Electronic Entertainment Expo

Got game? E3 does. In fact, it'll have about 720,000 square feet of it. Only the latest video games from each developer will be on display Tuesday through Friday at the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) at the Los Angeles Convention Center, each vying for the attention of thousands of industry-only attendees and members of the media who have been invited. At E3 2001, the war between the big three video game console makers -- Microsoft Corp., Nintendo Ltd. and Sony Corp. -- hadn't even gotten off the ground.

Final Fantasy XI (FFXI) has launched in Japan, an event the Japanese game industry had been looking forward to with a mixture of anticipation and trepidation for the last several months. FFXI's first day on the shelf went by without a hitch, but very little actual gameplay took place thanks to busy servers and long waits to log in to the online game. Game magazine Famitsu covered the scene last Thursday at the Yodobashi Camera game store in Shinjuku, the downtown area of Tokyo.

The "battle of the box" took center stage at this year's Electronic Entertainment Expo. Will Microsoft's Xbox, Nintendo's GameCube, or Sony's Playstation2 win the coveted spot in millions of living rooms and family rooms? For consumers looking at price alone, Nintendo will have a big jump on its competitors with a $199 price tag for the GameCube. That price was just announced Monday for the console's November 5 release in the United States. It is $100 less than the rival Xbox or Playstation 2. GameCube is expected to thrive especially in the 8- to 15-year-old market, with its popular and exclusive Pokemon and Mario Brothers characters.

Handheld computing just got extreme--Cybiko X-treme 2, that is. The updated PDA, geared toward teens, is being previewed at the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) here this week. Thinner, slicker, and more powerful than its predecessor, the CyX2 aims to become the handheld of choice for young gadgetheads. It is scheduled to hit stores by September priced at $150. The new edition features a faster processor, more onboard memory (2.5MB), an updated operating system, and a new keypad design with a pager-size QWERTY keyboard.

(CNN) Just a few blocks and a few minutes apart in downtown Los Angeles, Microsoft and Nintendo gave people a first good look at their new video game consoles, setting the stage for an all-out war with Sony's PlayStation 2 beginning this November. Nintendo's GameCube ships in the United States on November 5, with Microsoft's Xbox rolling out three days later. Both Nintendo's and Microsoft's booths were packed with onlookers at the massive Electronic Entertainment Expo at the Los Angeles Convention Center.

IDG The GamePros have finally returned from a bustling weekend in L.A., where they basked in the pounding hype that is the Electronic Entertainment Expo. Read on for impressions from our intrepid band of gaming gurus.;The nonplayable game of the show was without a doubt Metal Gear Solid 2 for the PS2. The 9minute video footage, cut by Kojima himself, shows exactly the type of game we expect from Sonys super machine. Its a shame that we wont see it till late 2001, since nothing else on the PS2 looked nearly as good.

IDG Held once a year in Los Angeles, the Electronic Entertainment Expo or E3 for short showcases upcoming software and hardware offerings from the likes of Sega, Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo. Gran Turismo 2000 unveiled Kazunori Yamauchi of Polyphony Digital, the father of the Gran Turismo series, unveiled Gran Turismo 2000 for the PlayStation 2, giving the crowd a detailed look under the hood at the next edition of gamings most popular racing series.Acclaim catches PS2 wave with surfing One of Acclaims E3 surprises was the announcement of a surfing game for PlayStation 2.THQ to release 3 more wrestling games in 2000 THQ announced that they are going to release three titles, WWF No Mercy for the Nintendo 64 and GameBoy Color, WWF Royal Rumble for the Sega Dreamcast, and WWF SmackDown 2 Know Your Role for the PlayStation, this fall.

IDG Digital cameras flashed, mobile phones rang, handhelds beeped, and maybe even a few Game Boys chirped as keynote speaker America Online President Bob Pittman spoke of convergence at the opening of the Electronic Entertainment Expo here. ; And AOL is a picture of convergence. From its pending merger with diverse media mogul Time Warner to its many partnerships, AOL is exploring different facets of entertainment and electronics. CNN.com is owned by Time Warner. ; AOL is introducing a new games channel this year, Pittman said almost as an aside.

LOS ANGELES IDG On the eve of the Electronic Entertainment Expo here, Sony announced it will release its PlayStation2 game console in the United States in October, priced at 299.;Kazuo Hirai, president and chief operating officer of Sony of America, demonstrated new features of the Playstation2, configured for the U.S. market. Its Japanese sibling which has sold more than 1.8 million units since its launch in March lacks many of the extras. ;Sony may have made the changes in response to Microsofts announced XBox console, which will ship with a hard drive and an Ethernet connection.