Alongside the US-based E3 and the Leipzig Games Convention,
the Tokyo Games show is one of the largest gaming-oriented conventions
worldwide, and the largest one in Asia. This
year’s TGS, the 13th so far, has 209 exhibitors from a total of 14
countries showing off their best. And even though the highest percentage of
games are for portable devices like Nintendo’s DS or mobile phones, big-brand
console makers are not to be outdone either.
Microsoft, of course is there, and aside from such
announcements as Tekken 6 for the Xbox, and the new Halo 3 Recon expansion, the
Redmond based company has made an announcement that will pique the interest of
the 14 million Xbox Live worldwide subscribers.
An update for the Xbox 360 Dashboard has been dubbed by
Microsoft the Xbox Live experience and has been announced as early as this
year’s E3. Yesterday we got a first look at it though, and it’s got our
interest. New customizable avatars have been implemented, with the avatars able
to be used as gamer pictures in the card. One cannot fail to notice the
striking resemblance to Wii’s Mii avatars here. Mentioned since E3 is the new
ability to install games on the console’s hard disk, which in theory should
reduce load times and disk noise, but still requires the game’s disk to be
present in the drive even the game is installed on the HDD. There’s the My Xbox
package, which includes new achievement cards. There are new themes, an
interactive games channel, a games database with information on the games,
their box cover art, literature, etc.
The new Xbox live experience will be launched on November
19, two weeks after the release of Gears of War 2. The update will be free and
will be streamed to all Xbox 360 machines worldwide.
It’s also rumored that SNK Playmore will be included with
the Xbox Live Arcade, with Metal Slug and King of Fighters ’98 Ultimate among
the supported titles. R-Type Dimensions is also said to be available with the
Xbox Live Arcade.
Other upcoming games announced by Microsoft at TGS are the
aforementioned Halo 3: Recon, which tells the story of Halo 3 from a different
perspective, and Halo Wars, an RTS based on the Halo Universe and which is
being developed not by Bungie, but by Microsoft’s Ensemble Studios, who were
also responsible for the Age of Empires series.
Microsoft have also announced Xbox Live Community Games,
which is a sharing service that allows young game designers to publish their
games online using Xbox Live. Reportedly, there are already one thousand
subscriptions.
This year’s TGS, appropriately is the place where the fruits
of Microsoft’s push into the Nintendo and Sony dominated Asian market are
beginning to show; and so far, it looks pretty nice. Last month, after the Xbox
360 price cuts, was the first month when the Microsoft console managed to
outsell Sony in its own territory. Let’s see if they can push their advantage,
and use these new features to keep it up.
