E3 2013 – The Nintendo, um… Conference

By Hedge

For reasons I don’t fully comprehend, Nintendo aren’t at the LA Convention Centre for E3 this year. That picture up there is from last year. Sure they’ve got a booth, but for the most part, they are holding gameplay events across the US and Canada, and held their own separate “press conference”, well after the other major players, but without any press there and which consisted largely of Satoru Iwata standing motionless before an incredibly bland background giving us a long, long speech about the new versions of old games Nintendo are presenting at E3.

I genuinely don’t know what’s happening in the minds of Nintendo staff anymore. The presentation (because it cannot with any seriousness be called a press conference) was like the dialogue sequences of Fallout 3 and Elder Scrolls: Oblivion. Iwata standing, frozen in place as a static and completely vacant environment encompasses the field of view. The games they did show were a mix of new facades on old games, new versions of their commonly trotted out titles and Bayonetta 2. I still don’t understand how that became a WiiU exclusive.

I’ve made no secret of the fact Nintendo lost me years ago. The Wii did nothing for me and the WiiU has done even less. The only newly announced game I’m even a little bit interested in from today’s presentation is Super Smash Bros. and that’s not coming out until sometime next year. Needless to say, I was pretty underwhelmed by this entry in the E3 list and wonder what is going on at Nintendo HQ?

Considering how pumped I was coming away from the Sony presentation, this left me feeling nothing much at all. At least I’ll have Pokémon X and Y in October. That’s something. Right?

What did you guys think? Who won the E3 announcements this year?