E3 2006 (Concept)

E3 2006

CONCEPT

The 2006 Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) took place at the Los Angeles Convention Center in Los Angeles, California on May 10-12.

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Overview

West Hall

E3 2006 was the final "real" E3 before the event went to a smaller scale event. For what appeared to be the last show of its kind, E3 went out with a bang in 2006 thanks to an onslaught of next-gen content that swarmed the show floor. The Xbox 360 (Platform) was about to enter its second year on shelves and the PlayStation 3 (Object) and Wii (Platform) were just a few months from joining the party. And aside from the consoles, there was the PSP and DS, which had both been out for less than a year at that point and were each featuring an excellent lineup of titles.

Nintendo (Company) confused the industry as a whole a few days prior to the show by officially naming their new console the Wii. Many thought, or hoped, it to be a joke, but it was not. The motion controllers that set the system apart were the primary focus of Nintendo's press conference. Titles like Wii Sports (Game), Super Mario Galaxy (Game), Red Steel (Game), and a Wii version of Twilight Princess showed that there were all new ways to play games. The line on the floor to get a hands on demo of 27 different Wii titles reached upwards of five hours long. The Wii was easily the hottest thing at the show this year.

Booth Babes Banned

Not far behind though was Sony's full unveiling of the PlayStation 3, which was much more easily accessible on the show floor in comparison to the Wii. Titles such as Gran Turismo, Resistance: Fall of Man, Heavenly Sword (Game), Heavy Rain (Game), Motorstorm, and Warhawk were all playable and showcased the power of the new hardware along with some implementation of the all-new Sixaxis controllers. Sony stunned many attendees with the announcement that the system would retail for $599.99 in the United States.

Microsoft, having a jump start on the competition, focused completely on blockbuster titles such as Halo 3 (Game), Mass Effect (Game), Blue Dragon (Game), Crackdown (Game), Fable 2, Forza Motorsport 2 (Game), Dead Rising (Game), and the earth shattering announcement that Grand Theft Auto IV (Game) would be coming to Xbox 360.

One game that quickly garnered a lot of discussion, but was not playable on the floor, was Ubisoft's Assassin's Creed. Konami once again had attendees stopping in their tracks with their Metal Gear Solid 4 trailer, which had the shocking ending of Snake's apparent suicide. As if Kojima wasn't surprising enough fans with this trailer, Solid Snake also made his debut in the trailer of Super Smash Bros. Brawl over at the Nintendo booth. Other notable games on the floor for E3 2006 were Crysis (Game), Rainbow Six Vegas, Spore (Game), LocoRoco (Game), God of War II (Game), Ōkami (Game), The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass, Guitar Hero II (Game), New Super Mario Bros., Final Fantasy XII (Game), Supreme Commander (Game), Too Human (Game), and Metroid Prime 3.

Games of the Show

South Hall

The games listed below not only include those playable on the show floor, but any game referenced at the show. This would include video presentations, announcements, advertisements, or any other official reference to the game from its developer, publisher, or platform. They are listed mainly according to the publisher of the game, with a few exceptions where the publisher did not attend the show. An example of this would be a hardware company such as Nintendo or nVidia showing a game not developed or published by them. In several situtations, games either changed their title or even their publisher before they were released. For historical accuracy in chronicling E3, such games will be listed with their original names and publishers, and linked to the corresponding page of the final game.

2K

2K Games - Prey

Activision (Company)

Activision - Half Pipe

Atari (Company)

South Hall

Atlus (Company)

Atlus

Bethesda Softworks (Company)

BioWare (Company)/Pandemic

Blizzard

World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade

Buena Vista Games

Capcom (Company)

Capcom

Codemasters (Company)

D3 Publisher

Eidos

Electronic Arts (Company)

EA

Funcom

Age of Conan: The Hyborian Adventures

Gameloft

Paris Hilton's Diamond Quest

Hudsonsoft

Koei

Konami (Company)

Konami

LucasArts

Majesco

Guilty Gear: Judgment

Microsoft

Midway

Namco Bandai

Namco

Natsume (Company)

NCsoft

Nintendo (Company)

Nintendo

RedOctane

Guitar Hero II (Game)

Rockstar

Grand Theft Auto 4

Sega (Company)

Sega

Sierra (Company)

SNK Playmore

Sony

Sony Online Entertainment

Square Enix (Company)

Square Enix

Tecmo (Company)

THQ (Company)

Tecmo

Ubisoft

Ubisoft - Splinter Cell DA

United States Army

America's Army

Vivendi Games (Company)

Vivendi - Scarface

Warner Bros.

Webzen

Huxley

Game Critics Awards

The Game Critics Awards are decided by an independent group of North American media outlets. They have selected the most promising games of each Electronic Entertainment Expo since 1998, and have thus become recognized as the most respected "Best of" awards that come out of the annual show. Games qualify for nomination by having hands-on playable versions of the game at the show. For more information, see the Game Critics Awards page.

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