Monday, July 6, 2009

PlayStation scoops multiple E3 awards

European journalists heap praise on the upcoming PlayStation games shown at E3 in 2009.

After the excitement of E3, the European games press found time to round up their favourite announcements from the LA Convention Centre, with several PlayStation titles scooping multiple plaudits.

Eurogamer awarded Sony Computer Entertainment with their Best Publisher prize, adding that it presented "Quantity and quality in abundance, but it was the sheer variety that amazed."

Judging from the permanent crowd assembled around Uncharted 2: Among Thieves, Nathan Drake’s latest adventure is one of the most anticipated games coming to PLAYSTATION 3, and the critics came away suitably impressed. 1UP gave it their coveted Best of Show award, while IGN and GameSpot both picked it out as their best PS3 game and the title with the most impressive graphics.

Similarly, Heavy Rain attracted plenty of attention on the show floor and this was reflected in the Best Adventure Game accolade it collected from GameSpot and the Special Achievement for Innovation award from IGN.

One game that was not available to play at E3 but was still one of the most talked about is The Last Guardian, the first PS3 title from the creators of ICO and Shadow of the Colossus. It gained an honourable mention in Eurogamer’s Best Game Announcement award, which was won by the shock revelation that Final Fantasy Online XIV is coming exclusively to PS3. IGN were also clearly excited by Akira Ueda’s latest experience, as they picked it out for Best Artistic Design and Best Non-playable Presentation.

It was also a good E3 for PlayStation Store and IGN picked upcoming PS3 games Trine, Fat Princess and PixelJunk Shooter for first, second and third places respectively in their Best Downloadable Game category.

Sackboy got some love from IGN, with LittleBigPlanet PSP winning Best Platformer, and Ratchet & Clank: A Crack in Time scooping the corresponding award from GameSpot.