E3 is underway in Los Angeles and the big news from day one is a coup for Microsoft: The Xbox 360 will be getting Final Fantasy 13 on the same day as it appears on the PlayStation 3.
Resident Evil 5 from Capcom has a date: March 13, 2009. The game is based in Africa and looks something like Resident Evil 4 on steriods, which is a very good thing, according to a GamePro correspondent at E3. Resident Evil 5 will feature an online cooperative mode in addition to the single-player story.
Microsoft is also firing back at Nintendo's Mii characters with the launch of its own avatars. They appear much more robust and customizable than Miis, and can be used to socialize with up to eight Xbox Live members.
And it's going to challenge PlayStation 3's upcoming video service with one of its own launched with Netflix. Movies and TV shows will be streamed from Netflix to the '360 from later this year. Xbox Live Gold members will be able to browse and rate movies, fast-forward, pause and rewind.
Monday also brought a new peek inside Mirror's Edge, the eagerly awaited first-person game from Electronic Arts. Much like the previous trailer our heroine, Faith, is running around on rooftops and jumping from building to building in the game, which is due out on the PC, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. There's no launch date.
Gamers can get in on the E3 action from at home with a new demo of Too Human available now via Xbox Live. The action-RPG built around Norse mythology has players assuming the role of Baldur, locked in a battle with invading machines to save mankind. The full game should be out in August.
In September look out for Unreal Tournament 3. We got a new trailer at E3 but the verdict of Gamepro's Sid Shuman a week ago: "The Xbox 360 version of Unreal Tournament III is a disappointment, mostly because it's not designed to be a console shooter to begin with, which means it's instantly outclassed by console-first shooters such as Halo 3, Call of Duty 4, and Gears of War. This is a shooter from an older era and, on the Xbox 360, it shows."
As any gamer knows, water is one of the most difficult things to create in a computer graphics world by Blade says it has come closest to simulating the real look and behavior of water with its HydroEngine. Described as the world's only full computational fluid dynamics engine for games, the engine is shown off doing its thing in this trailer for Hydrophobia.
And finally, the bear and bird are back as Banjo and Kazooie come to a third installment on Xbox 360. In "Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts", Banjo ends up in a showdown with evil witch Gruntilda to claim Spiral Mountain. Claiming to have created every game ever made, the Lord of the Games has built the game worlds in which the contest's challenges take place. It's coming in November.
Looking ahead to Tuesday and both Nintendo and Sony have their big E3 news conferences scheduled. Nintendo gave us a tease of what to expect with this picture - see the attachment at the end of the Wii-mote? It's the Wii MotionPlus, which brings much more sensitivity to the Wii. Full details are promised on Tuesday.
With reporting from GamePro correspondents at E3, this is Martyn Williams, IDG News Service.
