After a year of waiting the games industries biggest and loudest event, e3 will finally be with us on June 7th. Until that date we here at DC Reviews will bring you our predictions for the three big companies starting today with Sony.
Whisper it quietly but at the time of writing this the PSN is still down, by the time e3 rolls around next month it will be back up in some capacity I'm sure which leads me onto my first prediciton
AN APOLOGY
Yep, I have a feeling at some part during the conference the PSN outage will come up and Sony will humbly apologise, there won't be any Kevin Butler jokes because the whole debacle is serious, I mean, your personal data has been stolen and now 70 million people are in danger of being hit by fraud. This isn't the most shocking of prediction's but it does lead onto the fact that the rewards programme for consumers will be discussed. Europe is already confirmed to be getting an Identity Theft Protection scheme, 30 days of Playstation Plus and two free PS3 games and two free PSP games if you own that system, but what about everyone else?
GOD OF WAR IV
God of War III came out in March 2010 to some fantastic reviews and is currently a 91 on meteoritic. Kratos' story arc is supposedly over but the franchise is certainly not. Will we see another Kratos prequel for the PS3 like the PSP outings of the history's angriest man or will we be thrown a curve ball and be angry in someone's else's Greek boots? Who knows, but I will be pretty shocked if the series doesn't make some sort of appearance at E3.
NGP Full Reveal
Sony's new baby the NGP will be there of course and after it's early reveal in February expect Sony to really blow the lid open this time. We expect a release date for all territories, a semi-reveal of launch line-up but I don't think price will be announced. Revealing the price this early could harm sales and put consumers off unless the price is super low, even then it would probably have more impact on the lead-up to Christmas. A completed demonstration of the OS will be shown live and perhaps announce a revamp of the PS3 XMB to follow in it's new baby brothers' footsteps. Uncharted NGP will get a full showing and will be confirmed to launch with the system. The actual name of the NGP will be announced and I expect Sony to steer clear of the Playstation Portable name, it seem's that name conjures up a lot of stigma much like the Wii, no games etc etc
Warhawk Sequel Announced
2007 game Warhawk, which has a rather large loyal following will finally get a sequel, probably called Starhawk if you believe all the rumours. The multi-player only game will see a release at the end of 2012 and possibly join God of War IV as PS3's big hitters for next holiday.
And The Rest...
And that'll be about it for major news from Sony. A quiet E3 for the Playstation machine yes, but you could argue they have bigger things to worry about right now. All their major franchises are coming to the system, Uncharted 3, InFamous 2, Ratchet and Clank, Resistance 3 etc so barring a totally unexpected Killzone 4 announcement I can't see anything other than God of War or Warhawk sequel in terms of games as mentioned above. The only other thing that could happen that's not NGP related is a totally re-vamped PSN which has been rumoured for months now, even before the hack. Cross game chat will happen and this may very well be the year where Sony finally gets their house in order with the PSN. Sony may jump into bed with EA again and get some exclusive Battlefield 3 deal in terms of maps or something else like they did with Medal of Honour to try and combat the Call of Duty/360 partnership.
A solid E3 from Sony without being a spectacular one in my opinion. They won't win E3, it'll be either Microsoft or Nintendo. One without any games and the other with Zelda. Look out for Nintendo's E3 chatter next on the site!
You can follow Craig Shields on twitter @craigshields9
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