TGS with some more information and impressions

Thursday, September 20^th

It's TGS time again, after the ceremony I used the press entry to get into hall 5. At the Makuhari Messe hall 1-8 is one hall, which devided in 3 parts, 1-2, 3-6 and 7-8, and also there is hall 9-11 with the international exhibitors. I went to Capcom first to try Monster Hunter 4, Capcom had a giant booth, with many titles, such as Devil May Cry, the new Ace Attorney, Lost Planet 3, Bio Hazard 6 (Resident Evil 6) and others, even some mobile software. The queue was instantly very long, so I asked if a privat presentation is possible or if one has to wait as a press member compared to the business members, there was no difference and I had to get in line. After a while they handed out tickets for playing. I chose the single player and got a ticket for 10:30AM to come back at this time. So I used the time to go to the information counter to ask for a press kit, I had to give them my business card and they handed over a DVD with press material. After that I got back to get in line for the 10:30AM trial but still had to wait 30 min. There were noz so many differences compared with the older parts of the serie in this demo, but as this is only a small view I guess many things will be added until March 2013. After my 15 min of playing I had the chance to take some photos of the MonHun Booth, but not play the multiplayer, therefore I had to get in line again, even as press.

The promoters were very impolite and almost tried to push me out of the area, even when I showed them my Capcom press sticker that allowes me to take photos of the area but not of the screens. They also had the huge new monster, which I guess will be the new flagship monster in their area, I only wanted to know which material it was made of, a promototer got his supervisor, maybe because they wanted me to back off, she told me in a very rude kind that I shall leave the gaming area because this was no place for english questions:“ No english here, go to the information, no english, no english!!“, combined with a made face, I was really wondering about this rude behavior and also the fact that almost nobody speaks english at an international gaming messe. When leaving the area I got a small MH4 bag, which couldn't change my mood about this rudeness,after that I didn't go to the information counter to ask for the material of the monster, they maybe would have been able to understand me but unable to answer this question. I was very dissapointed about the promoters but not about the game, because it seems like they were only hired to stop the time that nobody plays more than 15 min and to clean the displays, but not for answering questions of the release or any other content stuff.

Capcom was followed by Square Enix – the same procedure, getting press kit, walking around, no allowence to take pictures of the screens, no demos, only trailer, no english except for the info counter, so I was also a bit dissapointed by this booth, too. This procedure was the same with all the other big publishers, such as SEGA, BANDAI NAMCO, SONY and others, too. Detailed facts about the the games and the given press material will be shown later on this blog, because right now it would be too much, so I will present this stuff one by one,every with a single entry.

Only one strange story left; I went to Sony, starting procedure was done already, so I asked in english (big mistake I know), wheather there's someone of the God of War developers at the TGS. The promoter I asked only understood God of War and went with me to the gaming area and put me into a line leaving me there alone, he thought I wanted to play. I got to a selection counter, where I needed to choose the game to try, I asked again for someone of the Santa Monica Studio, and once again they only understood God of War and gave me a ticket to wait in a second queue only for this game – this works with all the other games, too. Before getting in line, I asked another guy, who sorts the people, he noticed: english question about game, so he said, follow me or something like that, so I followed him and was looking forward and hoping to meet someone of the GoW guys again since GamesCom, then he stopped, turned left and pointed to the Sony info counter and said some thing like: “english question here“, I was almost going crazy because this little boy drove me nuts, in the end I had to get in both lines again, then I finally arrived at the GoW area and also had someone in front of me who was able to speak english very good, but he had a bad message for me, no one of the God of War team was there, so I only could play the new God of War Ascension with some kinda 3D-glasses, which was very awesome, even if I already knew the demo from the GamesCom, it was a completely new experience, so again: good games (if playable), bad promoters (except for the one who finally understood me)

A short summary about the games and the messe overall for now:

My highlight was definitely Monster Hunter 4 for Nintendo 3DS, because I love the serie and this new part of it will continue the things that make a game to a MonHun game, so I guess they won't fail and my second highlight was God of War Acsension in 3D which also feels like the other games of the serie with some new spicy features.

An interesting project is Project X Zone from Bandai Namco, I can't describe the genre, but the game has a hero base of many other publishers such as Valkyria Chronicles from SEGA or MegaMan, Zero, Ryu and others from Capcom and so on, it looks good,and we will see, wheather it will come to Europe.

Many promoters don't speak english, so communication was tricky, and sometimes they deported me to the info counter so I wasn't their problem any more

That's all for now, detailed entries about the games will follow but I think not before I'm back in Germany again