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Similar to the previous years, Sony is again going for a "less talk, Shawn Layden, his remarks relayed by Time, says that the audience will have to "suffer" only about 90 seconds of his stage presence.
As for the experience awaiting PlayStation buffs when the curtain lifts on Sony's E3 media event, live streaming from the Shrine Auditorium & Expo Hall (online as well as in select theaters) next Monday, June 12, Layden says to think of it less as a press conference than a software showcase."The crowd will only have to suffer I think in aggregate 90 seconds of me," he jokes. "And in the middle will be all the games."
Last year, Sony seemed to do a rather decent job of focusing more on games than in years prior. It's nice to hear that they are going to continue that tradition.
With that said, I will have to admit that for E3 2013, we were PISSED that Microsoft did little talking and more games, while Sony did more talking than games with great applause. Now of course, this was because we had a lot of questions regarding Xbox One and how it's supposed to have any value to gamers, while having concern that PS4 would follow suit, as well as launch price concerns. Ironically Sony was worried their price tag is higher than Xbox One, and became super relieved to see that they've won by default on that once Microsoft revealed it, while quickly adding a last-minute Powerpoint slide just to say, "We are changing NOTHING!" regarding used games.
The previous E3 press conferences made me feel like Microsoft did far more talking than Sony did, revealing a bit about Project Scorpio (and sweeping the highest quality pixel comment under the rug), and explaining what the future of Xbox holds. Sony, basically shut the Hell up and showed games and multiple camera angles to prove these are in-game demonstrations, as well as having a lesser focus on using stage cams. Except, Sony announced that they would not talk about the PS4 Pro (whether it's to hear what Microsoft had to say about Scorpio, or because it was irrelevant to the games, I don't know). So Microsoft ended up being more informative (though I didn't learn a whole lot about Scorpio) than Sony, despite Sony's presentation being more popular (from what I could tell anyway).
So here are my devil's advocate thoughts. Do we want more talk and less games when we question the value of products and its relevance to us? Like, do we need to have questions, doubts, and/or concerns for the demand of the presentation to be more talk and less games? And if we have no real questions, do we want more games and less talk because we've "settled in" (like a console already launched, etc.)?
Not saying what Sony did was wrong. I was thoroughly entertained by PS4's conference, while being VERY AGGRAVATED at Xbox One's conference where I learned more about the stage and planted audience members than I did about any of its games (and whoever was directing the cameras needs to be fired fast because they do not know anything about what the focus of the show is supposed to be about). But I am wondering if our demands and expectations of the show changes based on whether or not we have any particular concerns about their products/services. Because in my eyes, Microsoft and Sony reversed roles compared to 2013, yet Sony still wins.