Gamescom Preview

17th August 2009 • 0 Comments

The game show season has come about again and this time it's Europe's turn. Instead of it being called Games Convention as it has been for the past few years, it has been changed to Gamescom and remains in Germany. The show will probably be showing updated builds of games from E3 and have little in terms of new game announcements, however some companies seem to have some big things planned for Gamescom. 

Sony

From the rumours floating around it seems that Sony have a lot to show at Gamescom. The biggest rumour of them all is the PS3 Slim, this will probably be unveiled at their press conference on Tuesday, as the event is no stranger to hardware unveilings with the PSP 3000 being shown last year at GC. Speculation is also being fueled by the fact that some regions are in short supply of PS3's especially in Japan where 80GB's are becoming quite rare. This would suggest that a new version is going to be released soon or at the very least a new SKU will be unveiled at Gamescom.

Alongside the unveiling of the PS3 Slim I would also speculate there will be a dramatic price cut to go alongside it. At the moment the PS3 retails at €399 and £299 in Europe, I suspect the price would drop down to at least €299, however with the pound collapsing over the last few months against the Euro I would suspect the UK price to only drop to about £250 at the lowest. This is still way off from the magical £199 price point but it would be a step in the right direction. Lets hope they don't have the same idea as they had with the PSP Go! and charge more for it.

It will be interesting to see if there are any cuts to the PS3 Slim, but I suspect it will just be a smaller PS3, there are rumours of PS2 backwards compatibility returning in the form of a software update, whether it is exclusive to the PS3 Slim or not depends how willing Sony are to upset their current customers.

There have also been rumblings that an announcement regarding the European Video store will be at Gamescom. The Americans have had the video store for over a year and this announcement will probably just be stating that the European service has started. It may however be announced alongside a revamped Playstation Store, as Sony is rumoured to show more of the "app" store for PSP Go! Whether this app store will be for everyone or those who can afford the dev kit remains to be seen.

Aside from these announcements the games on show will probably more games for the PSP Go's launch. These will most probably be the app store games and a few more PSP game announcements for this Christmas and next year. I doubt they'll be many new PS3 game announcements and I get the feeling that more Heavy Rain may be shown on stage.

The final rumour is that Gran Turismo 5 will make an appearance at the show. Maybe Jeremy Clarkson will help demo it I don't know, it would be nice to see the Top Gear test track. There are also rumours though that Sony will announce that GT5 will be coming out by the end of 2009. This would be surprising as the PSP version is out in October and not much has been shown of GT5 to give the clue of a 2009 release.

If all these rumours turn out to be true it could be a strong showing from Sony.

Microsoft

Microsoft aren't expected to have such a big showing as Sony. There is a big possibility that there will be an announcement of a price cut, how much comes off remains to be seen. There is also a rumour that the Pro model is being phased out and the Elite and Arcade will be the only ones on sale. The phasing out of the Pro would make sense if they are also cutting the price and it seems that retailer Argos may have also hinted at this.

In terms of games at the moment there are a few hints on Lionheads website which seem to hint at a Black & White game and with Peter Molyneux keynoting the press conference, it might make sense to reveal the game there. Natal will probably also make an appearance with a few more announcements alongside that. Apart from that it seems Microsoft may have a quiet showing at Gamescom.

Nintendo

It seems that Nintendo may not have a press conference at Gamescom, instead I suspect that they will just show their games that are being released this Christmas.

Third Parties

Expect not too many new announcements of games at Gamescom. There will probably be a strong showing for Fifa 10 from EA and PES 2010 from Konami as these games are popular in Europe. New features of some games may be shown as well.

From the rumours floating around it seems Gamescom may have a pretty good first showing with some new announcements of hardware and software. It all starts off tomorrow and we'll try and round up the best news everyday. Lets hope it is a good show.

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