Sony's 2011 E3 conference dated

It's not too long now until E3 2011 begins once again and Sony has just revealed when they will be holding their official conference during the event. The largest gaming expo in the world will run from June 7-9 at the Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena in California and Sony is scheduled to present on June 6 at 5pm PST. Make sure not to miss it via the live feed or the downloadable versions.

NGP Revealed as the Successor to the PSP

Sony finally unveiled the successor to the PSP in Tokyo at the PlayStation event. Known by its working name as "NGP", the Next Generation Portable features the latest cutting edge technology to create the most powerful handheld device ever made. Featuring a 5" OLED screen, dual analog sticks, a quad-core ARM Cortex processor and Power VR graphics processing unit, the NGP is according to Epic Games, four times more powerful than anything else on the market and boasts PlayStation 3 quality graphics.

The NGP also contains front and rear cameras and touch pads, as well as 3G connectivity, three motion sensors, gyroscope, accelerometer and electronic compass and a microphone. UMD game discs are now replaced in favor of flash memory cards with even higher capacities and faster loading times than the 1.8GB UMD format. All this comes with a question of how much will it cost and how good is the battery life? So far all we know is that it won't cost $599. A few games were shown with the graphics impressing everyone in attendence. Check out the conference below:

God of War: Ghost of Sparta Demo Imminent

Can't get enough of God of War? Played the trilogy, the PSP game and even the cell phone game? You'll be glad to know that with Ghost of Sparta's November 2 release date looming closer, a free demo will be available tomorrow for download on the PlayStation Network. So dust off your PSP if you haven't already and prepare for some more God of War goodness. The sequel to Chains of Olympus is sure to impress.

E3: Sony Conference

Killzone 3 in 3D was the first game trailer to take the spotlight. The audience put on their 3D glasses to enjoy the arctic theme of the new game, along with jetpacks for some first-person platforming. Killzone fans won't be dissapointed.

The PlayStation Move was demoed with a new game called Sorcery. A third-person magic game basically. You cast spells with your Move and the Wand ingame follows your movements. One of the cool aspects of the game is the ability to combine your spells to create some real havok. The Move seemed to work really well. Another game shown had various characters from popular Sony games such as Jak and Daxter, Ratchet & Clank and Sly Racoon in one game called Heroes on the Move. Use the Move as your weapon in this platformer. Looking good. The Move controller will cost $49.99, but that's if you already own the PlayStation Eye. So no, it's not cheap. Other Move titles announced include Time Crises: Raging Storm (yay!), SingStar Dance and Echochrome 2. All these titles will be $39.99 when launched.
EA came on stage to show off Medal of Honor. The trailer certainly doesn't dissapoint and the PS3 limited edition version will include a bonus game of Medal of Honor: Frontline. EA also showed off the new Tiger Woods game with the Move, again it seems to work really well. A patch update off PSN will add the Move functionality. Finally, with Dead Space 2, the PS3 version will also include a PS3 port of the Wii game, Dead Space Extraction.

This time their was no new hardware unveiled on the PSP front. Though with the 3DS being shown this year, you can bet Sony will be showing the PSP2 at E3 2011. A trailer with new games was shown, such as the exclusive God of War: Ghost of Sparta, Gravity Crash Portable, 3rd Birthday, EyePet and Invizimals. 70 new games for the PSP are coming this year.

LittleBigPlanet 2 gameplay was shown. It pretty much lets you create any kind of game you want instead of just a platformer. Very impressive showing.

A subscription based model for PSN known as PlayStation Plus was unveiled. for a $50USD a year fee, gamers can access exclusive content for the PS3, download some games for free that would normally incur a charge and get a discount on downloads. Apparently you can only keep the content as long as you are subscribed to the service. Not sure how this works.

Having bashed the PS3 console for a long time, it was a surprise to see Gabe Newell show up and announce that Portal 2 is coming to PS3 as well as Steam. Not only that, it's also going to be the best version apparently. For someone who once said the PS3 is a "waste of time", I found it quite amusing.

Next up was Final Fantasy XIV, the only MMO. The trailer didn't show much, it looks pretty sure and there will be exclusive content for the PS3. Speaking of exclusive content, Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood, will also have content for the PS3 only.

Gran Turismo 5...again. Yes, another trailer. But this time, finally, we get a release date. Set your calenders for November 2.

Now we have Infamous 2, Cole will have more powers, not just lightning and will be in a new city. More of the same, should be great.

After many denials David Jaffe shamelessly unveiled a new Twisted Metal game for PS3. A Sweet Tooth van rolled on the stage with Sweet Tooth himself leering at the crowd to much applause. Only a bit of the multiplayer game was shown, but it's looking to be quite a blast with 16 players battling it out. Graphics were still pretty rough for a PS3 game, but this should improve by them time the game is released in 2011. A nice way to end Sony's E3 showing and certainly made Microsoft's show the worst by far in comparison.

Games to Own #6 - Gitaroo Man Lives! for PSP

With all the music games out these days and the success of the Guitar Hero franchise, I found that one game which had been released earlier on the PSP was a classic that recieved little fanfare. I am of course talking about Gitaroo Man Lives! for PSP, which I happened to play again recently after having a blast with it when it was released.

Apart from the obvious difference from Guitar Hero in the way the interface works, Gitaroo Man Lives! also contains a light-hearted story delivered with some pretty funny voice acting. The main bad guy in the game speaks really quickly, probably due to the Japanese translation differences. Anyway, the cutscenes between levels telling the story are amusing and worth watching.

The game features a duel system, where you attack and defend against your enemy by hitting the right buttons to play the melody in time with the music. To win the level, you need to deplete your opponents life bar. When on the attack, a line is drawn towards your cursor and you must follow this line with your analog stick and also press the circle button everytime a circle shows up in the line. These circles are of varying lengths, corresponding to the length of the note and how long you should hold the button. So basically, you only need to worry about one button and the analog stick in the attack mode, it's where you'll gain health and cause damage to your opponent. In the defense mode, the four face buttons of the PSP move from each respective direction into your cursor and you need to press the right face button as the note hits your cursor. Defense is used to defend against your opponents attack, everytime you miss a note, you lose health.

The music is pretty cool and covers a lot of genres. The fast paced ones are of course, much tougher. Gitaroo Man Lives! also features two difficulty modes, with me unable to beat the game on normal, but managing on easy. I always get beaten by the shark in the space level on the second defense phase...Anyway, the game also features multiplayer and collectibles to encourage replayability. My only gripe is that it's a little short, but considering you can easily play it many times, it's still a great game and good value.

8.5 out of 10