Kinect

Another E3 has come and gone, leaving gamers and journalists equally dizzy with anticipation. We saw dozens upon dozens of titles at the big show but only a few can be called "best of."

We've wracked our brains to bring you the 20 titles we were most excited about in an easy-to-use slideshow. Not sure you agree with us? Make sure to sound off in the comments section below or click on over to see if the title you're most excited about landed in our short runners-up list.

Even though these titles missed our top 20, there's still plenty to look forward to from:… Read more

LOS ANGELES--Another year, another show floor filled with bright lights, thunderous music, and scantily dressed women showing off big-budget studio games. Sometimes it feels like E3 never changes.

Yet, I've been to roughly 10 E3s in my life dating back to the Sega Dreamcast debut, and in my first on-the-show visit in a few years, the landscape has subtly and definitely altered from years past.

So here are my final observations about this year's show.

Everyone wants to be accessible. The … Read more

LOS ANGELES--Look around the halls of E3 2011, and you might notice something strangely similar about many of the most-hyped games on display. There's Battlefield 3, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, Gears of War 3, Uncharted 3, and Mass Effect 3. BioShock Infinite is the third game in that series, and Skyrim is the third modern/console version of an Elder Scrolls game (technically, it's the fifth game in the series, as there were a couple of prior PC games back in the '90s). We've also spotted Saints Row: the Third, Serious Sam 3, and Ninja Gaiden 3, Deus Ex: Human Revolution (the third game in that series), and there are probably a few others I've missed.

This collection of third-timers is partially a coincidence, and partly indicative of the industry's addiction to sequels. With production and advertising budgets at or near what Hollywood movie studios have been spending for years, there's a natural, and very understandable, attraction to finding a successful formula and sticking with it.

A trilogy is also a familiar construct from the larger media world that consumers are comfortable with, and the format is useful for putting together a compelling story arc over the course of three films or novels. But while most movies quit after three outings, there's no doubt you'll be seeing a fourth chapter in many of the game franchises above within a year or two. … Read more

LOS ANGELES--One of our biggest gripes with Microsoft's controller-less motion system was the fact that it required quite of bit of real estate to function properly. A minimum of 6 feet from the camera seemed to be the sweet spot, but even at that distance we've experienced some nags with gameplay.

Small apartment living rooms like the ones we're used to in New York may now be able to accommodate Kinect with Nyko's Zoom for Kinect accessory. Thanks to a series of what we'd describe as an arrangement of wide-angle lenses, the $30 snap-on accessory sits over the standard Kinect array and drops the space prerequisite by 40 percent. That's a bold claim, so we had to try it out for ourselves.… Read more

LOS ANGELES--A year after introducing Kinect, Microsoft used this year's E3 press conference to show how it's integrating its motion-capture console add-on to Xbox Live and games, and pump up the non-gaming entertainment experience.

EA Sports, EA Games, and Ubisoft announced baked-in support for Kinect in their 2011 Xbox 360 games. Tiger Woods, Madden, FIFA, Mass Effect 3, and Ghost Recon Future Soldier will support the Kinect. Forza 4, Microsoft's racing simulator, will also support Kinect. All Tom Clancy titles from now on will be integrated with Kinect, according to Ubisoft.

We saw demonstrations of how Kinect integration will work, including players taking the reins of a horse-drawn carriage, and firing guns and reloading ammo in games using only body and hand motions and no controller. Voice integration will also be woven into many games, including Madden to call plays. A demonstration of Star Wars with Kinect showed how a player can say "lightsaber on," and then using motions, swing away with the lightsaber.

Microsoft cleaned up the look of the dashboard, and is bringing a host of new features for Xbox Live. … Read more

LOS ANGELES--Microsoft began its press conference with some gameplay demos of Modern Warfare 3, Tomb Raider, and Mass Effect 3. Though these titles certainly impressed, they'll be available on multiple consoles.

But at E3, it's exclusives that count, and Microsoft finally showcased a number of titles that will only be available on Xbox 360 and Kinect:

Xbox 360:

As we suspected, an intense Gears of War 3 demo delighted the crowd with Marcus Fenix battling a skyscraper-size alien. The game will be out in September.

Next we saw a teaser-trailer for the ancient Rome inspired Ryse that looks to feature Kinect implementation. There wasn't too much information here--just that it's being developed by the team behind the Crysis franchise, Crytek.… Read more

LOS ANGELES--Kids and games. When Tim Schafer of Double Fine stepped onstage to demo his Sesame Street-branded Kinect game today, he explained how he had his 3-year-old daughter in mind when he developed the idea.

Sesame Street, Disneyland, and more: It looks like younger and younger kids are being targeted for gaming. Both Disneyland Adventures and Sesame Street: Once Upon a Monster are Microsoft exclusives for the Kinect. Add in Kinect Fun Labs, a series of interactive toys and camera-based art apps on a single disc, and you have a clear-cut strategy for attracting the toddler crowd.

Call it the iPad Effect, or whatever you'd like, but the hands-free gaming that Kinect represents looks like Microsoft's new fertile ground for the youngest gaming set. The question is, will parents want their kids to play? … Read more

LOS ANGELES--Microsoft's E3 press conference was packed with new software and services, from Kinect-enabled games to the promise of live TV. But, at the same time, some Xbox staples were missing in action, as were some hoped-for hardware announcements.

The biggest omission was the lack of a new Halo game coming this year. After Halo 3, Halo ODST, and Halo Reach, there has been a new Halo game each of the past three years. However, Microsoft couldn't go cold turkey. Instead we get Halo: Combat Evolved: 10th Anniversary Edition, a remade version of the original Halo game with … Read more

LOS ANGELES--While last year's Microsoft E3 briefing focused on the Kinect as debut hardware, this year seems to be about integrating the Kinect more deeply into mainstream games.

EA Sports, EA Games, and Ubisoft are among the first to formally announce baked-in support for Kinect in their 2011 Xbox 360 games. Tiger Woods, Madden, FIFA, Mass Effect 3, and Ghost Recon Future Soldier--along with, according to developers, many more--will support the Kinect in unspecified ways. Forza 4, the latest iteration of Microsoft's racing simulator, will also support Kinect.

It looks like there will still be standalone Kinect games, … Read more