Tokyo Game Show

A fellow JET and friend of mine called me and told me about the upcoming Tokyo Game Show (September 26-28th if I recall correctly.) It looks like the two of us are going to make it, he's just going to see what to do about hotel reservations and transportation and the like. Just wondering if anyone else was planning to go to this thing. Right now the game plan is to get there Friday (which isn't open to the public I don't think) and then go to the show on Saturday. So Friday night I might be able to sneak off for some VF goodness depending on where I'm staying and what time I get there. Let me know if anyone else has any plans - I figure if I'm going all the way to Tokyo again I might as well meet some of you guys and get my ass kicked. /versus/images/graemlins/smile.gif

 

I should probably just wait for them to reply, but if they somehow miss this thread - I think fishie tries to make this show, and maybe zerochan. You need to meet GP too.

 

Nah.
Been there, done that, boring.
TGS is a public show(apart from friday when its industry people only) and as such misses a lot of the buzz of E3.
TGS Isnt that special so I no longer waste my time or resources goin there.
If I lived in Japan tough I would go.

 

I'm not planning anything for TGS, but I should be in Japan in time for Comic Market 65 this December. If you're up for spending three days at Tokyo Big Sight with a few hundred thousand otaku, I'd love to have more company XD

 

Never been to E3. While I do miss seeing western chics, I have to say the TGS is quite enjoyable, although crowded as balls, and nowhere near the city... in my terms anyway. Someone living in say... Fukui might not find the commute from Tokyo so painful.

It's really not hard to get a press pass, but I'm sure you'd have to apply months ago. (Take note for the Spring show). Just say you're part of a site, and they'll send you a press pass. The bad side though - even the press day is pretty crowded.

All in all, it's fun, but I could see why, unless you were actually reporting news, you wouldn't travel 5000+ miles. For the most part, there's so many people, you'll be lucky to play more than a handful of demos. Depending on how things are in the industry, there may not be any shocking releases (PSO and a ton of other shit for the DC was unveiled when I went to my first TGS, and made it worth it and then some.)

I've got a surprise b-day party to go to on the 27th (night) but I might be able to go out there during the day. (saturday or Sunday). Get my mobile # before you head out and maybe we can meet up, b/c there's no way in hell we'll find each other there -- there's a huge collection of whities. There's no "magic" of spotting another one like you enjoy out in the sticks. /versus/images/graemlins/smile.gif

Oh yeah - take your camera... for the Cos Play. /versus/images/graemlins/smile.gif

 

Er... you do know that they haven't been running Spring TGSes for a few years now, right?

 

Its quite easy getting in on the bussuines only day if you come prepared, a legit bussuines card and sample of yopure work can get you in no problem.

 

When did they stop doing the Spring one? I went to the Spring one in 2001 I believe. Was that the last one?

I remember the one Spring TGS I went to, Sega didn't even have a booth. That kinda hurt.

 

Hey Nammy. When you get to TGS keep an eye out for 2 games for me. The first on is "Force Five" by Sammy. It's a new 3D fighter that sounds kinda interesting. The second one is "Dark Awake" by Taito. It's a 2D fighter that uses characters similar to The Lord of the Rings characters. Let me know if you see either of them. Thanks a lot man and have fun.

 

OMG they're going to announce Hyper Super Turbo at TGS OMG.

 

Okay it looks like my friend and I are definitely going to make it. As the plan is now we're gonna take an overnight bus from Fukui to get there Saturday morning, stay one night, and take the Shinkansen back Sunday. Seeing how the show isn't open all night I'm wondering if anyone wants to hook up either during the show or after it's over? Let me know

 

I might head out there Saturday, although you're in for a rude awakening on an overnight bus... I guess it depends on how big you are. I'm kind of a giant over here.

I slept on a 3-hour bus ride from Chitose airport (hokkaido) to the ski lift last year. After waking up sprawled out all over my buddy (who's taller than me) I had a serious back ache.

 

My friend and I just purchased tickets to and from Tokyo, as well as taking care of our reservations, so I'll definitely be there this coming weekend. Getting there early Saturday by overnight bus (thanks for the warning GaijinPunch but I'm gonna learn the hard way) and I'm leaving Tokyo around 5:00 Sunday night. If anyone else is planning to head out there let me know. If you want my keitai # just PM me. See ya all

Thanks for the warning Gaijin but I'll be taking my chances with the overnight bus.

 

I think I'll head out early Saturday. I assume your bus takes you to Tokyo station? You'll want to take the Keiyo (NOT Keio, which doesn't go to Tokyo anyway) line out to Makurhari, then walk 8 miles to the site. The Keiyo line, although not a subway, starts underground.... might be kinda tricky to find.

Looking forward to it!

 

Had some fun w/ Namflow, and a pretty good time. Here's a post I've made on some other sites... enjoy!

TGS 2003

NOTE: I'm posting this on other sites... don't read twice!

Disclaimer: This is no where CLOSE to comprehensive. I only had one day to go, and wanted to see all the interesting stuff, so didn't spend a lot of time at each booth. Basically getting crammed with so much information, I'm drawing a LOT of blanks on names, and games featured at booths right now (especially since I've been out of the news loop for a year or so). So, this is just a broad review that I hope gamers can enjoy. On that note...

Not a bad show if I do say so myself. A little bit foreveryone, except for the girls, of which there are always a lot, wearing very little. On that note, I think the Xbox Live booth (of which I tried out or looked at zero games) had the nicest girls. The uniforms helped, although I'm thinking of getting a petition together to have all the girls where mandatory butt-floss next year.

So, in no particular order, the things that stuck out.

Sega Booth:
Very nice. Some upcoming Sega Ages games (Afterburner [20% done, but very playable] and Gain Ground [60% complete] look great, but won't be released until next year -- nothing on PSII or IV). Sonic Battle (looks good, but not my cup of tea), Sonic Heroes, looks very good. Basically Sonic Adventure but using multiple characters simultaneously. PSO Episode III -- only saw the promo video as the line to play it was 2 hours long, and the screens were not over most of the 5'3" peoples heads. Not that excited about it anyway. The chic-ninja game (Kuniko or something) does look quite sweet, but it will be dubbed a Shinboi rip-off, for sure. Gungrave OD - I actually waited in line to play this for about 40 minutes, but had to go to the can, so didn't get a chance. I saw enough of it though - it looks nice. One guy I was with played it, and said it was harder than the original. Tetsuwan Atom (GBA) I played for a bit. Rather simple platformer, but shows promise. You run around punching and kicking the bad guys. The PS2 version only had a promo video up, and was mainly cinematic, so the vote isn't in on that one yet. The coolest thing at the booth was a showcase that had 4 Phantasy Star books: A strategy guide, the ever ellusive Fan Memorial and Drama CD which you can see at the site of yours truly, the Phantasy Star Compendium (also on my site) and The People that Made Phantasy Star book (which I own, but haven't posted it on the site). In the case NEXT to that, they had some original sketches (with artists notes and everythign on paper) of the original Phantasy Star characters, and some bad guys. I was tempted to break it open and steal them -- now THOSE are collectibles.

The bad thing about the Sega booth? They, like a lot of other companies think it's good for a selected number of people to play each game for 10-15 minutes, instead of a maximum number play it for 3-5 minutes (Taito doesn't follow this BS). Hence, I waited in line for 40+ minutes for Gungrave, and in the end, just wanted to take a leak and have a smoke. Sonic Heroes was 1 hour, and PSO Episode III was two hours... that's just wrong. No demo handouts either.

Hudson:
The booth for the retro gamer. Remakes of PC Genjin (Bonk), Adventure Island, and Star Soldier all ready to play, as well as their Smash Brothers clone (with Hudson characters). Tengai Makkyou II had some playtime on the screen, and looks promising for the old-schooler.

Konami:
I flew through this booth. Had some decent stuff, but I didn't spend much time here. Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater promo video was a big hit.

Capcom:
I'm TOTALLY drawing a blank here... I'll have to check my print ads and get back to you. Strange.

Square Enix:
Drag On Dragoon (got it already, so didn't pay attention), The Dragonquest game where you use the sword and slash the bad guys on the screen (someone posted about this earlier -- didn't try it, not interested) Shinyaku Seiken DensetsU (own it... moved on), FFVII DVD Movie preview - looks good, but I've not played the game yet, Kingdom Hearts II - I hate Daffy Duck so I stayed away. A brand new game that came out 18 months ago called Final Fantasy XI... Get over it Square... Final Fantasy 12 (not XII, btw). Just one measly poster, that says "Information Begins 11.19". So, wait for two months. Had some artwork on it that told nothing of what it will look like. Oh, yeah, there was a giant Chocobo and a Dragonquest Slime floating above their booth.

Tecmo:
Ninja Gaiden promo video on a huge screen. This looked nice, but was mainly FMV (and I didn't see the whole thing). The rest of the booth was a bust.

Taito:
Bungaiji something-rather (sorry... the pamphlet and demo are in the bag, will check later). The girl had enough personality to get me to line up and play the game even though I was out of time, and explained that was the only way I could get that demo out of her hands. She was polite, and could actually say words other than "welcome", and "thank you" (a trait that the other girls don't have) so I was delighted to wait in line (a very QUICK line). The game is basically Ninja-gaiden but doesn't look as good. Still fun, if you're into those 3D hack-n-slash games a la DMC, Drag On Dragoon, etc. Not a ton of other good things at the booth, unfortunately, but I didn't spend a lot of time there. See the "out of time" comment above.

Sammy:
Berserk. Looks very nice, and has a lot more detail than the DC prequel. You can actually swing the sword too hard and fall down. Lots of blood, as usual. There was quite a few more games, but this was the last booth I visited, and had almost no time.

Namco:
Xenogears Saga II promo video looked wicked... enought to make me go out and buy the first one when I get a chance to play it. Another RPG that I can't remember the name of right now, and then some otehr stuff kind of in the middle. I did play there new Half Life clone...called... damn it. What was that game called? Bah! Another blank. It was no halflife... some weirdness in the controls and whatnot will turn me off, although the graphics were nice. YOu run out of ammo fast though (a la Half Life).

Kadokawa / Atlus / and some other company booth mixed in one:
A bust... in and out.

Koei:
Didn't look to hot. A new Nobunaga no Yabou game that I'm not interested, so kept on walking.

Bandai:
A new Evangelion game that as best I can tell is adventure/RPG looked good, but vids didn't show much gameplay. A new Gundam game (which I think is out) that looked action-packed, and also a bit retro... at least in the cinematic stages. A new Macross game that looks really damn good, and a bunch of other stuff I'm forgetting. Have to go through my catalogue.

Probably leaving out a lot, but that should get some people going. I'm sure IGN will have a lot of good articles you can't read unless you pay them. If that's the case, just search around - there were plenty of white people there that I'm sure will report.

 

Here's some follow-ups after watching/playing some of the content I got:

Capcom:
These guys were nice enough to give out a DVD full of all the content they showed. Not a bad deal, since their booth was pretty full. Here's what I thoughta bout it.

Onimusha 3 Graphically looks nice, and there's certain French action star in this, and I'm just a bit weary about tha. Onimusha Bugaiden is a figthing game with Onimusha characters in it. Don't expect it to be a traditional fighter, as the players can interact with some of the scenery. Thank god it's 3D as well. Biohazard Outbreak I'm sure will be a big hit, but I've never got into the series, so won't really comment. The promo video looked nice. Monster Hunter Is a new idea, where (from what I can tell) you try to capture monsters in a prehistoric/fantasy setting. Doesn't look very actionpacked, but there were no in-game menus on the vid, so who knows what it'll actually turn out like. The FMV and character designs are worth looking at though. Maximo 2 I actually played at a store not too long ago. It's the exact same engine and graphics as the first. If you liked it, you'll like this one I think. Crimson Tears is a cell-shaded (hopefully) action game, featuring two hot chics, and one pretty guy. It was all promo-vid, so I don't know what genre it is, although now that I read the fine print, it says it's a fighter... I guess they could do it either 2D or 3D. Tekki Taisen - an online version of Tekki (Steel Battalion) which was playable at the show, but had a long line, so I can't comment. Gacha Force, for the Gamecube is a game where you collect Gacha Gacha figures (the ones you get from machines in convenient stores) and then you fight with them (CPU or a friend). Graphics don't look super-detailed as they're aiming for the kiddies. Killer 7, also for the Gamecube despite a bunch of violence, is a cell-shaded knock-off of Golgo 13 as far as I can see. There's a lot more info on the disc, but I'm skipping a lot of it... including Hyper Street Fighter II (Anniversary Edition) which will be out on teh PS2 this December.

Update on the Kunoichi being a Shinobi rip-off... that's b/c it is. I looked closely at the add today... it's called Shinobi: Kunoichi. /versus/images/graemlins/smile.gif

Also played the Shadow Hearts II demo... not really my cup of tea. I like RPGs, and I like ones that have a twist, like the Judgement Coin where you have to hit the button within a certain amount of time (like playing a golf game) but the graphics aren't all that, and it's a bit too 'real' looking for me.