NINTENDO

Nintendo’s conference was… well, I don’t exactly know what it was, to be honest. To deal with the conference as a whole is hard, since it was just so… confusing, underwhelming and exciting at the same time. Let’s look at their conference segment by segment.

The beginning to their conference is undoubtedly the best opening any E3 conference has ever had. To hear all our favorite Zelda tunes being done by a full orchestra as a montage of all Zelda games, starting with the NES original and all the way to the upcoming Skyward Sword (of which new, mindblowing footage was shown) led to many a nostalgiagasm. Miyamoto coming on stage and detailing Zelda’s 25th anniversary plans was the icing on the cake, with the best announcement undoubtedly being the availability of Link’s Awakening DX, the Gameboy Color Zelda classic, immediately.

The conference stuttered for a bit after that. Reggie took the stage, and detailed the 3DS eShop…   except that he told us nothing that we hadn’t already known. He talked about Pokedex 3D, a 3DS app that is free, in celebration of the shop’s launch… except that that was also something we’d already known about. Then Iwata came on stage, talked about Nintendo’s new console, said basically nothing except that he would talk about it later, and then he left… okay? Why even come on stage at that point then?

The star of the show was undoubtedly the Wii U and its controller. And the 3DS and its awesome lineup. And Zelda: Skyward Sword. And the third party support for the Wii U. And Super Smash Bros. 4. Gah. You get my point.

Thankfully, things got better when Reggie took the stage again and unveiled the 3DS lineup for the rest of the year. The five upcoming first party titles, in addition to the multitude of third party titles, all looked great, all confirmed for a 2011 release. It just confirmed that Nintendo planned on countering the PS Vita’s shiny specs and low price with what mattered: games. The 3DS was certainly justified at this conference, and its lineup for the coming year already looks better than the first year lineup for any other system in history, except for maybe the Dreamcast.

Iwata then took the stage again, and unveiled, formally, the Wii U, successor to the Wii console, along with its funky new controller. The system, which is expected to be more powerful than the Xbox 360 and the PS3, with output capabilities in 1080p, along with its boasted third party support and incredible new controller, looked awesome. The only issue was, Nintendo didn’t handle the unveiling of the system all too well.

The actual console was never shown properly, and the focus was entirely on the controller. The console’s specs, release date, price, nothing, was actually revealed. Worse still, while Nintendo made a point of trumpeting the third party support for the system (an exclusive Assassin’s Creed, Ninja Gaiden and Tekken, in addition to multiplatform titles like Arkham City, Darksiders 2, Ninja Gaiden 3, and hinted titles like Battlefield), they did not talk about the first party games for the system at all.

Except for when they announced that a new Super Smash Bros. game was in development for both, the Wii U and the 3DS. Holy cows.

The conference was messy and unfocused, yes. But thankfully, it also had the best announcements, and the most surprises. It might have been disappointing relative to expectations, but honestly, it certainly was the best of the lot this year.

FINAL GRADE: A-

The Wii U itself looks good, the 3DS has a killer lineup, great third party support for both systems, Skyward Sword looks epic, Super Smash Bros. 4 is a fanboy’s wet dream come true. The presentation could have used a lot of work, but as it is, this was the best conference of the bunch.

WINNER OF E3 2011: NINTENDO!