Microsoft E3 Press Conference

Microsoft's E3 Press Conference went down pretty much as expected. They threw games out there, lots of games. Everything they didn't' show at the XBOX One reveal was shown. They showed a lot of games that were new like RYSE: Son of Rome and Titanfall as well as old favourite like Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain, a game we all knew was headed to XBox after Rising became the first Metal Gear game to crossover to Microsoft and become cross-platform. Then you've got the surprise announcements, like Killer Instinct returning this time to Xbox, which for Nintendo fanboys like myself serves as a bitter reminder of the fact that Nintendo has lost so much third party support. That being said even if it's not the same Rare that was at Nintendo, it's nice to see them reviving an old favourite once again, I look forward to smashing some skulls as Glacius. Or maybe I don't because the price point rolled around. $499...

And this is for a console that essentially bans used games and puts the power with the game publishers rather than the gamers themselves. The 24 online check in requirement and other DRM issues were not addressed at all in the conference, probably to their benefit or else they'd probably cause all kinds of issues. To be honest, had they just ditched the disc drive system, they might have avoided a lot of this hassle for themselves because that's essentially what they're doing, but discs are still around and I literally can't remember the last PC game I bought that had a disc, it's all steam or formerly Direct2Drive for me.

Now speaking as a person who before the reveal, wanted so badly to be excited for the next XBox and for their E3 presentation. I am not an XBox guy, I have never owned a Microsoft games console but I'm a PC user all the way, even a somewhat defender of Windows 8. I'd hoped the Xbox One would blow me away, and honestly, between the extortionate price point and the ban on used games, I feel I can't justify the purchase of their new console. I don't think I ever can unless they sort these issues out. The Microsoft Press Conference was solid for gamers, until you look behind the scenes a little more and realise that for all these great games, there are the huge flaws and issues in the Xbox One.

Perhaps for many Xbox Gamers, they don't care too much about that, they'd like to play the new Halo game that was announced, with no number or subtitle, we'll see how that goes down. But it's looking like the console will have a solid line up but it's a line up that for the most part, Sony will be able to compete with, match or even out do, we'll find out more soon enough.

Final Thoughts: A Solid Presentation of Games and Exclusives, but the $499 Price Point and the DRM issue still lurks over the Xbox One.

Conference Rating: 8/10 - GREAT***

*** Note the conference was great itself, but not enough to override what they'd said in the past, which at least they got out of the way early.