other M.. Team ninja and metroid?? Awesome!

    Biggest let down was Gran Turismo PSP.. just not that excited..and it seems like its lost its buzz… but i could be wrong.
    that and the heavy focus on Tween gaming… sigh.. I can take casual just not that crap.