My one day at WCES
James A. Squires
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This is just my raw impressions, I'm a hacker not a writer!
***
So I flew out of LAX in a *hammering* rainstorm (not at all fun) and
arrived at a wet 'n cold and *CROWDED* Vegas. And it didn't help
any that I had to lug about this heavy Panasonic WS (demo time).
But anyway, the show isn't a large as COMDEX or SIGGRAPH, but it was
much more intense. 100,000 people in 3 daze!
Amazing how many booths had sexy-babes pulling in the lookers, to
just drool or have them sign their silly posters. This was even more
so at the car electronics area.
<>[]O <>[]O <>[]O <>[]O AT THE 3DO BOOTH :
I think I like the strategy that 3DO has taken with the CESs :
Nice, classy booth, far away from the "other's" noisy arcade booths.
In the main hall, where you find Intel, Sony, MickySoft, Panasonic, and
their like, is where I found 3DO. It was well attended, almost every
game was being played at all times. (Somebody *please* show those girls
how to drive NFS!).
This positioning keeps down the number of kids underfoot, and increases the
exposure to the big-kids. One guy said to a confused asian title rep, how
many titles are available now? When the rep answered "in March", I helped
out with "about 120+", and he seemed stunned, like how could this be.
Handouts included "3" mag, buttons "what are you playing with?" heh, and
flyers for many of the titles, and the 3DO flyer.
<>[]O <>[]O <>[]O <>[]O NEW HARDWARE :
I tried out the cool 3-button Logitech mouse running with World Cup
Golf (it was *very* sensitive, I hope it can be adjusted). They had the
6 button pad on display. Many of the games had the CH Pro, and lightgun.
They were showing the MPEG-1 running on both the FZ-1 and the Goldstar.
No announcement when the Panasonic will be sold, the Goldstar in March.
The quality was quite good. Except for Wayne's red boxers, I really had
to look for any artifacts.
Each station had either the title's rep or a 3DOr. All very polite and
helpfull (*very* different from the "other" booths). I saw alot of new
unreleased titles (sorry, if I didn't have that damn WS I'da taken notes).
<>[]O <>[]O <>[]O <>[]O NEW GAMES :
RETURN FIRE: This will be a *must have*. I talked to the guy right before
he went on-line for the AOL IRC. He said it will be out this Wednsday.
It looks very fun. Has a great two-player mode. Good 3D, lots of action.
Very cool destroying things from your Tank or Heli to Dolby Surround of
Wagner, Verdi, and Rossini. heh heh - I *love* that smell of napalm.
DRAGON TYCOON EDGE: An RPG from SANYO. Very surreal 3D landscape. Ready
in 24FEB95. A step up from GW imho. I hope it will have English tho.
PO'ed: This looks to be fun for Spring '95. Very texured 3D world (almost
too much texturing). You walk or fly with jetpack, grabbing weapons and
kill kill kill. Forty levels to master.
THE D: Very spooky looking 3D high quality rendering. A 1st person movie
kind of like AITD, but *not* cartoony. All the 3D CG *must* be
pre-rendered, it was very rich in detail and quality. A funny line from
their company flyer: "All software is developed by the staff of the
company under the strict product guality (sic) control...".
FLYING NIGHTMARES: The guy from Domac said the blokes back home had a
good joke on him - they left the AAA set to full-smart. So he kept
getting shot down when he'd demo. The target date is March. They
hope to have the frame rate up to 20 by then (it was running about 12).
Our first real flight sim.
Others:
Saw one I can't remember the name that looked like Slayer with
a Doom-like engine, the music was very nice.
11th hour looked interesting.
Did not see GEX.
SWCIII looked cool, with *alot* of FMV, using several famous actors.
<>[]O <>[]O <>[]O <>[]O OUR MAIN MAN :
I was glad to meet our own Rick Reynolds (he's a cool guy). One of the
other 3DO people said they did not know *how* he gets his work with all
his net time. I asked him about the dreck that Gomer said in Friday's
IRC about the ex-programmers saying no one's doing any more future work,
and Rick said that was a bunch of HOOEY, and if he can, he'll try to
address the issue (or non-issue) later.
<>[]O <>[]O <>[]O <>[]O REP TALK :
I made my own poll of the title reps there, and they said things like:
The dev environment is very powerfull, *alot* easier to program
than many other systems.
We wrote this from scratch using Suns just for the 3DO, but we hope
to maybe port it to others in the future (PO'd).
We've got more titles planned, and really like the 3DO.
But, there in the 3DO booth, what *could* they say?
<>[]O <>[]O <>[]O <>[]O CES FINAL IMPRESSIONS :
MOST COOL THING I SAW : The amazing car music systems, could power a city!
MOST LAME THING I SAW : Kereoke booth with sexy model types sitting at
pretend cocktail tables not-pretending to swoon at VERY bad singer dude.
MOST FUNNY THING I SAW : In Akklaim booth, dudes posing on future bike with
two busty-biker sluts hanging on him mugging for the camera.
<>[]O <>[]O <>[]O <>[]O END OF REPORT :
Anyway, I've gotta get some work done, I *still* haven't broken 200mph!
Speed, it's a freaky thing,
-JAS
Enrique Conty
>
>THE D: Very spooky looking 3D high quality rendering. A 1st person movie
> kind of like AITD, but *not* cartoony. All the 3D CG *must* be
> pre-rendered, it was very rich in detail and quality. A funny line from
> their company flyer: "All software is developed by the staff of the
> company under the strict product guality (sic) control...".
What company was this? Panasonic? WARP?
>MOST LAME THING I SAW : Kereoke booth with sexy model types sitting at
> pretend cocktail tables not-pretending to swoon at VERY bad singer dude.
A CES joke for you: The lamest products often have the sexiest babes.
Like the remote control shaped like a gun at the '94 SCES, or the
(again) Karaoke booth opposite the 3DO pavillion.
>MOST FUNNY THING I SAW : In Akklaim booth, dudes posing on future bike with
> two busty-biker sluts hanging on him mugging for the camera.
There's always a bunch of those every year. Last summer's Cammy/Guile pair
would have knocked over several drooling fanboys... ^o^
--
E n r i q u e C o n t y
Disclaimer: Motorola doesn't know I'm posting this
co...@cig.mot.com