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Before I get into the highlights of the last day of E3 2008, I'd be remiss if I didn't mention the trade show's overall vibe. Something is missing. I plan on writing more about this next week after I've had some time to process things and I'm not so tired my that I can barely walk (read: top 5 list), but something is wrong. There are a number of different factors but could it be that the biggest factor is the absence of regular gamers? Is it because so much of the news on games is already known by E3? I'm not quite sure. After interviewing Adam Sessler this afternoon I shared a cab back to the LACC with former EGM Editor Dan Hsu who was spending the week working for G4TV. We talked about the state of E3 and he said it was almost sad. I agree.

On a brighter note, today was the best day of E3 for me. I finally got to do what I love to do at this event, instead of sitting through press conferences I got my hands on some games.

EA - My first stop was the EA suite. I tried out some of their new iPhone/iTouch games (Tetris, Scrabble and Spore) and was really impressed. The touch screen works well with all the games and the accelerometer is a feature unique to the system.

I also tried out Mercenaries 2. The game has 140 controllable vehicles and some cool highjack sequences. The big airstrikes and explosions looked sweet. The only disappointment is in its multiplayer mode, which only offers drop in and drop out co-op, no big multiplayer battles...Next I tried out Madden 09 All Play on the Wii. Usually I prefer Madden on a 360 or PS3 but the Wii version uses the Nunchuk well. My favorite feature was using the Wiimote to draw my own hot route...I took a peek at Dead Space (which looked much better up close than it did during the EA presser), Facebreaker and Mirror's Edge but they were very crowded so I never got any hands on time with them.

Midway - I checked out two games at Midway, Wheelman and Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe. Wheelman features the voice and likeness of Vin Diesel. Its set in Barcelona and is primarily a racer similar to EA's Burnout series but about 20% of the game is out of the car. There are a number of different main mission modes and side missions, motorcycles are driveable and jacking a car by jumping from one vehicle to another looks pretty cool. But the driving controls felt a little loose and the graphics were a little boxy...MK vs. DCU was a surprise, I'm not really into fighting games but the special moves were very fun to pull off. Each character (I saw Sonya, Flash, Batman Scorpion, Subzero and Superman) will have at least 6 special moves as well as a few finishing moves. I watched Superman hammer Subzero into the ground like a nail. There are also a number of level transitions, initiated by knocking a guy through a wall into another room or knocking a guy through a wall and fighting while falling 100ft.

Take Two/2K - Here I got a look at Bioshock for the PS3 and Borderlands. The Bioshock demo showed a new option for the PS3, challenge rooms. They're outside of the Bioshock narrative but certainly fit in the Rapture universe. They showed only one challenge room, a Little Sister stuck in a ferris wheel that you have to save. Some of the DLC is a puzzles like the one demo'd, others are combat...Borderlands is set on a barren planet on the outskirts of space. It was like Firefly, the video game, minus Serenity.

After visiting with 2K I headed out to the nearby G4TV studio and had a conversation with Adam Sessler. We talked about E3 and Sess was impressed with Far Cry 2, Fable 2 and Mirror's Edge. He was also dissappointed with Nintendo's showing. Adam talks so fast he fits about 2 hours of dialogue in 30 minutes so it'll take me a bit to transcribe our conversation. Look for it next week.

When I got back to the LACC I noticed I was starting to run out of time. There were about 2 hours left and I wanted to cram as much into it as I could. I played some Madden 09 (reliable as always) and Halo Wars (another impressive RTS, about the 4th I've seen this week). While wandering around the Microsoft suite I ran into Peter Molyneux and we talked for 10 minutes about Fable 2. He hit on three points where he felt his new game was much improved - Drama, Combat and its Social aspect. We ran out of time but Peter agreed to an interview in the near future.

Feeling even more pressed for time I headed over to Konami and took a look at their two new Castlevania games. But what truly caught my eye was the Rock Revolution drum kit. Its got an awfully lot of pads...I then ran over to Capcom and took a look at Bionic Commando for 5 minutes. Swinging through a half destroyed city with the grapple was very Spider-Many, and then I looked at Resident Evil 5. There were a ton of people in the room trying it out. With only 1 hour left of E3, Capcom let everyone in and everybody wanted to check it out. From the little I saw, it looked impressive....Finally I headed over to Ubisoft. I really wanted to see Far Cry 2 but ended up seeing Tom Clancy's End War. That's right, yet another RTS. The voice command feature was very unique but I was so exhausted I didn't have the energy to try it out.

Well, another E3 has come and gone and I'm completely spent. Not that this is the end of the E3 coverage. Next week look for interviews with Adam Sessler and Geoff Keighley and probably a top 5 list (Top 5 Reasons E3 is Dead) or two (Best of E3, Far Cry 2?/Worst of E3, no schwag?). Until then, I'm done. Time to go soak in the pool.

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