A little handy news post which we’ll update throughout the day and through the Sony press conference with news from the Games Convention over in Germany, which starts (properly) today.
6.35pm. And, after a crazy bit of German SingStar, that’s it. Fireworks indeed.
6.20pm. Yawn. Check this out.
6.15pm: FIFA. There’s going to be an Interactive World Cup, from October 2007 to May 2008.
6.07pm: Still on PSP. Go! Messenger and Go! Explore.
6.00pm: PSP Slim out early September. We reckon the 5th. Yep, 5th confirmed.
5.55pm: GT 5 Prologue: 16 players online in races, and 1080p/60fps confirmed, with 50 cars and five tracks. New trailer. Now some PSP games which we’ll not bother covering, except to say Wipeout Pulse looks lovely.
5.50pm: Now it’s Buzz, everything on the one disk, you select the topics you want. It’s online. It’s a bit like the PS2 one but with better graphics and more disk space, but with future proofing via downloadable question packs. Not sure how that’s everything on the one disk, but there you go.
5.45pm: Finally, some games. Heavenly Sword date confirmed as we said earlier today, Uncharted is shown, SingStar, Warhawk, Lair, Eye of Judgement, GT 5 Prologue. All confirmed for before Christmas. Nice. We might finally get SingStar, then.
5.40pm: PlayTV details – the unit itself is tiny, and allows you to record one channel and watch another at the same time. Takes full 1080p signals, right down to SD. The EPG is really quick (and gorgeous) and also supports the PSP with both live feeds and pre-recorded stuff. It’s now being demoed.
5.35pm: We’ve just got the press releases for PlayTV and all the other embargoed stuff, we’ll update later. In the meantime, it’s PSN time: nearly 650,000 accounts, with a download tie ration of 12:1, which is great. 4M Euro in wallet spending. Wow.
5.30pm: They’re showing a graph of sales across Europe. “All the growth trend lines are upward.” Plenty of sales chat – Motorstorm and Resistance obviously the best sellers so far. Over 65 titles will be available in Europe by Christmas. In total, we presume, and not new ones.
5.24pm: It’s on. It’s a PS3 games montage, as usual.
5.22pm: Embargo over: PlayTV (below) and Buzz PS3 (online) news coming soon.
5.15pm: Ok, places please.
5pm: It starts in 30 minutes. Right.
4.55pm: Looks like Microsoft cancelled their little get-together. Odd. Anyway, 5 minutes to go…
4.15pm: Here’s the MGS 4 trailer – not great quality, but well worth a watch.
3.40pm: Just a few bits from the Activision conference: Call of Duty 4 will launch here on the 5th of November, and Tony Hawk is looking great, as we said in our preview yesterday. It’s the Microsoft conference now, so we’re off for a cup of tea. Back at 5pm.
2pm: We’ve just had it confirmed that Heavenly Sword will be out in the UK on the 14th of September, and a week later throughout the rest of Europe.
1.45pm: Just had an email from Sony saying the Folklore demo is up now for download on the European PSN, for a limited time only. Presumably will be mentioned during the Sony Press Conference later today, too.
12.35pm: OK, Hideo Kojima’s on stage. Damn, it’s the same MGS 4 trailer as E3. He’s still planning on a Worldwide release. Oops, trailer doesn’t have any voices. Trailer stopped, gameplay demonstration showing instead. It’s live, but it’s the same environment we’ve all seen before, including the nude statue bit. A new trailer will be shown tomorrow, oddly. And that’s it.
12.15pm: Konami conference has started. A well-known franchise is heading to the DS, more soon… Lots of stuff for Wii, PS2, 360… Now they’re showing PES 2008 – it’s the PS3 version, and looks lovely. PES 2008 will have a new AI learning feature called Team Vision. DS game is Track and Field. Phew, MGS 4 exclusivity retained… :p
11am: First movie from Gran Turismo 5 Prologue:
10.45am: Codemasters have announced (finally) Operation Flashpoint 2 which will be out on PS3, 360 and PC. First screens here.
10.30am: The Ubisoft conference was a pile of shit for hardcore gamers, with the only new games announced being Wii and DS casual shovelware. New shots for Haze distributed to media, though, so we’ll have a nosey at the press kit later. On a not related note, the first gameplay video of Pro Evolution Soccer 2008 is available.
9.15am: Gran Turismo 5 Prologue will be compatible with the Dual Shock 3, or whatever it ends up being announced as later today. This doesn’t mean the controller will be out in October, though, at least that’s not confirmed yet.
9am: Haze is confirmed for 30fps, which was to be expected, but a bit of a departure from the 60fps Timesplitters series. Home will see a version integrated into the PSP’s XMB, for the ultimate in remote play, and the Dual Shock 3 will be announced tonight at the press conference. From the EA conference, it looks like FIFA 08 will be 60fps, with uploadable replays (a la Skate) and will come with 15000 real life, fully modelled players.