In lieu of actually ... oh, finishing the site migration or posting a Psychonauts review*, I've been frantically working on stuff that pays the bills and fretting over these E3 press reports. So, why not put some of my knowledge to use and opinionate?

Two of the big three press meetings have happened and ... well ... it certainly seems like Xbox 360 blew its wad (pardon my French) last week. So far I haven't seen anything from the upcoming 360 library that looks at all intriguing, and in fact there was one GTA-ripoff that looks outright laughable. Other than a stable of slightly gussied up franchises, there honestly appears to be nothing original there at all. Sequels and derivative gameplay ahoy. I miss Ed Fries.

So enough about the 360 and onto the PS3. Wowsa. It's honestly hard to deduce whether what we're seeing is in-game or pre-rendered, or cheated a bit but just about everything (with the exception of the shameless Eyedentity) looked fantastic. Well, okay, Sonic Team's Fifth Phantom Saga also looks yawnworthy. The new Killzone would look great if it didn't seem like the audio track was completely offset about 30 secs fron the video (edit: nope, that was just Gamespot's lousy video. Still, the question remains: is this pre-rendered or what?)

From what Sony showed, Heavenly Sword looks to be the only uniquely visual game (stylized lighting is the next cel-shading), and the fact that it appears to be a bit of a hack-n-slash doesn't hurt. The sheer number of enemies thrown at you looks incredibly impressive (as Eurogamer said, it appears to be a Matrix Reloaded sim).

NioH looks to have potential but also could be another yawn-worthy action/adv. game. It's from Koei so ... I'm hedging my bets towards yawn-worthy.

Then there's EA's Fight Night Round 3. This new Fight Night simultaneously showcases how far we have come, and how far we have to go to make a purely realistic two-person fighter. Fight Night Round 3 definitely contains something I haven't seen in many games - realistic contact. In fact, almost too much - one specific facial brutality was looped in the demo and it did come quite close to actually sickening me. While apparently we aren't to the point of tooth fragmentation, we're getting closer to recreating Raging Bull than we've ever been. And that's an accomplishment, I suppose.

Honestly, I can't wait to see what Nintendo has up it's sleeve but right now Sony has actually grabbed my attention. I'm still skeptical but they've blown the doors of Microsoft's paltry half-second gameplay clips, and then some. Maybe Microsoft is holding back but to quote Head & Shoulders, you never get a second chance to make a first impression. Also, it doesn't help that I still think that a console should be a game device, first and foremost.

However, if you think I've conveniently forgotten Sony's PS2 hyperbole that essentially killed the Dreamcast, you're frickin' crazy. But if you think that hyperbole wasn't one of the main factors that killed the Dreamcast, and that Microsoft just fell into the same trap well ... we'll just end up comparing notes in about four years.

Regardless of the two megaliths, I'm brimming with excitement about Nintendo's new console. Bring on the Revolution!

* Expect both of these to occur this week. Hah! See, it pays to read to the bottom of the entry!