Nintendo DS.
1. Rune Factory 2.
It was a close call with another stellar Castlevania title coming, but Rune Factory 2 wins on its depth and significant gameplay upgrades. Neverland has upped the ante on the graphics, giving Rune Factory 2 an absolutely gorgeous world to explore. They have also wisely included both standard and touch screen control options as well as creating a quick scroll bar on the touch screen to avoid pausing the game so often to switch items.
Rune Factory 2 has over 940,000 translated words and features a story line that will span two generations making this no slouch in the story department either. The combat is fun and the music was also very pleasant.The first game brought a great addition to the Harvest Moon series, and Rune Factory 2 looks to be everything both Harvest Moon fans, and newcomers could ever possibly want in a title.
2. Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia
Surprising no one, the next Castlevania title looks to be another must buy entry in the series. Using a new glyph system to acquire weapons and skills, Order of Ecclesia looks to be a unique entry in the Castlevania series by thinking outside the normal character roster. This is the second time a female has been the sole lead of a Castlevania, only now the Belmonts are nowhere to be found and its up to a new organization to bring Dracula down.
Another seemingly new addition is the appearance of a world map. While its almost assured that the bulk of the game will take place in the titular castle, the demo on the show floor showed us a training ground, and a monostary. This could lead to a number of new locations, thought probably not as radical as the Egyptian levels in Portrait of Ruin. The controls were as spot on as usual, even with the new combo attack system and ability latch onto blue runes ala Super Mario Galaxy. An easy recommendation for action adventure fans everywhere this year.
3. Princess Debut
You might be thinking someone at Zentendo has lost their mind, but special note must be made of the work Natsume is trying to accomplish with their girl aimed Nintendo DS title, Princess Debut. The quality of games being marketed toward the female audience right not is completely wrong and unfair. Natsume seems to be one of the first companies in realizing this, and to be honest this isn't their first foray into the female demographic either. Even before the tidel wave of shovelware pet games hit the market, Natsume was bringing entire Harvest Moon games to girls with all the depth of their more male oriented originals. Princess Debut takes the Rhythm based mechanics of Elite Beat Agents, The story and dating sim aspects of Harvest Moon, and adds them to a game with tons of motion captured dancing animations and clothing options to finally give a game of quality to the other half of the world.
If this game were instead a sequel to Oundan, or Elite Beat Agents, and had taken the games world map, story aspects, and wardrobe altering functions then it would likely be hailed as a masterpiece rhythm game. The sad fact is, because the industry is so male focused right now, this game has gone unnoticed. Sure this isn't a game that males are going to buy, but the best of E3 is graded by game quality and innovation, not target demographics. It is for this reason that Princess Debut sits in the top spots for E3 2008.
