This is my seventh E3.  I started coming back in the mid 90s to keep up with what's going on in the game industry.  For gamers, E3 serves as an exciting preview of things to come.  For a small game developer, E3 can be scary as you discover that "everyone else" has stuff far cooler than you could possibly imagine.

Going to E3 as a indie developer is like playing the classic game Civilization. You've just produced your first musketman and think you're doing great when suddenly the Mongols land on your shores with a dozen tanks.

For the most recent times, I've tried to "blog" what I see. You can read past ones here.  There you can read glorious predictions such as how great Duke Nukem Forever is going to be and my prediction that the Game Cube is the best of the consoles. But then again, I also used to make games for IBM's OS/2 operating system so..

So what's exciting this year? Well, first off there is the XBOX 360 vs. Playstation 3. Both sides claiming their mega hardware will be the end all be all..  But who are we kidding? We don't all have amnesia. I still remember the Playstation 2 demos which looked incredible. Games are much more taxing than demos.  But from all indications, the Playstation 3 does look like it's a bit more powerful.  But the Xbox 360 is going to ship first.

Hardware specs, aside, the Xbox 360 is being designed for high-definition TV. All its games support HDTV resolutions (1080i/720p) which means that they will be much crisper, cleaner, and just plain better looking than the original Xbox.  Visually, it will likely be an immense improvement.  It will also play DVDs and CDs and connect easily to various digital devices you have (digital cameras for instance). 

I think Microsoft has learned a lot from its first Xbox.  I have an Xbox and it's a big heavy thing.  The new one is much smaller, cleaner and to be honest could teach PC vendors a thing or two about good case design.  It also has fewer wires -- its controls are wireless so setting the thing up at a friend's house is even easier.

And it sounds like Microsoft plans to push its advantage with Xbox live even further allowing people to send instant messages, voice chat, email and provide a host of additional user services over time.  Now, if Microsoft can get some good games for it, they'll be in really good shape.

The Playstation 3 seems to have such advanced hardware that one is left wondering just how much further can game graphics go?  At some point, it's going to be all about the quality of the content.  At 1080i/720p resolutions (the realistic best-case that players are going to have ) there's a hard limit on how much computing muscle you need to have incredible graphics. At that point, it's up to the artists to produce the stuff to take advantage of it.  That's one of the reason why games have gotten so expensive -- as capabilities improve, the content has to improve.

Nintendo will also be showing off its Nintendo Revolution which isn't scheduled to come out until mid next year.  Nintendo is struggling with its third-place position in the US console market.  They just don't seem to have the ability to make the noise and build the excitement for their stuff here the way Sony and Microsoft are.  So it will be interesting to see what Nintendo comes up with.

But consoles aren't the only big news for E3.  There are a lot of exciting PC games in the horizon too.  One of the things that hasn't been discussed much in the press is the significance of DirectX 9 as a platform for games.  DirectX 9 really made doing 3D games much more practical in all settings.  Whereas before there were legitimate cases to make sprite based games (especially in the strategy arena), DirectX 9 makes it much easier to have your cake and eat it too in 3D.

To that end, one of the things I'm here at E3 for is to show off Galactic Civilizations II. A 3D engine for it has delivered not just much nicer visuals than the sprite-based original but a lot of practical game-play additions.  For instance, it's resolution independent -- you can play at any resolutions > 1024x768 you want, even weird ones and it will automatically adjust itself.  It also allows players to design their own ships from scratch.  No more being stuck with pre-canned ships, players can literally dive in and put design up nearly any kind of ship they can imagine.  As a former..ahem..Lego starship designer, anyone who's ever played with legos will appreciate the free form ship design stuff.

Beyond the computer games, there's also renewed excitement over handhelds.  I have to admit, as someone who has never had any interest in a Gameboy, the Playstation Portable (PSP) is pretty damn cool.  I'll be looking at what's new there.

I've also brought with me my Canon Elph digital camera which has some video capture features.  I'll be recording what I see and putting it up for you guys over the next few days.