The biggest pop today at the pre-E3 conferences came when Sony audibly shat all down the throat of Microsoft’s unpopular restrictions, and online policies. It was an amazingly earnest moment at what is usually a bunch of canned, forced, presentations. Imma go ahead and rub my face against PS4 screenshots.

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…and just like that, Square has convinced me to give them my heart. Again.

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So uh, yeah. More as it comes. I’m fine with it. (Seriously, do we really care about console designs?)

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Hello friends! This is Monday Morning Commute, the column where we share what we’re digging on in a given week. I will be honest – I’m currently treating this like a lightning round edition. The real shit is going to have to take place in the comments section. I’m trying to follow all of E3, while attempting to take a shower, jack one out, and plan a class for next week.

With alacrity!

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Today, it was a pretty blase Microsoft E3 conference. Then Respawn Entertainment showed why they were Infinity Ward, hanging Titanfall on my ass. I am so, so, so in love.

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It’s a confusing fucking start to E3’s flagship channel of coverage, Spike/GTTV.

A Vita world premiere that amounted to an esoteric Japanese handheld bore that looked like a war of icons and numbers?

Rare’s return to the centre stage to show off a new Kinect Sports?

Kill me.

We can all hope this is all just ancillary padding to the main events – the first of which is Microsoft’s XBox Media Briefing at 12:30pm EST – which are primed to be as packed full of goodness as they ever have been.

Today is the day the big hitters – MS, EA, Ubisoft and Sony – speak to the gaming press, the gaming population and the public at large about their plans for entertainment for the next 5-7 years. Make it good kids! The world’s watching.

What are you all excited for this E3?

Welcome to E3 vs PR – A blog series on the Gaming Industry’s Most Important Season from a Communications Perspective.

You’re having a bad PR week with the media if you’re one of the following two clients:

Toronto Mayor Rob Ford, following allegations of crack-cocaine use caught on tape, or, Microsoft’s Games and Entertainment Division, following the incredibly confused and poorly communicated debut of their next generation platform, the Xbox One (XBO).

I’m a gamer. Have been since I was 3. I’m also an upcoming communications and PR graduate. The lens I’m looking at this industry through is changing radically, but the last week has been bad enough that the popular opinion is all on the same side.

We all threw our hands up at Microsoft’s lack of a coherent set of key messages throughout the eight days since launch. Everything we’ve been taught not to do, they’re doing.

While Microsoft didn’t match Ford and (allegedly) break the law over the last poorly-planned eight days of the XBO PR launch, you’d definitely call most of their actions criminal, from a communications perspective.

A game and entertainment console ‘reveal’ is one of the most critical and risk-laden PR events that can take place in the interactive entertainment industry. A console, like the XBO’s predecessor, the XBox 360, typically lives on the market for a healthy five to six years. That’s before being relegated to second-tier status upon its successor’s launch for the next three or four years.

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Those two guys who were fired by Activision because they were going to make like a zillion dollars in Modern Gunfaire royalities or whatever are finally going to reveal their new game. Yep. That’s right. Just in time to stand on the throat of the gasping generation they helped shape, Zampella and West will be dropping their much ballyhooed IP on our skulls at this year’s E3. Prepare yourselves.

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Probably way late with this, but I don’t care. I do what I want! Come at me! Take that knife in lodge it in my soul, I will devour it and proclaim myself king. Oh uh what? Yeah, Borderlands 2 screens. I can’t wait for this game.

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I don’t want to like Star Wars 1313. Despite loving the Universe, the original trilogy, and pretending I can open automatic doors with the Force, my bitterness for Uncle George runs deep. Somehow the gameplay trailer for this newly-announced title has managed to pierce my scabby heart. reigniting my Star Wars  loins. I wouldn’t bet on the game being good, for far too many titles in the Universe have aroused my interest only to let me down. I’m looking at you, SWTOR, KOTOR 2, and The Force Unleashed. For now though, I dream. Of dopeness.

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