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ECTS London EXCEL Part 2
em Review

Monday
So I ended up going back to ECTS, even after a disappointing first day (except for the free 4Gamers pack of course). This time I was going with my current employers. However, I had to offer my new badge to a colleague, who didn’t already have one, so was forced *cough* to use my eyemachine press badge again. How unfortunate.

Now feeling more like a confident member of the press I strolled into the arena to attend to those highest of journalistic principles…blagging some free stuff. This was far from the case though. Maybe it was because there were more people attending this time, maybe it was because there were more business people who were only coming to get away from work and the ones that came on Sunday were the people who really mattered? I don’t know, but there weren’t many stands offering goodies today.


Disappointment
Ok, so know I knew the general layout of the floor and which ones deserved a second visit. My mental list of priorities was to go see the Erotica Island stand, which I can’t believe I missed on Sunday, talk to Peter Noble and try and get another free bag at the 4Gamers stand. This is how things went:

So I started off by going to see the “hot babes” (as it said in the guide) at the Erotica Island stand. And it pains me to say that I was severely disappointed. They had one girl at the stand that just worked there, and was nowhere near as good looking as the Digimask or Logitech girls, but I’m sure she had a wonderful personality. So I walked away; narrow-minded maybe, but they advertised porn and failed to deliver.

"It was a ridiculous thought on my behalf to offer you money in exchange for goods."


Backtrack
So I thought I’d head over to the far end of the hall again and look at some of the smaller stands for a second time, and once again, my attention was grabbed by the evil Telegames stand tempting me with the wall mounted Atari Jaguar and Lynx. However, something I missed on Sunday was the GBA with a review copy of the new ‘Doom’-esque game ‘Backtrack’ running, whch is to be published by Telegames. It gave a good insight into what the game would be like and how Doom could turn out.

I didn’t notice any immediate plot to the game, but then again I skipped the intro that undoubtedly explained the whole thing. The game seemed fairly fast with good playability and surprisingly easy to control with the shoulder buttons controlling strafing, D-pad turning and walking and the a and b buttons firing and changing weapons respectively.

However the weapons were fairly weak and obscure and didn’t seem to respond too well. The graphics also looked quite blocky, which may be a limitation of the system. We’ll see when Doom comes out if that is the case. However, it looks like it’ll be a good prelude to Doom and great fun, especially in four-player mode. Hopefully we can get a review copy soon. (Er, we didn't - david)


Return Of The Sea Monkeys
So, next on my agenda was to try and find Peter Noble again, however he either hadn’t turned up to the Just Play stand yet, or he was elsewhere. So while waiting around I gave the Interactive Sea Monkeys game a quick go.

You’re given control of a large tank (or a small ocean, I couldn’t discern between the two) and there you can add Sea Monkey eggs, growth food and plasma. But you weren’t just limited to the brine shrimp, you could also add all sorts of aquatic life and also some entertainment including an underwater jukebox. The game looks great fun for kids and could be a good method for learning how to care for your real Sea Monkeys, not that they’re difficult to keep. Although saying that I’ve managed to kill off both batches I’ve had.


No More Freebies
For genuine reasons I did wander over to the 4Gamers stand again. Even though they gave me the free goodie bag the previous day I still wanted a price for the cool looking GBA carry case on show. The guy I spoke to this time was a little more austere and didn’t seem to have much time for speaking to me, even though the stand was devoid of visitors and the staff had to keep themselves occupied with Tekken. Yeah, sorry for intruding your hard work people, it was a ridiculous thought on my behalf to offer you money in exchange for goods.

Anyway, the carry cases for the GBA and Gamecube won’t be out until November and they don’t have any prices available as yet. They do look good though, but no matter how much I hinted and told him how good they looked and that I wanted one, he was reluctant to offer one for review.

So that was all on my agenda really, and with still about 40 minutes to kill until I met the rest of my team for lunch I found myself wondering just what to do next. So after wandering past the Digimask stand just one more time I ended up at ANP who had an interesting handheld joystick on show, demonstrated with Star Wars Racer. The stick handled well and worked by moving I left and right for turning etc. This may sound obvious for a joystick, but it wasn’t attached to a base and presumably worked with a motion sensor inside, much like the Kirby cartridge on the GBC.


Listless and Desperate
So by this time I was just aimlessly wandering, trying to find any freebies at all. All I managed was a highly annoying clicker thing from the Criterion software stand and a free pen from some other people. Pickings were slim. But then I bumped into some old Gameplay buddies, so that was cool.

"I went back for a second look at this lemon of a game…what was I thinking?!"

Just before lunch I came across a row of four GBAs at some accessory manufacturer stand, which were fitted with some awkward, chunky peripherals. I didn’t really care for these add-ons, but they were running some forthcoming games, one of which was Pitfall: The Mayan Adventure.

The game was in use to demonstrate the awkwardly clunky rumble pack that was attached to the GBA. The pack worked well, but did it need to vibrate whenever I took a step or jumped? The game seemed pretty good fun though, decent animation and pace and a good update on the original formula. Although I think this is just a port from the SNES version of the game so there’s nothing new there apart from this rumble feature, which was fairly effective but clunky. And rumbled too much. Oh, sod it, it was bloody awful.


Return To G-Surfers
For a laugh I wandered back over to the Midas software stand for another look at G-Surfers. As before they were desperately giving everyone and anyone who looked at the game for longer than five seconds the whole background and technical accomplishments of the game speech.

This time I decided to give it a go, and I found out that it played just as badly as it looked. And they clearly know that because they mention nothing of the gameplay but everything about the technicalities behind it. Spiel you’d expect to hear about a PC game, but not so much a console game. But this sums up just how poor the show was this year. I mean, I went back for a second look at this lemon of a game…what was I thinking?! I should have just gone past the Digimask stand a few more times.

I ended up wandering back to the Just Play stand where I eventually found Peter Noble, and as busy as the man was he still found time for a quick chat and took me to a personal sneak peak and demo of the still in early development game of The Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy.


Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy
The game is based more on Douglas Adams’ books
rather than the adapted TV show and comes in the form of a 3D third person action/adventure. Apparently, keeping in tune with the nature of the novels and general good nature, there will be no death or killing as such, but you will be able to delay your enemies by various means, including flicking them with a towel.

"Anything else I saw just wasn’t worth mentioning"

The game will be single player only and sees the cartoon-like character of Arthur Dent running round all the different environments in his classic dressing gown and slippers. Phase 3 Studios (the developers) have also taken great care and pride in their character development, drawing inspiration from the TV show and their own interpretations from the books. Marvin the android for example looks vastly different from the TV show, but the characteristics incorporated in this severely depressed robot did raise a smile.

The game seemed similar to Alice and should be initially released on the PC and Mac formats around about Easter 2002. Seeing as this was the only in-game contact information I got I’ll try and keep you posted on development.


Public Displays Of Piracy and Hormones
Just a quick note about one stand in particular: Microboards Technologies, who had one of the largest displays of piracy seen with their 50-100 capacity DVD recorders.

And that was about it really, anything else I saw just wasn’t worth mentioning. You can tell how desperate and bored I got by the final note in my notebook, which says:
Fittest Girls seen were at the Digimask and Logitech stands. The Cyber Goth girl handing out the OPM Recruitment application flyers was strangely alluring too.

Let’s hope the show attracts more of the large publishers and much more attention next time, or Europe could quickly find itself showless in the future.

david twomey

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