Ping: E3 peanut gallery
 

Still three weeks 'til the show, but I have confirmation of meetings with the following companies:

Konami
Majesco
Akella
1C
Atlus
D3Publisher
EA
Activision
Codemasters
RedOctane
Bethesda
Midway
Eidos
Sony Online Entertainment
NCSoft
Microsoft (actually six separate half-hour meetings)
Crave
Natsume

I am awaiting confirmation from Sony, and then my schedule is Officially Booked(tm).

There are two or three others who are outside shots; if we land any of 'em, I'll post them here.

Keeping in mind that these are companies whose wares we'll definitely be seeing (I don't know how restrictive the booths in Barker Hangar will be for companies we aren't confirmed with), are there any titles in particular you guys would like me to focus on with hands-on previews?

Feel free to start a list for me here; some of them will likely be slam dunks, but you can post 'em anyway. Who knows; there might be something you guys overwhelmingly want to know about that's not really on my radar at the moment.

As I said, still three weeks 'til the show, so feel free to pop something in here at any time between now and July 10, but I just figured I'd use you guys as a sounding board.

Rock Band if you can, GTA 4 (if Rockstar is even there) and GH3

If Eidos is showing off Age of Conan, I'd love to hear more about it.

Since you have 1C listed, really interested in King's Bounty - The Legend.

Other than that, the 2 expected - Spore and Assassin's Creed.

Plus, Project Offset. Heard that team was going to be at E3.. but, not sure.

I'd be interested in seeing more info about Star Trek Online.

Jagged Alliance 3.

Edit: I meant Fallout 3, not sure where my brain was at.

Well you already have the obvious one covered: Bethesda for Fallout 3!

DeTox - yes, there will be a Rock Band preview. It will be up either as soon as the embargo lifts on 7/11, or after my second meeting with EA on 7/13. Take Two will be at E3, although I don't know if they'll be showing GTA IV.

They're one of the holdouts I referenced. I think it's fairly likely that GH3 will *be* RedOctane's show, although they could surprise me.

Atocep - Eidos has invited me to an "Age of Conan" after party, so I have to think they'll be showing it off. I'll see what's up.

WVUFAN - who's handling that? It's not on my radar (which is why I'm asking for input!).

Tigercat - yeah, Fallout 3 and Rock Band are easily atop my list of "titles that cause irrational glee" list. There's a couple other obvious ones, I'd imagine, but it's always nice to know what people want to read about.

Purpetual Entertainment. I think they're doing Gods and Heroes as well.

http://www.startrekonline.com

Here's some of what they're working on:

Is blizzard showing up? If so, any look you could get at starcraft 2 would wet my appetite!

Any info you could get on The Agency would rock assuming SOE will have an update on it.

Travis - I'll see what I can see.

Blade - Fairly sure Blizzard is doing BlizzCon and giving E3 the finger this year.

WVUFAN - that's the developer; do you know who's publishing? It'll make a difference as to whether or not I can expect to see it.

Star Trek Online; If I recall, they are publishing themselves, or at least they haven't inked a publishing deal with anyone else and don't necessarily plan to (but may) in the future.

If that's the case, they won't be there. At least, they aren't named on the list of current attendees.

Yea, they are a small development group. They have only done one other game, a Rome MMORPG, that is being published by Sony.

Updated with Activision's confirmation.

Not sure who is involved in what areas of it (assuming it's Sony, not SOE), but another one I'm curious about is Afrika (haven't heard of it going by a new name as of yet).

Now that SOE is publishing Pirates of the Burning Sea, and I see you have a meeting with em, get all the goodies you can on that one!

There's a live chat going on with the devs right now if you want in, Coffee.

And I'm there. :)

Awesome. I would be too, but I just got the email about an hour ago, and my connection keeps dropping abruptly.

I'm only at work for another 40 minutes. Shame.

NCSoft is getting added to this list, although it will be Jason attending that meeting; day and time is still under negotiation.

Updated to firm up NCSoft.

I'm chasing Microsoft's tail (or some suitably mixed metaphor) on a meeting with them; my previous contacts will no longer BE my contacts in about two days, so they're directing everything to new people. Joy.

Also on the merry-go-round with Sony.

Did get one bit of good news, though - invited to the Nintendo press briefing. Yay!

On the verge of finalizing Microsoft. They'll have stuff at Barker Hangar, although the way my schedule is shaping up, I'll have very little time on the show floor proper. That's going to be a first for me.

Microsoft, now, I had to actually request specific stuff; looks like, if I get what I requested, I'll be seeing everything important except Fable 2, which I just won't be able to shoehorn in there.

I'll be curious to hear your impressions from the Midway meeting. Feel free to PM me your thoughts on anything that's still unannounced...

Unannounced in what sense? Like, games? Or meetings?

Penultimate update. Still awaiting a go/no-go from Sony.

Games. I'm not entirely certain if our game (Surreal Software) is being shown to anyone at E3, but I strongly suspect it will be, as well as perhaps a few other Midway studio games.

As indicated above Age of Conan and Fallout 3. Too bad you won't see Fable2 as that is looking to be great. At least I hope it is, loved the first one.

Anything on Two Worlds and Mass Effect?

Gramm, my contact for Two Worlds hasn't said a word about being at E3, so I have to think 'nope.'

Especially since it's due out in July, IIRC.

Mass Effect is one of the six meetings I've got scheduled with MS, though. You'd better believe I'm excited for that.

Woo :D

SI

Crave and Natsume added. I know you guys are breathless with anticipation over Brunswick Pro Bowling for Wii.

Could be cool to have a more dedicated bowling game, though of all the Wii Sports games I thought bowling was the best.

Reminds me. You getting anything from EA/Mythic for Warhammer?

Not sure, Warlord. My EA appointments confirmation lists 'and others' for the hotel suite appointment, but neither Barker Hangar nor hotel lists Warhammer specifically. I shall investigate.

Konami contacted us this morning. Waiting to hear back from them on available appointment slots, but that may be an unexpected bonus addition to this list.

Updated for the addition of Konami.

When you see Microsoft, tell them to fix their crappy motherboards on the 360. :mad: I'm now sending back my second one due to hardware failure. It can't cost that much more to use a quality solder.

Hopefully I will get it mailed out and back before NCAA 08 comes out.

So, when you go to the appointments, do you get to play the games or just watch a demo and get information?

Gramm, it depends on the appointments.

The Microsoft appointments, for example, could go either way. Last year, I had meetings relating to Mass Effect, Too Human, Viva Pinata and Gears of War. Gears was playable, everything else was a developer demo + Q&A.

Konami tells me that our appointment with them this year is in developer demo form, with the potential for hands-on play if time allows.

Several others I can point to (such as, say, EA) are very likely hands-on demos.

If you can find out anything more on either of the Final Fantasy Tactics games coming out, that'd be awesome :) If not, no worries.

Jason is a FFwhore. I'm sure he'll finagle some information on it one way or the other.

Anything cool or new regarding this year's PES/WE would be appreciated. :)