2009年洛杉矶游E3戏展

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It's video gaming's big annual event. Electronic Entertainment Expo threw open the doors again to fans after scaling down in the past two years. An estimated 40,000 gamers joined celebrities like Stephen Spielberg.

“I've been involved in the video game business long before you were born.”
The latest devices from the big three, that's Nintendo, Microsoft and Sony, plus games from other top developers like Electronic Arts weren’t just on display, they were there to be played.

April US sales of video games fell 17% according to research group NPD, but don't cry for the industry, global sales including hardware could top $98 billion this year and $110 billion in 2010.

"Gaming is adapting to the changing market", says the President of the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences, Joseph Olen. "We have uNPRecedented growth in the number of players in America; we have uNPRecedented number of players spending more time playing games than ever before. And I think that fuels the game makers to wanna create more opportunities for people to play."

Part of the strategy is diverting resources to only the most bankable franchises, like Nintendo's updates for its best selling Wii. But Wii's motion sensing technology is being challenged from both sides.

For many, Project Natal from Microsoft was the Expo's highlight.  The Xbox 360 accessory allows onscreen action without a controller. Sony announced a new PlayStation motion controller too, but Sony really targeted mobile gamers, by unveiling its smaller, lighter PlayStation device called PSP Go. PSP Go has no disk drive for contents, says Al De Leon from Sony. "a lot of the consumers, particularly gamers, are on the cutting edge of technology, and they're used to really consuming digital media whether it’s movies, or music, photos, so games is really, you know, the next frontier for that, and we believe that PSP Go will get us there because it's a fully 100% digital product.“

As for the games themselves, Nintendo focused on the preteen crowd with games based on Disney franchises like Hannah Montana and the Jonas Brothers. For those of us a little older, MTV Games and Harmonics rolled out the Beatles rock band, players can be their favorite Beatle, and play dozens of Beatles' classics.