Crave

It's a clear sign of the continuing evolution of video games when hot titles splurge on big mainstream media ads. The most shocking example we've seen recently has been Tuesday's Election Day New York Times, where Fallout 3 was featured in a full-color, full-page ad (see below), taking up the coveted back cover spot of the paper's "A" section.

That's especially surprising, as Fallout isn't a particularly mainstream brand, along the lines of the Halo or the Rock Band franchises, but a fairly serious RPG that requires a multi-hour investment of time to get into, and offers little in the way of immediate gratification (not that we're not enjoying the game, having just passed the 39-hour mark).

The ad plays up a string of recent "perfect" review scores (a contentious topic we discuss on the latest episode of the Digital City podcast), but we doubt that more than a small slice of the paper's daily readers would be in the right demographic group for a full-page video game ad, especially one that quotes the Official Xbox Magazine or GameSpy.

Are newspaper ads a smart investment for games? What game do you think will be the next to buy a full page in the New York Times? ... Read more

You can say a video game has really made it to the next level of commercial appeal when it gets treated to a midnight launch event. Only a handful of games rise to that level, including Halo 3, Grand Theft Auto IV, and (more for being a cult favorite) Super Smash Brothers.

Somewhat surprisingly, Bethesda's Fallout 3 is the next game to get the midnight launch treatment--the game industry equivalent of a red carpet premiere. The game is buzz-heavy, to be sure, but lacks the clear mass-market appeal of Halo or GTA, and is the kind of talky, drawn-out, plot-driven role-playing game that usually appeals mostly to serious gamers, not the adrenaline-fueled, trigger-happy masses.

Best Buy stores will be opening at midnight on October 27 in Washington, D.C., New York, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, Dallas, and Chicago. The New York event is being held at the same midtown Best Buy that hosted last year's Halo 3 launch, which featured, massive TV coverage and a visit from a full squadron of costumed characters from the game.

Having spent the last week playing Fallout 3, we can safely say it's one of the year's best gaming experiences. Built around the same game engine as Bethesda's 2006 hit Oblivion, Fallout 3 keeps the same wide-open world and morally gray decision-making, but trades the swords and sorcery for guns and high-tech gadgets in a post-nuke Washington, D.C.

Still, the new game isn't as accessible as Oblivion, which had miles of lush forests to explore and cities full of friendly (and not-so-friendly) people to talk to. The storyline in Fallout 3 takes a few hours to really kick in, there are fewer people around, and the terrain is much sparser and more dangerous (expect to be reloading your game a lot). The drab palette and post-apocalyptic environment make for an experience that isn't exactly uplifting.

But don't let that scare you off. Investing some time into the game eventually opens it up (we're about 20 hours in so far), and there are few moments in gaming as satisfying as firing a shoulder-mounted nuke at a 20-foot mutant giant, right after using your chemically enhanced charisma to charm a much-needed MacGuffin out of a wasteland trader.

Check out the latest Fallout chat on the latest episode of the Digital City Podcast, and then peruse this list of some of the Best Buy Fallout 3 midnight launch locations:

Every year, E3 has one game on display that's almost universally tagged as the critical favorite, despite not having the big-name pedigree of a Halo or Grand Theft Auto. Last year, it was the underwater adventure BioShock, which -- thanks to a steady drumbeat of positive press coverage--went on to sell a few million copies and become a true sleeper hit.

This year, it's Fallout 3, a post-apocalyptic RPG set in the ruins of Washington DC. The original Fallout games were PC titles from the early '90s, so the franchise can't rely on the faded memories of aging fans to sell big holiday numbers when it's released this fall. Instead, developer Bethesda has modeled the game on its previous big hit, the popular 2006 sword-and-sorcery RPG Oblivion.

That game was a hit because it offered deep, immersive gameplay that overcame the genre limitations of elves and wizards by offering a landscape dozens of square miles in size, where players could largely wander everywhere and talk to anyone. Fallout 3 follows the same path, as our protagonist steps out of a '50s-era atomic bomb shelter after a couple of decades underground and discovers a ruined world filled with feuding groups of survivors.

Our hands-on time with the game was mostly spent exploring the outskirts of Washington, D.C, and finally making our way to a settlement built inside the ruins of an unexploded atomic bomb. There, we could talk to the denizens, make deals, and get jobs, while outside, we had to fight off violent scavengers, who shot at us on sight. The appeal is that there are multiple solutions to every problem, and you can choose to handle most situations by shooting your way through, sneaking by, or even talking to people and convincing them to help (rather than fight) you.

The game is filled with quirky references to mid-century Atomic Café bomb-shelter culture, with amusing ads for retro products and references to classic duck-and-cover education films of the '50s, and was clearly one of the most buzzed-about games of the show.

Look for Fallout 3 for Xbox 360 and PS3, sometime this holiday season.

The new Xbox 360 dashboard

(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET News)

The E3 conference opened Monday in Los Angeles with a press conference from Microsoft. Here are some highlights.

Microsoft showed off first-ever game play footage from the post-apocalyptic title Fallout 3 and announced that there will be downloadable content exclusive to Xbox Live. We saw real-time action from Resident Evil 5, shipping on March 13. We got a peek at the new co-op feature in the game, where players will be able to team up and make their way through together. Developer Square Enix also made announcements that included the release of four titles for Xbox 360 including Final Fantasy XIII.

roundup
Complete E3 coverage

Expo is no longer a huge free-for-all,
but that doesn't mean Microsoft
and others aren't making noise.

As for console exclusives, we saw in-game action from Fable 2, shipping in October. Players will be able to seamlessly invite other friends who are also playing the game. Finally, we were blown away by the impressive game demo of Gears of War 2 shipping November 7. The game actually looks better than the original and will feature a five-player online co-op mode.

Microsoft will be releasing a new dashboard interface this fall that incorporates an avatar system--the Xbox answer to Nintendo Mii characters. The new feature allows you to join up with other friends to form a "party," a group of up to eight people where you can share multimedia items or start a game. A new mode called Primetime will actually incorporate real-life TV shows like 1 vs. 100 and allow Xbox Live members to play and watch these game shows and possibly even win real prizes.

Microsoft also announced ... Read more

This year's E3 will be a ghost town compared with this view from 2004.

This week brings us the annual Electronic Entertainment Expo--the video game trade show better known as E3. This is E3's 14th year, and my 10th time attending the show. But despite booming game sales and a firm foothold in the mainstream pop culture marketplace, the future of this gaming event is in jeopardy.

After years of big-budget extravagance for an audience of 60,000-plus visitors at the Los Angeles Convention Center, the game companies that form the backbone of the show felt their budgets were spiraling out of control, and even the large amount of media attention they got from E3 wasn't worth the millions they put into building massive booths and displays.

So for last year's show, the Entertainment Software Association (or ESA), the trade group that actually runs E3, decided to scale back the show, moving it from May to July, and from Los Angeles to a series of small hotels in Santa Monica. The attendance was cut as well--from around 60,000 people representing everything from TV and magazines to small blogs to retail workers at game stores--to a smaller list of around 5,000 invited guests.

The smaller 2007 version of E3 (dubbed Min-E3) got mixed reviews, and was purportedly almost as expensive to put on, so this year we're back at the good old Los Angeles Convention Center, but the still scaled-down show will occupy just one hall and a series of meeting rooms, and will be almost unrecognizable to anyone who attended in previous years.

Adding to E3's woes, several key game companies have left the ESA in the past few months, including Activision, Vivendi (those two companies are merging to form Activision Blizzard), Lucasarts, and id, the company behind the Quake and Doom franchises. Without their support (and membership dues), the trade group may have a hard time putting on the show in future years.

But enough of the doom and gloom--here are a few things to keep an eye out for this week:

1. Xbox 360 price cut to $299--(Note: This is actually official as of Sunday, see here for details.)

2. Sony will push the holiday season release of two long-delayed casual gaming projects: the cooperative platform game Little Big Planet and Home, an online meeting place for 3D avatars and the backbone of the PlayStation 3's community platform.

3. Nintendo will be pressed to address the storage problem on the popular Wii console. There are plenty of classic games available to download through the Wii's online store, but the console lacks a hard drive to store anything more ambitious.

4. Fallout 3--this free-roaming post-apocalyptic RPG seems to have the same preshow buzz that BioShock did last year. If the gaming press anoints this the "it" game of the show, it could be a serious holiday season contender.

5. Rock Band 2 and Guitar Hero World Tour--a year later, and we've got two new versions of the dueling faux rock simulators. The question is: will these new versions continue to innovate, or will consumers tire of being pushed into another Madden-like annual update cycle?