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E3: Bloody-Disgusting E3 Coverage: June 17th Day 3 Wrap-Up
It’s the third and final day of E3 2010. It’s been a great show with lots of exciting announcements and some pretty good surprises. Today we’re hitting the show floor to check out a few games and finally brave that long, long line to get our hands on a Nintendo 3DS.
To start the day off, we stopped by Konami’s booth to get some more info on SAW II: FLESH AND BLOOD. We interviewed producer John Williamson and got a brief look at the cringe-inducing eye scalpel mini-game. Interview with SAW II producer John Williamson Part 1
Interview with SAW II producer John Williamson Part 2
SAW II: FLESH AND BLOOD Scalpel Mini Game Demo
Over at the Namco Bandai booth we got to play the revival of the uber-violent classic SPLATTERHOUSE for the PS3 and 360, which will be out Halloween 2010. This game is ridiculously bloody, living up to its title in every way and beyond. You slice, dice and maim your opponents in just about every conceivable way, from slicing them in two to ripping off their arm and beating them to death with their own severed limb. Oh yes. Have a look at the play through below.
E3 Hands-On with Splatterhouse
Finally, it’s time to brave the long lines to get some hands on time with the Nintendo 3DS. It takes a little under an hour to get into the room, which isn’t too bad considering we were given 20 minutes to try out the 3DS with all the games and demos they had on hand. It’s strange at first to look into the 3DS screen. It takes a second or two for your eyes to adjust to the image. Starting with a playable demo of STARFOX, the 3DS immediately impresses. The 3D adds an incredible depth and pulls the gamer into the screen. It’s immersive in a way I’ve never before experienced on a portable. It really is 3D without glasses.
STARFOX was a blast to play, but I pulled myself away to get a look at some other games. There’s a RESIDENT EVIL game in the early stages of production, basically just a short trailer. The 3D effect really adds to the atmospheric world of the RES EVIL games. As a character heads down a dark hallway, you really do feel transported into the game. After that, a rep offers to take a picture with the 3D camera. She tells me to hold my hand out. After taking a shot, she flips the 3DS around to show me a sharp, 3D image with my own hand literally reaching out of the screen. It’s quite a trick.
To round things out, I check out the new KID ICARUS, MARIO KART, NINTENDOGS, PAPER MARIO and one of the movies for 3DS, HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON. All show off the 3D effect very nicely. The 3D is smooth and sharp with none of the blurriness of the old red and blue days.
All in all, the 3DS is very exciting. The 3D does fatigue the eyes a bit at the full level, but with Nintendo’s slider option to control the level of 3D, you can take it down a notch to go easy on the eyes. I found that the effect still worked great and was less fatiguing and about the three-quarters level. The slider control on the left side takes a little getting used to, but works very well once you get the hang of it.
Well, I’m sold. I definitely want one. The big question now is price and release date, though Nintendo hinted at a release by March 2011. As for the price? My guess is $199, which would be just about perfect. I’d consider up to $249 but even that seems a tad high and anything more would probably alienate a large portion of Nintendo’s core audience.
And that wraps up another E3. Hope you’ve enjoyed the coverage. After a few slow years, E3 seems to be heading back towards the days of old. This year’s was the best in a while and it really seems like the big companies are starting to pull out all the stops, even in light of the economy. E3 2011 dates were just announced for June 7-9. Can’t wait to see what happens next year.
Sam Neill, the New Zealand actor best known for his role in 1993’s Jurassic Park, has passed away this week at 78 years old. In a statement shared on Neill’s Instagram page this morning, the actor’s family said that his passing was “sudden and unexpected.”
Neill had been diagnosed with a rare blood cancer in 2022, but stated the following year that he was in remission. The family notes that he “remained cancer free” at the time of his passing.
The family statement reads, “It is with immense sadness that the whānau of Sam Neill share the news of his passing on Monday 13th July, in Sydney Australia. Sam was surrounded by family and passed with the dignity that has characterised his whole life. The loss was sudden and unexpected but blessed by the fact that Sam remained cancer free.
“They would like to express their deepest gratitude to the staff at St Vincent’s Private Hospital for their incredible care. More details will be shared later, but for now, on behalf of the family, we ask that you respect their privacy as they navigate this immeasurable loss.”
In addition to his iconic role as Dr. Alan Grant in the original Jurassic Park and the sequels Jurassic Park III and Jurassic World: Dominion, Sam Neill left an indelible mark on the horror genre with memorable roles in Andrzej Żuławski’s Possession, The Omen: The Final Conflict, John Carpenter’s In the Mouth of Madness, and sci-fi horror favorite Event Horizon.
Sam Neill’s vast resume in film and television began in the early 1970s and also includes the films Sleeping Dogs, Enigma, The Good Wife, A Cry in the Dark, Dead Calm, The Hunt for Red October, Memoirs of an Invisible Man, Hostage, The Jungle Book, Snow White: A Tale of Terror, The Horse Whisperer, Bicentennial Man, Daybreakers, Escape Plan, and Thor: Ragnarok.
Sam Neill is survived by his four children and eight grandchildren.
Steven Spielberg said in a statement to Variety, “I owe a debt of gratitude to Roger Donaldson, Gilliam Armstrong, Graham Baker and Phillip Noyce for casting Sam Neill in the roles in which he was so brilliant that brought him to my attention and led to his playing Dr. Alan Grant in Jurassic Park. Sam was exceptionally collaborative. It was a stretch for him to play a character who acted as though children were messy and smelly because this was the opposite of the loving father he was to his children. I adored making all the Jurassic movies with him.”
Spielberg adds, “Along with Laura Dern and Jeff Goldblum, we will always have our Jurassic family and Sam will never be forgotten by us or his many millions of fans around the world.”
Sam Neill in ‘Event Horizon’
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