Who had the best E3 2012 press conference?
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Who "won" E3 2012?
Though E3 has, actually, just begun, the big press conferences (and, thus, the big surprises) are now behind us. Microsoft, Sony, Nintendo, EA and Ubisoft all brought with them a slew of jaw-dropping trailers and announcements, giving us plenty to look forward to for this year and beyond.
Now that they've wrapped up, everyone can start the annual debate over who had the best press conference. Did Microsoft's full-frontal assault of AAA trailers steal the show? Did Sony's exclusives blow the competitors away? Did the Wii U give us a glimpse into the next-generation? We checked in with GamesRadar's staffers to find out what they thought, and we want your opinion as well. Check out who we think "won" the E3 press conference battle, and let us know in the comments below which reveals were the most monumental in your eyes.
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Justin Towell, UK Content Editor
With all of the big three totally missing their big opportunity to take control of the hardware market for the next year, I'd say Ubisoft had the best showing with Watch Dogs and Assassin's Creed 3. I love the look of the galleon sections in that. Being able to walk across the deck of your ship, before taking the helm and then engaging in battle with other vessels? Count me in! And then make me a whole game based on that.
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Henry Gilbert, Senior Associate Editor
Despite my nostalgic love for all things Nintendo, I have to say that Sony won this year’s E3. Why? Simply put, they had the best line-up of games. Opening with David Cage’s stunning new game Beyond, keeping it going with interesting Vita developments (particularly the exclusive Assassin’s Creed III: Liberation), showing the first solo action God of War: Ascension and ending with the truly stunning Last of Us gameplay, Sony proved that focusing on gameplay instead of buzz words was where it’s at. Sure, there was the childish Wonder Book and the additions to PlayStation Plus weren’t as big as I would have liked, but what Sony had on show are easily my strongest memories.
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Sterling McGarvey, Reviews Editor
It's a toss-up for me. Microsoft is giving me multimedia content that I want in my living room. Sony has some excellent games, and I'll probably play Assassin's Creed III on PS3 after watching the press event yesterday. Ubisoft came on strong, from a better press event minus the traditional awkwardness to a strong lineup. Watch Dogs, Far Cry 3 and AC III are easily among my most anticipated games of the show.
After checking out NintendoLand hands-on, I think the nay-saying is a bit overstated. The mini-games are unarguably fun and approachable. All in all, I'm less about "who won" and more about "what impressed me most."
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Lucas Sullivan, Associate Editor
Maybe I have a man crush, but when Jack Tretton spoke, I listened intently. Having him as an anchor to all the reveals and trailers made everything cohesive, and the games practically spoke for themselves. Seeing as I'm going to propose marriage to Ellen Page at some point, I was totally on board with Beyond. The Last of Us looks incredible, and I was cheering along with the crowd when Ellie totally bricked that dude's head. Add in the PlayStation All Stars: Battle Royal reveals, and I was totally sold on Sony's showcase.
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Sophia Tong, Managing Editor
I feel like Nintendo had the strongest showing in terms of games that I’m interested in playing. Pikmin, the Mario games, even Scribblenauts are games I’m going to be keeping a close eye on. Sony’s press conference started off great. Beyond: Two Souls is going to be my most anticipated game and I can’t wait to hear more. I’ve always been a fan of what Quantic Dream is trying to achieve. As for overall showing, I feel like Ubisoft really surprised people this year. Having a less awkward host was a start (not to mention Aisha Tyler is awesome) and presenting a big new IP is refreshing.
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David Houghton, UK Associate Editor
Ubi, if only for Watch Dogs and Rayman. In fact yeah, pretty much for Watch Dogs and Rayman. I watch E3 for fresh, innovative, new games, and those two were where it was at this year. Ubi seemed way more confident to simply trade on pure creative game design than any of the big three. Visuals aside, WD’s clear blend of Hitman’s cerebral Machiavellian play with the aggressive stealth DNA of Splinter Cell: Conviction hits all the right buttons for me. And Rayman gave me exactly the sort of imagination-firing, endorphin slug that Nintendo games used to be by default. And while it might basically be Quake reskinned, Shootmania's return to pure, fast FPS skills wins major respect points.
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Clint Demeritt, Cheats and Guides Editor
I thought Sony had the best presentation. They had a few good surprises with the big daddy being included in PlayStation All-Stars and the Assassin’s Creed ship demo showed off a whole new dimension to the game. The Wonderbook demo was also a lot of fun, even though I probably won’t run out and buy one. I would also tip my hat to Ubisoft, who had a really strong showing this year. The Rayman preview had my head rocking throughout the musically portion, and they really showed off the new Wii U GamePad well. But I am most excited for Watchdog. The game looks really interesting and adds a lot of unique gameplay mechanics. I can’t wait to see more of this new IP.
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Matt Cundy, UK Editor
I'm going to perch myself precariously upon the limb of controversy and say Microsoft. Granted there was a lot of waffle in places, but it definitely had the most explosions of all the conferences and I love games with explosions (although I did fall asleep twice during the Sony conference so I might have missed some explosions there). The Microsoft conference also had Matt Stone and Trey Parker and they turned out to be the least robotic and most human-like people on stage in any of the briefings. And they did a funny joke about Microsoft's SmartGlass which made me laugh.
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Lorenzo Veloria, Associate Editor
The Ubisoft and PlayStation press conferences really did it for me this year. The Last of Us presentation blew me away with all the face-to-desk pounding and survival-style, conserve-your-ammo gameplay. The announcement of Assassin’s Creed 3: Liberation for the PS Vita and the ability to link to its console counterpart really made the biggest case for me to consider finally throwing down the money for a Vita. But what sticks out the most is Ubisoft’s amazing Assassin’s Creed 3 demo. The hunting, tree climbing and running assassinations had me at the edge of my seat. I was pumped to jump back into the Assassin’s series before, but now the wait is almost unbearable. Oh, and Flo Rida gave me good feelings.
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Alex Roth, Associate Editor
In my mind, Sony and the PlayStation 3 won E3 2012. Between Assassin’s Creed III and The Last of Us, they had the most impressive software. I can’t wait to see what controlling a giant 18th century battleship with a DualShock is like, and The Last of Us is continuing to blow me away (speaking of which, that shotgun blast to head at the end of the demo? Holy. Crap.) And that sneaky reveal of the Big Daddy in PlayStation All-Stars Battle Royale? Very nice. Sony may not have had a surprise hardware reveal, but that’s ok with me. I’d rather buy new games for the system I already have, especially when they’re tailor made to the PS3’s hardware. That and Jack Tretton was a classy host.
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Hollander Cooper, Senior Associate Editor
Though none of the press conferences were all that stellar, I think the third-parties ended up bringing the most interesting looking games to E3. Ubisoft, in particular, wowed me with Watch Dogs, which showed that this generation still has some life left in it. At the same time, the trailer for of ZombiU (which was later shown off at the Wii U presser to be fairly awesome) blew me away, and got me more excited for Nintendo's new console than anything shown at their own press conference. Oh, and Aisha Tyler. *Swoon*?
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What do you think?
And we're off! Now that the press conferences are over and we've made our choices we're going to run around the convention center, getting you previews, news, reactions, and videos from the biggest games of the show.
What do you think? Which E3 2012 press conference did you like best? Answer the poll below and let us know in the comments which conference impressed you the most.
And if you want more tid bits on the E3 press conferences, check out The 7 things we took away from Monday's media briefings.
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TheLeagueOfNinjaSquirrels - June 7, 2012 5:46 a.m.
For me they were all rubbish. With Nintendo being the worst for missing too many opportunities to really show of the 3DS or Wii U (sounds very much like Wii 2, a bad sign for hard-core gamers) I do remember a few weeks ago someone from Nintendo saying how they need to learn from mistakes about the Wii and alienating is core customers. And their big secret game for the Wii U was …a mini game fest…WOW that really makes me want to pay £250 for it now. Disappointing X10. At least we got to see what Halo 4, South Park and Luigi’s Mansion 2 looks like. The only good thing from this year’s E3 was the fan made trailer for Majora’s Mask. Shame Nintendo couldn’t wow the Zelda fans like they did. I kid you not, more people are taking about this trailer then the E3 press conference. -
FierceDeity - June 7, 2012 5:33 a.m.
i don't get why theres so much nintendo whining, i thought pikmin 3, zombiu, scribblenauts, mario bros and nintendoland all look really good. -
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StonedMagician99 - June 6, 2012 11:38 p.m.
For me, it went: 1. Ubisoft 2. Microsoft 3. EA 4. Sony 5. Nintendo -
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brian-johnson - June 6, 2012 6:54 p.m.
Its not really a fair contest when there is software companies who have it easy by just showing off games only and then there is the big guys like Sony and Microsoft not to mention Nintendo who have to impress us w/ hardware and software.They only have so much time to explain so much more, not to mention Nintendo w/ their new console. So, that being said, I can't say anyone won in Particular. Each had good and bad parts of there conference and I'm excited for the year ahead. -
brian-johnson - June 6, 2012 7:09 p.m.
I don't mean 3rd party software companies have it easy. Poor choice of words. They can focus more on just one area as opposed to Hardware and software. On the other hand they also need to learn the new hardware too. -
Lucstanfa - June 6, 2012 6 p.m.
Meh. Microsoft went on and on about their stupid apps, and Nintendo is usually always disappointing. With the exception of the WiiU which looks promising. Though that doesn't mean it will be. Im an Xbox fan. Mostly because I've never owned a Ps4. Though i must admit Sony had the best press conference. They actually focused on games. It doesn't mean their games were better than Halo 4. -
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chad-munn - June 6, 2012 3:21 p.m.
Ubisoft had the best- just... PERIOD. They did an amazing line up of games and they showed plenty of them. The stupid host work could have been scrapped, but they focused on games only (for obvious reasons) and got deep into all of them. I wasn't expecting much and that just added to the surprise. Way to go with Watch Dogs!! And AC3, SC:BL and FC3 were all extremely polished and interesting to watch. Way to go Ubi! -
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FlyinHawaiian13 - June 6, 2012 1:07 p.m.
I think I'm going to get a PS3 now. Microsoft is forgetting about the games. All I'm getting over here is more shooters. Don't get me wrong I'm excited for Halo 4 and the new gears, but they seem more focused on exclusives for multiplatform games instead of new IPs. -
christian-shaffer - June 6, 2012 9:58 a.m.
Ubisoft showed games, whicch is what I want from E3. Yes there was the matter of Flo Rida, but aside from him and some minor awkwardness, they did what a game company is supposed to do at E3. Show game footage, and excellent footage at that. -
FearlessRaven - June 6, 2012 7:30 a.m.
It was definitely Ubisoft that "Won" this E3 just for the sake of what it was showing, Nintendo was going strong and then kicked the bucket, and Sony had me up until their halfhour presentation on "magic wands". Microsoft and EA, as much as everyone pew-pewed about it was looking back, maybe the most interesting because both just seemed to be pushing filler for now which makes me very very excited for what they have hidden in store for later. IF you doubt that it was filler just think about the smart glass. As much as everyone thinks its just a WiiU tablet ripoff it seems like they invested much less into it then Nintendo did. This seemed like one or two code monkeys as opposed to a whole R-D division working on it just in case the WiiU does well and they need to have something. Their press conference still sucked in the middle though.
phade3 - June 10, 2012 9:17 p.m.