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E3 2011: what were the highlights?
The Wii U and PlayStation Vita may have grabbed the headlines, but there were plenty of other games developments to enjoy
Nintendo Wii U: grabbing the headlines at E3 2011. Photograph: Mario Anzuoni/Reuters
And so it is all over for another year – the hubristic press conferences, the cacophonous mega-stands, the queues of fanboys regaled in freebie promotional tat. E3 2011 was everything that's great and awful about the games industry savagely compacted into 100 hours. The show was undoubtedly dominated by the two new machines: the Nintendo Wii U and the PlayStation Vita. While show-goers were impressed with the potential of both propositions, there were concerns about how either would secure a mass audience (compounded by the unexpected drop in Nintendo' s share price). In the end, Apple didn't (as predicted by some) steal the show by announcing a games strategy at WWDC, but the huge numbers of visitors carrying iPads around with them should have reminded manufacturers that the hardware battle lines have shifted for ever. Away from all that, 2011 certainly wasn't a year for massive game announcements (or "reveals" as the specialist press refers to them). Microsoft tacked Halo 4 on to the end of its press event, but a Kinect version of Minecraft was just as intriguing. Nintendo concentrated on its Zelda 25th anniversary celebrations, but threw in Luigi's Mansion 2 and Star Fox on 3DS, and Super Smash Brothers on both 3DS and Wii U. Sony cluster-bombed us with minor revelations: Starhawk, Medieval Moves: Deadmund's Quest, the potentially fascinating persistent shooter, Dust 514, a couple of Star Trek games and a return for cartoon-style action adventure hero Sly Cooper that brought such a whoop of deafening joy from the man sitting next to me, I thought my eardrums would implode. Amid the third-party publishers, EA had a reboot of its old snowboarding series, SSX, Insomniac's not altogether convincing squad-based sci-fi shooter Overstrike, and an intriguing Facebook version of The Sims. The publisher let Fifa, Mass Effect 3, Battlefield 3 and Star Wars Old Republic dominate. Ubisoft relied on Assassin's Creed: Revelations and Ghost Recon: Future Solider, though Brothers In Arms: Furious Four, Far Cry 3 and Rabbids: Alive and Kicking all drew interest. Activision simply left a huge area of its stand empty and surrounded the carpeted expanse with screens showing a clever collage of Modern Warfare 3 trailers. Elsewhere, Square Enix put on a strong showing, with Hitman: Absolution, Final Fantasy XIII-2 and Tomb Raider all attracting compliments from the gaming press. Bethesda's Prey 2 kept being mentioned as an unexpected highlight, while Warner offered the highly contrasting duo of Batman: Arkham City and Sesame Street: Once Upon A Monster. It also gave space to the absolutely charming indie action RPG Bastion, by Supergiant Games, which deserves the early platitudes heaped upon it by the big American game sites. 
Batman: Arkham City ... highlight from Warner Finally, there were delights on the fringes of the show. The Atlus puzzler Catherine managed to tempt sizeable crowds into the smaller Concourse Hall. Here, too, was Blitz Games Studios showing off its fascinating Kitsu, essentially a demo of a new procedural emotional animation system, capable of generating computer-controlled characters that react in real-time to in-game stimulation. Ambitious and important stuff. And in the West Hall, just metres from the giant Sony and Nintendo stands, was IndieCade, an intimate gathering of indie developers, showing off their latest projects. Here, I played the startlingly addictive Skulls of the Shogun, a pared-down real-time strategy game soon to arrive on Xbox Live Arcade, that will be this year's major breakout hit if there is any justice in the universe. I also enjoyed Q.U.B.E from Toxic Games, a Portal-style puzzler, based around manipulating coloured blocks to escape a series of monochrome rooms. These were titles by small, passionate teams, usually working from their homes and co-operating remotely. As usual there was a friendly, chatty community vibe to the whole IndieCade area that provided a few moments of calm amid the corporate hubbub. Not that the noise of the main stands was all bad. EA, Activision and the rest had a more conservative year, but who can blame them right now, and big franchises aren't necessarily evil, creative vacuums. The Guardian team all had sequels amid our highlights – Nick Cowen was astonished by Bioshock, Steve Boxer picked out Hitman, I had a cracking match of Fifa 2012, and loved Batman: Arkham City. If this wasn't an E3 of huge surprises and glittering debuts, it was one of solid endeavour, of development teams using their technical expertise with the current console platforms to get the most from well-known "brands". And it was an E3 with two new consoles, based not around sheer processing grunt, but around new interface ideas, connectivity and innovation. Not bad then, not bad at all.
Batman: Arkham City ... highlight from Warner Finally, there were delights on the fringes of the show. The Atlus puzzler Catherine managed to tempt sizeable crowds into the smaller Concourse Hall. Here, too, was Blitz Games Studios showing off its fascinating Kitsu, essentially a demo of a new procedural emotional animation system, capable of generating computer-controlled characters that react in real-time to in-game stimulation. Ambitious and important stuff. And in the West Hall, just metres from the giant Sony and Nintendo stands, was IndieCade, an intimate gathering of indie developers, showing off their latest projects. Here, I played the startlingly addictive Skulls of the Shogun, a pared-down real-time strategy game soon to arrive on Xbox Live Arcade, that will be this year's major breakout hit if there is any justice in the universe. I also enjoyed Q.U.B.E from Toxic Games, a Portal-style puzzler, based around manipulating coloured blocks to escape a series of monochrome rooms. These were titles by small, passionate teams, usually working from their homes and co-operating remotely. As usual there was a friendly, chatty community vibe to the whole IndieCade area that provided a few moments of calm amid the corporate hubbub. Not that the noise of the main stands was all bad. EA, Activision and the rest had a more conservative year, but who can blame them right now, and big franchises aren't necessarily evil, creative vacuums. The Guardian team all had sequels amid our highlights – Nick Cowen was astonished by Bioshock, Steve Boxer picked out Hitman, I had a cracking match of Fifa 2012, and loved Batman: Arkham City. If this wasn't an E3 of huge surprises and glittering debuts, it was one of solid endeavour, of development teams using their technical expertise with the current console platforms to get the most from well-known "brands". And it was an E3 with two new consoles, based not around sheer processing grunt, but around new interface ideas, connectivity and innovation. Not bad then, not bad at all.
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