Link is back with a new look and a new quest...

Link is back again with another Gamecube adventure titled The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, though the cute child-like character we saw in his previous Wind Waker excursion is gone. We are left with a significantly more adult and life-like version of the character that should assauge the complaints fans had with the outgoing art style of Wind Waker. On an interesting side note, Nintendo has revealed that this incarnation of Link is not the one found in Ocarina of Time or Wind Waker, but how this Link relates to the others has been left rather inscrutable up to this point.

What do you call more than one Colossus?

In their new game Shadow of the Colossus, developer SCEI has taken the time-honored formula of saving a damsel in distress, and crafted a very innovative game based around the search for a lost love. Finding your lost love won't be an easy task, as the nameless hero will be required to match wits against sixteen of the eponymous creatures of the title.

Kingdom Hearts II Emerges from the Cloaked Shadows

To date, Square Enix has been more tight-lipped about Kingdom Hearts II than government agents are with nuclear armament codes. Finally though, at E3 we got our first taste of what to expect from the highly anticipated sequel to the game that successfully blended Square and Disney characters.

The first thing that everyone will immediately notice is the maturation of Sora, the main protaganist from the first game. He now is sporting some fancy black duds, and doesn't appear quite as child-like as in Kingdom Hearts. The tone of the game has certainly darkened to some degree, as enigmatic cloaked figures were in abundance during movies shown for the game.

SEGA Wrecks All Combat Racers with 360's Full Auto

If there was one game that I would say that epitomizes what next-gen games from Xbox 360 are going to be like, that one game so far would have to be SEGA's Full Auto. Imagine a cross between EA's Burnout, Need for Speed series, Ubisoft's Prince of Persia and Atari's classic RoadBlasters and you've got the idea of what Full Auto brings to the table. The game was on display at E3 in Microsoft's booth running on Xbox 360 alpha hardware (read: PowerMac G5s). This one game truly overshadowed everything else being demoed publicly for Microsoft's next console. Full Auto is a delicious blend of jaw-dropping destruction and high-speed racing that shows off the promise of what next-generation games have to offer graphically.

We Love Katamari Rolls Over Worthless Co-op Mode

Katamari Damacy was one of those games I heard about, but never got around to playing. The basic premise is that you roll a ball around picking up anything in the world smaller than you, and try to reach a certain size in a certain time. The bigger you get, the more items in the world you can pick up, and this leads to a very interesting type of gameplay.

At E3 Namco had the latest incarnation, We Love Katamari, which now includes a two-player cooperative mode. In theory, you should be working together to build a bigger ball, but in actuality you end up spending most of the time trying to compromise and decide which direction to go. The two-player mode requires that both players perform the same action, or at least two similar actions. If you want to go left, the other person has to want to go left. Want to turn around quickly by pushing both analog sticks at the same time? Well, just convince your partner to do it too, and do it at the same time, and it will work great.

Odama crushes classic pinball with a microphone

Upon walking past the Odama booth, the initial impression you get is that it's just another pinball game. A ball is bouncing around the level, creating sounds and animations as key points are hit. Then you notice more movement, and you see that the level is actually a battlefield, with men fighting each other, and all sides being crushed by the Odama ball. Then you stop and take a longer look, to see what else this game has to offer.

Hands On the Game Boy Micro, Where'd It Go?

Boy is that Game Boy Micro tiny. It literally is no larger than a standard PC Card wireless card. Making the unit so small required a trade off in the size of the screen, which really doesn't make sense. The Game Boy Micro's screen is way too small to make out several details on games that you should no problems seeing on a Game Boy Advance SP. I'm thinking that the Game Boy Micro is a way for Nintendo to expand their market share over the PSP to the opposite end of the spectrum, people with the dexterity of a 4 year old. Nintendo may be harping on the screen being the best the Game Boy has ever seen; however, I'm thinking that they're trying to stay on the offensive on the screen to keep people from discussing it. Well, tell you what, the Game Boy Micro is definately not going to replace my Game Boy Advance SP any time soon. No matter how much smaller it is.