E3 has officially been kicked off after Microsoft’s Press Event, hosted by Don Mattrick. There were a ton of announcements and it wouldn’t be a Microsoft event without throwing around a bunch of numbers to inflate their egos:

$48 billion on video games this year! 5 million more Xbox units than PS3’s install base! $2.2 billion in third party game sales over the last 12 months! A new Xbox Live member every 5 seconds! More than 10 000 movies and TV shows released on Xbox Live! 1000 titles launching by the end of the year! 3.5 million rhythm-game songs downloaded through Live! 500 million pieces of content downloaded (trailers, movies, music etc.)! In terms of games, the Xbox 360 is outselling the PS3 and Wii combined!

And a promise from Mr Mattrick; they will beat the PS3!

Other announcements in this vein involved a deal with NBC, Universal and NetFlix of the US and MGM International and Constantin Film of Europe. They will both be providing content, exclusive to Xbox Live, starting today. But enough with the chest-beating. Games were also shown and revealed as well as other announcements. Amongst the announcements was the new avatar system and a new Xbox Live user interface, including new Xbox channels such as ‘My Xbox’ and a new ‘Community’ channel. The avatars are as expected, designed and developed by Rare and can be added to your Gamercard. Avatars can be custom-built using different sets of clothing, hair and face options, amongst other settings. These new items (thousands upon thousands of them) will be available via Xbox Live Marketplace.

Community Channel

The Community Channel included a ‘Live Party’ option, allowing users to share in each others’ activities together, such as watching the same movie, sharing photos or playing the same game, in groups of eight.

Onto the games!

Todd Howard of Bethesda Softworks was on-hand to show Fallout 3, now exclusive to PC and Xbox 360.

Jun Takeuchi of Capcom came on stage to show off Resident Evil 5 and play a co-operative level. Resident Evil 5 will be released on Friday the 13th of March 2009, across Europe and America (a day later than Japan).

Peter Molyneux appeared to walk people through the intro and beginning gameplay of Fable 2, which is finished, according to Molyneux, and will release in October this year.

Gears of War 2

Cliff Bleszinski was also there to show some gameplay from Gears of War 2. Highlights include the reveal that players will be able to pilot Brumaks (the big monsters with rocket-launchers on its hands, only glimpsed in Gears of War) and that the game would be available on November 7th. More of the same gameplay was shown (shooting hundreds of Locust horde and using enemies as ‘meatshields’), although a new mode, Horde, was announced, with 5-player co-operative option.

More games were shown, such as gameplay from Banjo Kazooie Nuts & Bolts and Viva Pinata: Trouble in Paradise, showcasing a desert and snow level. Apparently the original Viva Pinata will be made available through Xbox Live.

More games were revealed and shown, such as Geometry Wars 2 Retro Evolved, Uno Rush, Galaga Legions (a Pac-Man CE-like update to Galaga) as well as Portal: Still Alive, sporting new levels, exclusive to Xbox Live. A game, related to South Park was also hinted at. XNA games were also touched on, revealing that XNA-made games would soon become available.

You’re in the Movies, a game using Eye-Toy-like technology, was revealed. You’re in the Movies allows players to place themselves in home-made movies, using the games’ pre-made art assets. The 3 Microsoft executives on-hand, Shane Kim, John Shappert and Don Mattrick, ran around on stage with video of themselves placed in the game real-time, as in-game elements animated around them, at one stage being ‘chased’ by a lizard. When released, You’re in the Movies will include a LIVE Vision camera.

A new Scene It! game, ‘Box Office Smash’, with avatar support, was announced while Lips, the SingStar competitor, was revealed as Duffy, the singer, sang one of her own songs through the game. Lips will allow players to grab songs from their Zune or iPod. Keiichi Yanno (Elite Beat agent creator, of iNiS) came on stage to talk more about the game and demonstrate the motion-sensitive microphone, also used as a tambourine.

Representatives for Red Octane and Harmonix both came on stage (separately) to talk about the new features of Guitar Hero: World Tour and Rock Band 2, respectively. Van Halen and The Eagles are exclusive to Guitar Hero: World Tour while Metallica downloadable content will be released alongside their new album. Rock Band 2, on the other hand, will feature a varied tracklist, ranging from Tenacious D to Bob Dylan.

Final Fantasy XIII!!!

The big announcement of the event (or, the announcement least expected) came after Yoichi Wada of Square Enix announced and showed their line-up of games coming out on Xbox 360, such as Star Ocean (available next year), Infinite Undiscovery (available September this year) and The Last Remnant (available later this year).

After Wada had left the stage, allowing Don Mattrick to continue to speak and attempt to wrap up the event, Wada came back on stage to say, “I do have one more big announcement.”

A video started playing with indefinable forms shown. No-one knew what it could be. The video continued until it was made clear that the game being shown was none other than Final Fantasy XIII, previously thought to be a PS3 exclusive, now coming to Xbox 360 as well!

After that announcement, Don Mattrick wrapped up the event. The end.

Further, in-depth coverage of each announcement will be available on El33tonline.