Microsoft certainly “dressed to impress” with their conference this year. Their presentation stages are usually pretty lavish, but the stage this year seemed to have a few more lights and gizmos than years past. If anyone was worried that Microsoft was compensating for something, it wouldn’t take too much time to calm their fears.

The show started with a long presentation of The Beatles Rock Band. The opening cinematic was shown, featuring some impressive animation. Several people then came on-stage to demo the game, playing through the entirety of Day Tripper. The screens of the game looked almost exactly like Rock Band, however there were three people harmonizing, and the instruments looked rather impressive. Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr came on to much pomp and circumstance, but they pretty much said “We think the game is good” and left the stage.

After a long time spent on The Beatles Rock Band, Tony Hawk came out to show off his new skateboard controller for Tony Hawk Ride. The controller features several accelerometers and even something that lets you move your foot to the side of it to accelerate, just like a real skateboard. Honestly, he should have just said “It’s like a real skateboard, only without wheels.” It would have been much simpler.

At this point, I was hoping that Microsoft would show something more impressive. Luckily the next thing they had up their sleeve was a presentation for Modern Warfare 2. After a trailer, they did a live demo of the game onstage, and everything looked very impressive. The level shown was out in the snow, and the graphical detail was very high. Snow was stuck to the characters’ clothes and blowing in the air, and everything looked very “cold”. The demo began with a cliff climbing sequence, and then it skipped ahead to a sequence set on an enemy compound during a blizzard. The blizzard provides cover, but the enemy soon discovered the player’s presence and explosions and gunfire quickly broke out. The demo culminated in an exciting chase aboard snowmobiles. Yes, you can still fire a pistol while tearing through the snow-covered countryside.

After that, the games kept on flowing. Final Fantasy XIII was demoed on the Xbox, and it looked very good. Epic Games presented a brand new title for XBox Live Arcade called Shadow Complex that was apparently inspired by 2D Castlevania and Metroid games. Trailers were shown for Crackdown 2, Left 4 Dead 2, and Splinter Cell Conviction before the latest of Sam Fisher’s adventures was demoed onstage. Splinter Cell Conviction’s live demo was very stunning in both graphics and gameplay. It looks like Sam Fisher is going to be more of a badass this time around, as a ton of bad guys were quickly dispatched during the demo. Microsoft then took some time to show off Forza 3 which wasn’t very impressive to me, but it looks like it will probably go over well with fans of the series.

Next up was Halo ODST, and it didn’t disappoint. The game will switch things up a bit, allowing you to “flash back” and play sections with different characters in different areas, piecing the story together bit by bit. Lots of things blew up, and it looked very pretty. The presentation from Bungie ended with the announcement of Halo Reach, promising to show you the beginning of the Halo story coming sometime in 2010. However, those who purchase ODST will get into the Reach multiplayer beta. Halo fans seem to have a lot to look forward to.

Next up was a game that most had assumed to be vaporware until now, Alan Wake. The game is now slated to come out in the spring of 2010, and the in-game demo of the Alan Wake looked very good. The game appears to feature a voice-over while you play like someone is telling a story, and title cards like “Previously on Alan Wake” seem to imply an episodic structure. The lighting and particle effects in the demo were particularly impressive. At one point, Alan Wake pulls out a typical flare, but when he sets it off, the flare spews out sparks and a ton of smoke, looking very realistic.

After showing off several games, Microsoft turned their attention to XBox Live. To that end, they announced that last.fm, Facebook, and Twitter will be coming to the XBox, and soon we will be able to add movies to our Netflix queues through the 360 interface. Bonus points go to Microsoft for getting Felicia Day to do the Facebook presentation. Also coming XBox Live is 1080p video content that will supposedly play instantly, and the previously announced Live Party will let you watch content with your friends over XBox Live.

Next Microsoft went on to announce their new motion control camera system, but not before a surprise appearance of Hideo Kojima to announce Metal Gear Solid Rising for the 360. The teaser trailer for the game proclaims that “Raiden is back”, implying that Solid Snake will not be in this game or at least not be the focus.

Now back to that camera. To be honest, I was a little disappointed that it didn’t seem to be that far along. Despite spending a lot of time focusing on the new “Project Natal”, everything seemed to be in the prototype stage. There was a lot of “this is what we hope to do” and “this is what we could do” rather than “this is what we’re doing”. It all seemed very hypothetical to me, and any mention of a price or release window was nowhere to be found.

Several videos were shown, talking about what the peripheral can do, including facial recognition, full body motion capture, moving menu pages with the wave of a hand, and other actions. One demo was for a game that looks very similar to the soccer minigame found in WiiFit, except in the XBox version, you are punching and kicking balls into a wall of bricks in an effort to break them down. Microsoft also showed a painting game that seemed like the equivalent of throwing cans of paint at a wall.

After that, Peter Molyneux came out to show a video of Lionhead Studios’ new tech demo, an interactive character named Milo that utilizes the Project Natal camera to interact with the player. In the video, the woman talks to Milo and he responds to her, but the whole thing felt very scripted and perhaps even staged. It didn’t help that Molyneux was in full-on hype mode, making some pretty far-fetched claims about what was going on.

Overall, I think that Microsoft had a pretty strong showing this year, despite the disappointing “what if” attitude while showing off the new camera peripheral. They showed some great looking games, and there were even a few surprises like the announcements of Left 4 Dead 2 and a new Metal Gear game for 360. They had a few stumbles during the presentation, but it never came to the point where they completely dropped the ball. It wasn’t quite the “revolutionizing of home entertainment” that was hyped before E3, but the Microsoft Conference still had quite a bit of news to share. The complete lack of sales charts was also a big plus in my book.

I’m not sure what Nintendo and Sony have in store for us on Tuesday, but I think that Microsoft left the door open for someone to completely blow us away this year. Will Nintendo or Sony be able to do that? I’m not sure, but I am definitely excited to find out. I will be back later this week to share my thoughts on each of their conferences.

Take the best things about a chat room, and combine them with the best things about Blogging, and you have Live Blogging. Users will be able to log in, ask questions, discuss the latest news, etc. However, the primary purpose is actually to get the news out there. So whether or not people show up to discuss everything, the show will go on. The blog will get posted, and people will be able to read through the history very easily. 

However, like most things, this is the most fun if people are there to participate. So I hope to see some video game fans for the following dates and times:

Microsoft: June 1st – Live Blogging begins at 1pm EST (Set a Reminder)
Sony: June 2nd – Live Blogging begins at 1:30pm EST (Set a Reminder)
Nintendo:  June 2nd – Live Blogging begins at 4:30pm EST (Set a Reminder)

Hopefully, everyone that cares will be there to share their opinions as they roll in. Watching the show and talking about it at the same time. What could be better? Live blogging begins 30 mins before each conference.

Going into this years Mobile World Conference (MWC) the hottest topics of discussion were new Android phones and new mobile app stores to rival the Apple app store.

So far only the G1 has been available to test the potential of Google’s mobile phone operating system, Android. Although the G1 hardware has had mixed reviews the operating system itself has generally been praised. The market had poised itself for a whole mix of new Android phones to flood the market. So, what came out of Mobile World Congress this year? Answer, the HTC Magic. One phone – not the flood that was expected. It does look like a very nice phone, but then there is nothing else to directly compare it with.

The Apple App store for the iPhone and iPod Touch has been one of the biggest success stories in the past year. Other manufacturers want to get a piece of this very lucrative pie and ‘OnlyAndoid.com’ was launched late last year to support the Android operating system. The handset giant Nokia and Microsoft have now announced their own versions of app download markets for their own operating systems.

From May, Nokia will open up the ‘Ovi Store’ to offer apps and multimedia for their own range of phones. Microsoft will launch ‘Windows Marketplace’ later this year to support their range of ‘Windows Phones’.

Below are my top three phones to be announced at this years congress. All are high end phones that have the standards of wi-fi, 3G and GPS. These are the phones that I feel will make it big in 2009.

HTC Magic

The phone formally known as the G2 has now been renamed the Magic. This is a slimmer, cleaner version of the G1 and in my view a lot nicer. Gone is the slide out keyboard and this has made the device smaller and lighter. All the other specs are very similar to the G1 with the 3.2″ touchscreen providing the majority of the control for the device. The Android operating system has changed slightly to the ‘cupcake’ version to try and address some of the teething problems with the first version. The device will now also record video.

This device appears to be aimed at the group of people who didn’t like the form factor of the G1 and may like the new body of the Magic. Unfortunately the lack of device options that are on the market may still limit the spread of Android (although it didn’t seem to stop the iPhone!)

Sony Ericsson Idou

Sony have gone for the high end multimedia features for their latest phone. The Idou is packed with a 12.1 MP camera (seems a tad over the top for the size of the lens) and a 3.5″ 16 million color touchscreen (same size as the iPhone). What looks interesting with this phone is that will have a similar interface to what is currently used on the PS3 and PSP. I do like this interface, it is very clear and easy to use. Combined with a touchscreen, this is definitely an interface that could rival the iPhone.

The operating system looks to be a variant of the Symbian S60 so there should be plenty of apps available to compete with all the other app markets that are in development.

Samsung Omnia HD

Thanks to the iPhone, touchscreen phones are top of the pops when it comes to phone tech. To complete my trio of the best of MWC comes another touchscreen phone, the Samsung Omina HD. Yes the ‘HD’ gives away the Samsung’s killer feature – it can record 720p HD video at 24 fps. It comes with a 3.7″ AMOLED (active matrix organic light emitting diode) display that has the iPhone style capacitive touchscreen technology. This makes the screen very responsive and thanks to the OLED tech, it should look very impressive.

Like the Sony, this phone will use a version of the Symbian S60 operating system so can make use of the solid base of apps available on the market.

Now what could trump all of these phones is the rumour that Apple will be releasing a new iPhone this summer. As with all new Apple rumours, Apple are saying nothing and very little information can be found about what this new version would look like. I personally do not expect anything radical from Apple (there’s not that much wrong with the iPhone design). If Apple do release a new iPhone I would expect more memory (64GB), a weight reduction, color options, a better camera (with video) and some new OS options.

GadgetGeek – Tech Reviews, News, and Future Views

Windows 7

This is the successor to Windows Vista which, as most people will agree, never lived up to all the hype. Microsoft look to be following the Apple philosophy of quick and simple for this new version of Windows. The boot up times are expected to be significantly quicker than previous versions (I hope they also address the deteriorating boot up times you get the older the installation and the more software you install). Both the UI and appearance have been slim-lined from previous versions with the Task Bar now taking on more of a MAC-OS inspired Dock feel. The software has been designed to run on a wide range of machines including cheap netbooks (Microsoft are desperate to get rid of XP and I guess this is their answer!)

The Beta is available now with the full software not expected until late 2009 or early 2010. Microsoft have announced this week that there will be unlimited downloads of the Beta software until January 24th, so go get yours now.

Palm Pre

I’ve never owned a Palm, but looking at the pictures and specs on this new one and I could be tempted. It comes with Palms first new O/S in years and looks very tasty. Its form factor is aimed directly at the iPhone and Blackberry designs with a 3.1” multi-touch screen AND a Blackberry style QWERTY keyboard. It has the standard smartphone 3G and GPS and also a 3MP camera and flash. The Pre uses the new Palm Synergy feature to bring your Outlook, Google, and Facebook calendars together for one logical view of your day. And if you have the same contacts in different places, Pre can link them together, making it easy to find the information you need.

No date yet on when this is expected on the market.

Sony X1000 Walkman

This is Sony’s latest Walkman and appears to be created as a direct competitor to the iPod Touch. It comes with a bright 3” multi-touch OLED (Organic Light Emitting Diode) screen. Which I suspect will become the standard with new screens over the next couple of years. It has Sony’s very good hardware noise reduction built into the device which will enhance the already excellent sound quality that Walkman’s have (in my view better than iPods). Sony Walkman’s have always had excellent battery life and I expect this one will beat the poor battery life of the iPod Touch, especially with that cool OLED screen. The first players will come in the 16 Gb and 32 GB sizes (sound familiar?)

Expect this in the shops sometime this summer.

Asus Eee Keyboard

Now this is different. Asus have gone and stuffed all the innards of a PC into a keyboard!

It has a large 5” touchscreen and full wi-fi capability. Just connect it to a monitor or your TV through its wireless HDMI (yes wireless HDMI – I like it). It runs Windows XP Home, includes a 1.6GHz Intel Atom microprocessor, 1Gb of DDR2 DRam and a choice of 16GB or 32GB solid state drives for storage. It doesn’t have a built in DVD player, but if you are only going to use it for the internet and email this would not be a big issue. I like this concept and hope that this works well and has good battery life. I could really see this as a nice addition to my living room.

Expect this around September this year.

If I end up getting any of this cool tech, I will of course give your a much more detailed review.

With hundreds of vendors and thousands of visitors, the expo hall was crowded. One major exception was Adobe, who late last year decided to pull out. A large empty space at the front of the south hall was noticeably vacant. The footprint was familiar and Adobe-shaped, but that didn’t stop people from doing crazy stuff to win prizes.

The most visible of the giveaways was Peachpit Press. The contestants just needed to be spotted wearing bunny ears. The catch was that prizes were given away every hour, so no rest for the wicked or the freebie whore, and among the included prizes were iPod Nanos and iPhones. The entire week was nothing but bunny ears, and even other vendors were wearing them. This type of giveaway was the most extreme, however most prizes were won by raffle. Easy enough. Walk by a booth (maybe more than once) and pick up a raffle ticket that cute young girls and guys were handing out as fast as they could. Show up later at a predetermined time, and (hopefully) if they call your number, claim your prize . Last year everybody was giving out prizes, but this year it was slim pickins.

The most popular raffle-style prize-givers were Speck (makers of iPod/iPhone cases), Elgato (EyeTV – DVR for the Mac), Microsoft and FileMaker Pro (Database software.) The last two allowed audience members to have a chance to win hourly after each product demonstration.

MacWorld was not just about new software and the latest iphone case; vendors often targeted the tired and weary user. From ‘Brain Tonic’ to a glorified back brace, users found everything they always knew they never wanted. It was all about getting bodies in the booth. That could was done by showing off intriguing devices, walking around the show floor advertising, or even having a Rock Band contest to win prizes.

For a description of the photos, check out the gallery bellow.

Included in the Fallout 3 content, is the following:

• Operation: Anchorage. Enter a military simulation and fight in one of the greatest battles of the Fallout universe – the liberation of Anchorage, Alaska from its Chinese Communist invaders. An action-packed battle scheduled for release in January.
  
• The Pitt. Journey to the industrial raider town called The Pitt, located in the remains of Pittsburgh. Choose your side. Scheduled for release in February.
  
• Broken Steel. Join the ranks of the Brotherhood of Steel and rid the Capital Wasteland of the Enclave remnants once and for all. Continues the adventure past the main quest. Scheduled for release in March.

Also, new content was announced for Fable II as well. Obviously, being an Xbox 360 exclusive game, this will also be limited to the Xbox 360. There will be two DLC packs released in mid-december. One of them will be free, but beyond news that you will need to download the DLC in order to continue playing co-op with someone that has the paid DLC, not much else was announced. The other DLC will run 800 microsoft points ($10 USD), is titled “Knothole Island” and will include to following content:

• Embark on 3 unique quests set in 3 unique dungeons.
  
• Unravel the mystical secrets of the resurrection shrine.
  
• Try on a whole new range of outfits and look like an armoured knight, an assassin, a barbarian or a leather-clad biker, among many others.
  
• Brandish 6 new weapons.
  
• Dozens of unique potions that will drastically alter your appearance.
  
• Customise your weapons the way you want with the new augment tool and a whole new array of augments.
  
• +50 additional leaderboards.

Is the content worth the additional cost? Will it add a significant chunk of time to the already arguably long experiences? Will gamers shy away from DLC announced a mere month after the game is released? There are still many questions left unanswered. Hopefully in time, they will find promising answers. But in the meantime, I’ll use this space for an excuse to post the nice looking but slightly unfulfilling new trailer for Batman: Arkham Asylum:

One of the biggest problems with the show was that Microsoft seemed as if they wanted to rush through all their announcements because they had so many. As a result, a lot of the news didn’t get the time it needed in order to be understood by gamers.

Major Nelson runs a podcast over on his website where he often talks about the 360, his job at Microsoft, etc. Well, yesterday he put up an episode where he could just go over everything, go into more details where need be, etc. Give it a listen if you have time and you are interested. If you don’t have time but are interested, I’ll try to sum up some of the details. So keep reading.

New Xbox Experience:

• Avatars are optional. You can choose to use your gamerpic instead.
• Many 3rd party developers are already thinking of ways to use Avatars. Fallout developer thought of the idea of releasing a hazmat avatar suit. Developers will be able to release clothing pieces and stuff with their games.
• All themes, gamerpics, etc will work with the new system.
• This update will "definitely be out this year".
• You will be able to install games to the hard drive of your system, and play them from there. You still will have to insert the disc to verify you own it. However, after that, it will not spin from the drive at all. Also, all games will support the HDD install, not just new games.
• Also works "really slick" with multi disc games. You can install the first disc only, 2 of the 3, whatever you want.
• Fully optional to install to HDD.
• Xbox Marketplace online. Go via your computer to Live, buy/choose a piece of content. When you turn on your 360, it automatically starts downloading the content you chose online.
• RSS feed will be available online so that you can monitor new content.
• Primetime is broadcast simultaneously, everyone will be able to answer the same questions. You can win real prizes. Major Nelson is trying to host one.
• Xbox Live Party System – So cool, but you may have to try it to realize it’s full potential. 8 players. Allows you to assemble your friends, go into any game as a group. You stay together as a party between friends. If 4 players want to play Gears of War, and 4 wants to play Uno…you can do that. You don’t have to be in the same game. Works with every single Xbox 360 game. Obviously you’ll have to have a multiplayer game that supports that many players.You could have 4 different co-op games, for instance.
• New display support 16×10. Letterboxing so nothing gets stretched.
• Current Dashboard is built into the new Xbox Guide. The current blades system will make up the new guide button feature. Every single thing you can do in the  dashboard will be in the new guide. No ads, pretty obviously. But you can browse the marketplace for content, for example. It will detect your game, and assume you want that content.
• If you don’t want to use the new dashboard, you could always leave your game in the system, and operate the whole system from the new guide rather than the dashboard.
• Optimizing the speed, so it will be "wicked fast". Thank God.
• It’s pretty much done, but not code complete. The changes will be tweaks.

Netflix:

• Two requirements for Netflix: You must be a Gold Member. You must be a Netflix subscriber that has unlimited instant watch. Which means the cheapest subscription plan ($4.99, apparently) won’t work, but the rest do. So starting at like the $8.99 plan.
• Lots of Anime for anime plans.
• In order to use Netflix in the Party system, all members must meet the requirements of watching Netflix. That’s sad, but understandable.

Lips:

• 2nd player can join in just by picking up your mic and shaking it. Then you will be in a duet with the first player.
• You can use your Zune/iPod with any non-DRM song.

Rockband 2:

• You will have a fee to export your Rockband 1 songs off your disc. Probably like $5. Most likely to pay for the fees of re-lisencing the songs.

Final Fantasy XIII:

• North America and Europe, but not Japan. It will come out at the same time as the PS3 version.

Alright, I have to apologize up front. The evil podcast faeries came along and stole 2 hours of this episode from my computer. I went into the living room, and came back to an 11 minute episode. I don’t know what happened. One minute it was there, the next it was not.

So, what you are about to hear is the live version of the show. For the most part, it is decent quality. There are some sections where it has bad echos though. My apologies. Again, I have no idea what happened to the good version. If the echoing gets too bad, it fixes itself after a little bit. Hope you enjoy!

Fallout 3: Exclusive DLC for Xbox 360 (In addition to PC)

Resident Evil 5: Online Co-op is included. Friday, March 13th 2009 release date

Fable 2: Release date October 2008. Online Co-op confirmed.

Gears of War 2: Ride a Brumak, 5-player co-op streaming enemy mode online, but story-mode apparently only 2 players. Release date November 7th

Xbox Dashboard Face Lift: Completely re-designed dashboard. Mii-like avatars. 8-player party system used to play games, chat, share photos, and share netflix (!) movies. Lots of clothing and accessory options. Apparently partially designed by Rare. Release date: Fall 2008

XBL Arcade/Primetime: 1 vs. 100 (Avatars, win real prizes, blah blah), Geometry Wars 2, Galaga Legions, Portal: Still Alive (Exclusive to Xbox 360. New Challenge mode, same single player game), South Park (Nothing really shown. Just that it was a South Park game), Uno Rush, Original Banjo Kazooie, Original Star Ocean, Primetime = Game shows like 1 vs 100

Netflix: Exclusive to Xbox 360. Netflix subscribers will get the option of streaming movies to their Xbox 360 for no additional fee. May be shared with people in your Live Party (See Xbox Dashboard Face Lift). Doubles the number of Xbox Live content pieces available.

Scene-It Box Office Smash: Sequel to succesful Scene-It game for 360. This time with Online play and downloadable content to expand the game with. The way it should have been done to begin with. Uses Avatars.

You’re in the Movies: Weird Xbox Vision Camera game. Act out scenes based on the mini-game’s criteria. Ala – Swat at bugs as they appear on your screen. Then when you and your friends get through a game, it takes those recorded scenes and makes them into a cheesy B-movie that had nothing to do with your mini-games. Hillarity ensues.

Banjo Kazooie/Viva Pinata: Showed a couple trailers. Still looks nice. Viva Pinata allows you to scan cards to bring in new Pinatas via the Xbox Vision camera.

Guitar Hero World Tour: REM track pack exclusive to the 360. Eagles is exclusive to Guitar Hero. Metallica is releasing some of their new songs on GHWT and GH3.

Lips: Microsoft’s answer to Playstation’s Singstar. Looks like mostly pop/hip hop. Duffy performed live, and didn’t seem to be able to follow her own song in the game. Mics pulsate with light, and are motion sensitive for bonus points when you dance. Also, you can hook up your MP3 players to sing along to "any song in your collection".

Rock Band 2: In addition to the previously announced backwards compatible DLC for RB2, the songs from the original game’s disc will ALSO be backwards compatible. So you can copy the game’s songs to your hard drive, and play them from there. Also, the official track list is out now. And apparently there will be a 20-song pack available for download for free at the game release. Supposedly songs that wouldn’t fit on the game. 104 or so songs total. Also, AC/DC is exclusive to Rock Band.

Last Remnant: Dated for November 20th, worldwide.

Final Fantasy XIII: Coming to Xbox 360 (In America only, perhaps) on the game’s release date. This is in addition to the PS3, not instead of.

Sorry if I missed anything. A /LOT/ happened today.

Read More for live updates.

1:42pm – XBLA gets exclusive Fallout 3 DLC. That’s pretty big.

1:46pm – Resident Evil 5 features online co-op. Could be cool. Looks a bit rough to me.

1:47pm – March 13th (Friday), 2009 Resident Evil 5 release date.

1:50pm – Epic. Fable 2 starts with you being crapped on by a bird. Online co-op confirmed. You can bring in any friend by walking up to glowing orbs in the game, and inviting the orbs. A bizarre. October release date.

1:55pm – Gears of War 2 trailer looks pretty awesome. And BTW, Cliffy B has the best name in the history of names.

2:01pm – You can ride a Brumak? Interesting. November 7th release date. No 4 player co-op (Stick with 2 players), but there is a 5 player co-op mode that involves taking on wave after wave of enemies.

2:04pm – Sweet. Took them 30 minutes to get to the circle jerk portion of the presentation. That’s an improvement. G4 claims a big announcement is coming at 2:08pm

2:07pm – NBC Universal is a new partner for content. Is that the big announcement? God I hope not.

2:09pm – Xbox Live guy is on now. We’ve had rumors of some big XBL news. Will we get some here?

2:10pm – Xbox 360 will be completely reinvented through software. Oh dear God. Avatars. Gag me. Still. This is huge news, for better or worse. The dashboard interface will completely change this year.

2:13pm – Your avatars will have cool clothes. I see ridiculous DLC for clothing.

2:17pm – 1 vs 100 … oh, yay. /sarcasm

2:19pm – Geometry Wars 2. Pretty cool looking.

2:21pm – Portal: Still Alive, exclusive to XBLA. Hell yeah.

2:23pm – SWEET! Netflix teaming with XBL. At no additional cost, you get to watch your streaming videos on XBL. AND, you can share you movies with your live party!

2:26pm – Banjo Kazooie trailer. Woo hoo. That game looks so fun. And viva Pinata 2

2:29pm – Original Banjo Kazooie on XBLA. And more Scene-It. Arg! I can’t keep up. Scene-It will have DLC this time. And play on live. The original had neither.

2:33pm – Some cheesy movie making game starring the vision camera. Weird.

2:42pm – Guitar Hero World Tour has an exclusive REM pack for the 360. Plus, the Eagles and someone else is exclusive to the Guitar Hero franchise.

2:44pm – Long rumored singing game called "Lips" is confirmed. Sing along to any song in your collection.

2:45pm – Duffy, singer of Mercy is singing Mercy, on Lips. Very bizarre. She keeps singing it different than the game has it :P

2:46pm – Now onto Rock Band 2. Talking about it’s limited exclusivity. This is a really long Press Conference.

2:53pm – Rock Band 2 will support Rock Band 1’s disc content! Sweet!

2:55pm – Square Enix president on stage now…Showed all the games we knew about.

3:00pm – Square president comes BACK on stage for a big announcement….Final Fantasy XIII!

3:06pm – That’s it folks. I have to say….best Microsoft Conference I can remember. HUGE stuff announced. Not all of it great, but all of it was huge.

*EDIT* Keep Reading for new images!

Mock-ups from the design team in response to questions about themes and stuff:

A majority of the week’s events will happen on Monday and Tuesday, as the biggest surprises of the convention generally happen amongst the formal stage presentations (And even then, the majority of the news will likely come from the console makers’ shows).

As such, in order to allow for a majority of the news from the show to take place before we record (You know, so we can actually discuss it), we are going to have to hold off on the E3 Discussion episode. We apoligize to anyone that would’ve been available on the original day, but will now miss the show. However, it’s just about the only way of doing it properly.

The E3 Discussion episode of GeekiNput will take place on Wednesday, July 16th at 8pm EST/5pm PST. The remaining GeekiNput shows will not be effected by this change of schedule, and will continue to record on Mondays.

We hope everyone understands and can still make it.

Rock Band 2 has just been made official. Releasing in September on the Xbox 360, with the other consoles recieving the game "later this year". In addition, IGN has an excellent interview up with harmonix over at their site. Check it out. Some of my favorite bits from the article:

The most important question. Will Rock Band 1 DLC be playable in Rock Band 2?

Dan Teasdale: Yes. We’ve been developing Rock Band as a music platform from the start. All of the songs that you’ve purchased so far (and will be able to purchase in the future) are instantly playable and fully supported in Rock Band 2. We’ve even added some cool new features that let you play your DLC in different ways, which I think people will be very excited to get their hands on.

…

"Rock Band 2’s instruments will not disappoint. Like I mentioned before, our philosophy here is to innovate, then perfect. Along those lines, we’ve been able to take all of the feedback we’ve received to make quieter, more realistic, and more reliable instruments."

…

"Rock Band 2 has the strongest playlist we’ve ever assembled, and I think fans will be blown away not just at the spread, but also at the caliber of acts we’ve attracted."

…

"We’ve taken almost everything people have asked for in Rock Band and added it to Rock Band 2, as well as including some "first time ever" features."

More details will be released at E3 this year. Join us July 15th for GeekiNput’s live discussion of all the E3 events, including Rock Band 2!

Limited content can’t be used under certain circumstances. Basically, if you lose access to Xbox Live, you lose access to your content. If you log out of the gamertag that purchased the content, you also lose access to that content. Under perfect conditions, this generally isn’t a problem. But in some cases, it’s obviously a huge problem.

Larry ‘Major Nelson’ Hyrb posted yesterday on his blog (Http://www.majornelson.com) that the Microsoft developement team has finally finished the DRM license transfer tool. In addition to posting a video explaining how to run the tool, he also posted the following image, demonstrating what content purchased on multiple systems can look like.

 Click below to see the video explaining how to use the tool and where to find it.

Movies:
Michael Sheard, Admiral Ozzel, dies
Star Trek Movie currently known as Star Trek: The Beginning
Jim Carrey and Ben stiller in “Used Guys”, a Scifi Comedy
Lady in the Water starts production

Games:
Sony Bashes Microsoft…again
City of Heroes Issue 5 goes Live

General & Discussions:
DragonCon takes place this weekend
I bought a DS…and I like it!
Every10minutes.com 360 giveaway
Buffcast Season 2, coming soon?
Bandwidth all used up!

Also, a Link for the Unaired Buffy Pilot!