Here’s all the big stories that came out of EA’s press conference. Enjoy!

Note: For an at-a-glance tour of EA’s conference, have a little look here.

Sim Animals Announced

EA have just (at the time of writing) announced The Sims Animals, an exclusive Wii and DS title that will let players create pets and environments for them. Apparently some pets will be cute and cuddly, while other will be more difficult to handle. All I want is a pet creator that will let me make some mutant freaks.

In my opinion this is just another Sims money generating spin-off, but I could be proved wrong. Changing the environment certainly looks interesting.

Have a look at it here:

Sims Animals is out January 2009.

Sims 3 Details

First of all, Sims 3 is coming out in 2009. How specific! It will feature the most complex characters ever in a video game and, as well as letting you edit your home, will let you venture out into town where an entire city will be at your finger tips, with plenty of fellow citizens to interact with - including a Hobo rooting through bins.

The trailer is in the same video as Sim Animals, so have a look at the video above.

More more more, on the next page!

Dead Space Details

EA showed off the usual Dead Space gameplay. There’s no HUD so health is displayed on the characters back, and ammo is show on a hologram. In case you’ve forgotten, Dead Space is that game with all the dismemberment. Enemies will sprout new limbs or adapt their behaviour depending on the limbs they have left - your objective? Shoot off the limbs strategically so that the enemy is dead. Yay!

Here’s the game play walkthrough from EA’s conference:

To me the strategic dismemberment seemed to make the game a bit slow paced. The graphics looked gorgeous and the game was very atmospheric, but it looked a bit plodding.

Here’s the trailer shown at the EA conference, which was made entirely with in game footage.

Creepy.

Dead Space is out on 360, PC and PS3 on October 21st, 2008.

More details can be found here.

Mirror’s Edge Trailer

Mirror’s Edge looks incredible. It’s a first person action game by DICE that features lots of jumping, sliding and melee combat. For me, the first person aspect of the game is what separates it from everything else. Seeing your arms fly out in front of you as you jump for a helicopter is truly something special. That combined with the beautiful art style, makes Mirror’s Edge one of the games I’m most looking forward to this year. I just hope there are a variety of environments so that the game doesn’t become sterile and boring.

Mirror’s Edge is out later this year on the 360, PS3 and PC.

Over the page, please.

Spore

There wasn’t much to note about spore other than a new trailer which is just down there. Oh yes and one other thing! EA teamed up with National Geographic to film a documentary about Spore, which will air when the game ships. That should be quite interesting. Will Wright also said that he had expected 100,00 creatures made in the Spore Creature Creator, but the actual number exceeded 1.5 million. Well done guys!

Here’s Spore’s showing at the EA Pess Conference:

Probably some EA Sports News

[snore] Sorry what? Oh right, yeah they announced ‘Dynamic DNA’ for NBA Live 09. Apparently it will capture the ‘unpredicability’ of basketball by gathering statistics of real life basketball players everyday. So if your basketball team are doing badly in real life, your NBA team stats in the game will decrease. I can hardly wait - it’s not that it’s a bad idea, but sports games just don’t interest me. The only problem I have with it is that your team will loose skill due to events outside your control. It’s not that you played badly or picked a bad team, it’s purely a result of external factors. I don’t see why a player should be punished for things they haven’t done.

Also, this year is the 20th anniversary of Madden. I fail to be excited.

Wii All Play

The ‘All Play’ series hopes to make sports games accessible to all. I’m guessing that they are achieving this through two things:

1. Putting the games on the Wii

2. Toning down the difficulty/options available.

One interesting thing that’s come out of all this is that, while demoing Tiger Woods PGA 09, Peter Moore wins, however he is using the new ‘All Star’ mode, while his opponent is playing on the normal mode. Now Peter, that’s just not fair!

Find out all the details from Doc here.

EA Reveal New Way to Spend Money on Micro-transactions - Nucleus Announced

Nanea Reeves, head of EA’s online group, announced Nucleus, which allows you to have a persistent identity across all EA games. This will help you make easy micro-transactions whatever the game!

More on the next page!

New Details on Rupture

For those of you who don’t know, Rupture is a social-gaming network bought by EA and created by the guy who made Napster - Shawn Fanning. The only thing announced were social achievements, which Fanning is allowing independent developers to make. Get 2 friends on your friends list (10 points). Yes that will work very well.

iPhone Games Announced!

That exclamation mark was sarcastic. EA announced that Need for Speed: Undercover and Tiger Woods 09 are coming to the iPhone. Also confirmed was the use of the accelerometer and Wi-fi for scrabble. Wi-fi scrabble? Count me in!

Bioware Announce Dragon Age: Origins

Dragon Age: Origins is a spiritual successor to Baldur’s Gate and will feature detailed back stories. Greg Zeschuk says it will spawn a big new franchise and will eventually make its way onto consoles.

Here’s the trailer. Enjoy!

The next one is the last page. Promise.

Left 4 Dead Trailer and AI Details

Left 4 Dead will feature an AI director that will help sort out the game’s difficulty. Basically, if you’re playing badly, fewer enemies will come and the game will become easier. However, the easier the game the fewer rewards, so being good at the game pays off. An example of these rewards include being witness to a massive explosion at a gas station. The game launches on November 4th for the PC and 360.

And the moment you’ve all been waiting for, maybe, the Left 4 Dead footage:

EA and id Partnership

Have a look at this post by our very own Rothbart for all the details.

EA and id have just announced a partnership. Apparently, EA is going to help id publish their new game Rage - a Road Warrior style action oriented game.

Here’s the Rage trailer:

Phew! There you have it, everything that was announced or detailed at this years EA E3 Press Conference.

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