by Byron Mudry on May 14, 2006
By: Byron "Messiah" Mudry
Well, E3 is over for another year. Ratboy, Ralph and I (Messiah)are all on our way home to Winnipeg . As I type this we are on the LA to Denver leg, then have a 3 hour layover then fly home to Winnipeg . After a whole week away from our families we are all looking forward to getting home and relaxing for a little while.
The trip as a whole was brilliant. Everyone from the group worked hard and played hard. TenTonHammer is a virtual company so most of us had never met before. We have employees all over North America with very few in any single location. One of the best things about this trip was the chance to meet everyone and get to know them face to face.
One thing that really brought everyone out of their shells and laughing and joking was the energy drink company Bawls handing out caffeinated Bawls mints at the start of E3. It quickly turned into a running joke, that had several people staring at us, laughing at us, and in the end, laughing and joking with us. By the end of the week the saying Can I have you bawls? was a running joke throughout the media room.
Not really what you're here for though is it? No, you likely want to hear about my overall impression of E3 now that its past, right? OK.
Big, I mean really Big! Bigger than Big. I was warned that it was big, load, crowded and crazy. I was prepared for the people, noise and busyness of the event.
I have done many things in my life, that are many of those things. I've worked in a prison and been in an area with 500+ inmates walking through, unescorted. If that doesn't get you over crowds, nothing will. Loud? I used to listen to Metal all the time and have gone to a ton of concerts, so noise is not an issue either. The size though! WOW!
Many of the booths were bigger than school gyms. The largest booths, where the size of city blocks. Nintendo, Xbox, Sony, EA, and others had huge palace sized booths, with multiple floors, bars, meeting rooms and more. While I can't quote numbers, it seemed like the Sony booth was bigger by itself than most normal cities convention centers! It was something that you needed to see in person to believe. The pictures we took do not even start to portray the scope of the event. Each of the 4 halls was big enough that it would take at least a day to fully take in all that was in them. That would still leave you a day short on time to see the event. You would then also miss out on all the private rooms hosted by companies and all the booths in the concourse. Three days just simply isn't enough for an event of this size.
What would E3 be without Booth Babes? We came into E3 unsure how many would be around or how scantily clad they would be. E3 had proclaimed no booth babes, and set strict standards to limit how much skin they could show or how risqué they could be. When we did get there though
Simply put, wow. There were tons around. Not as many as I imagined, but then being a guy, I can imagine a lot of hot, scantly clad females. The ones that were there, were very nice, and we heard very little about E3 clapping down on them or fining them. The one big exception was the banishment of Wonder Woman, and she was media, not a booth babe. One of our crew followed up on that and you can read all about it here: Wonder Woman Busted at E3 . You can also checkout all the pics of the booth babes here. Lastly you should watch for our contest to pick the TenTonHammer Best Booth Babe, coming soon.
Being there to cover new MMO's was a cool experience. I got to officially attend interviews for:
WoW - Blizzard [First Impressions] [Interview with Tyren] Warhammer Mythic [Interview] Vanguard Sigil [Interview] Seed - Runestone [Interview] Ryzome Ring - Nevrax [First Impressions] more to come... Darkfall Aventurine SA [First Impressions] Hero's Journey - Simutronics [Interview]I also got to checkout Tabula Rasa, Auto Assault, Gods and Heroes, Pirates of the Burning Sea , Pirates of the Caribbean , Fury and more. There were several others I would have liked to investigate, but ran out of time.
I have to thank all the developers for the time that they all gave us. The best thing about the interviews was getting to hear the enthusiasm that the developers have for their products. It is very easy to see the love of their game pour out as they are describing and demoing their creations. It is so contagious that it makes it very had to not play each an every one of these creations.
All the games I got to preview / review were very cool. Despite liking most of them, the ones I was most impressed with were:
Warhammer I love the tabletop game, and am amazed at how well they have captured the feel of it in the MMO. Even more surprising was how polished it looked even though it is so early in its development. This is a MUST have for me.
Seed The graphical style of this game had everyone talking. The graphics are really amazing, the screenshots we saw only went so far. When you see the comic characters run around in lifelike motion it's crazy. In addition to the graphics seed has a very unique take on MMO's and puts a ton of control over the direction of the game in the hands of the players. It is like nothing else out there and eally should be tried.
Hero's Journey The character creation and customization is beyond anything else out there. The game itself is very cool looking as well, and has many features that I think will make it very popular when it is released. It features a very cool item enhancement system called Wyrs and features a cool grouping system.
Tabla Rasa I have so been looking forward to this game. The best part? It ROCKS! While not a traditional MMO style game it is so easy and fun to play that I just have to have it. Even cooler, I got to meet Lord British at the booth, and they knew who we (TenTonHammer) were! Who could miss us in our bright yellow soccer jerseys!
Pirates of the Burning Sea Who doesn't want to be a pirate! Arrrr!
It was a week of long and sometimes sleepless nights for many of the team. In the end though, it was all worth it. We got to meet, work, play and enjoy E3. We even got to make many new friends at E3 and the parties that surround it. Apparently we made at least one enemy too, but even that was mitigated by making friends with several of the other media. Who could avoid a herd of people in yellow, joking, laughing and having fun. We had many people come over to talk with us, work with us, or just to find out more about us.
Be sure to check out all of our E3 coverage and check back often for follow up articles.