7 games we DON'T want announced at E3 2011

5. Anything related to the Wii Vitality Sensor

Unveiled at E3 two years ago, the Vitality Sensor was/is a little plastic clip intended to measure a player’s pulse and feed that information back to the game. When we were first introduced to it during one of the more deflating Nintendo press conferences in recent memory, our minds quickly skipped past all the potential survival-horror applications, and concluded that this was just another gimmick aimed squarely at the demographic that made Wii Fit a huge seller.

Since then, we’ve seen absolutely nothing about the Vitality Sensor, and we kind of like it that way. It’s comforting to think that Nintendo, finally realizing it had gone too far, caught and killed the device in its conceptual stage – or better yet, introduced it as bait to see which competitors would actually try to copy it. We’ve since giggled at Ubisoft, who – in an apparent bid to beat Nintendo to the punch – announced its own pulse sensor last year, complete with a questionable “relaxation” game called Innergy.

Above: lolwut?

However, Nintendo is wily, and if it thinks there’s a good reason to bring a pulse-reading clip to market – possibly even as part of the much-speculated-on Project Café controller – then it will. We just hope to God we don’t stumble across it next week.

6. Gran Turismo 6

It can’t be understated what a disappointment Gran Turismo 5 was/is. That may sound harsh, but like many other gamer/car lovers, we’ve spent hundreds and hundreds of hours on the franchise believing it was the ultimate standard to which any simulation racing game should aspire. Because it was. Gran Turismo set the bar so impossibly high time and time again that it was understandable that GT5 would have a couple delays. So we happily overlooked it, knowing that perfection takes time. But then the delays dragged on. And on.

After 5 years, it finally arrived, underwhelming and somehow still unfinished. Gorgeous Premium vehicles were awkwardly parked beside embarrassing Standard vehicles that looked as if they were ripped straight off the GT4 disc. Convoluted menus, arbitrarily locked game features, and massive loading times all helped tarnish a once impeccable franchise. We’re not saying we don’t want to see a new Gran Turismo ever, but E3 2011 would be much too soon. Like a jilted lover burned after a years long relationship, the hurt is too fresh and we’re gonna need some time to get over it.

After 5 years, it finally arrived, underwhelming and somehow still unfinished. Gorgeous Premium vehicles were awkwardly parked beside embarrassing Standard vehicles that looked as if they were ripped straight off the GT4 disc. Convoluted menus, arbitrarily locked game features, and massive loading times all helped tarnish a once impeccable franchise. We’re not saying we don’t want to see a new Gran Turismo ever, but E3 2011 would be much too soon. Like a jilted lover burned after a years long relationship, the hurt is too fresh and we’re gonna need some time to get over it.

7. Five new Dance Dance Revolutions

Does this one sound farfetched? Well, there’s a precedent. Back in 2008, Konami simultaneously pulled the wraps off no fewer than three DDR games: Dance Dance Revolution X, Dance Dance Revolution Universe 3, and Dance Dance Revolution Hottest Party 2. Now, we know DDR still has legions of fans, and we say good on them, but the series has seen so many releases, and so few changes, that we’ll be damned if we can even tell the games apart anymore. So you can imagine our excitement when, at a 2008 press conference, Konami invited all three games’ Japanese producers onstage to muddle their way through lengthy speeches about how awesome it is to step on arrow buttons.

Since then, we’ve done a lot of thinking about what could possibly be worse than the simultaneous announcement, unveiling and presentation of three not-so-distinct DDR games. The answer is clear: five of them. One or two wouldn’t be a big deal. Three or four we could handle. But at five, we draw the line, and that number is less of a speculative stretch than you might think.

With Kinect, Move and (potentially) Project Café all opening up entirely new frontiers in the field of dancepad-synched awkwardness, the potential certainly exists for new DDRs to arrive for all three. (Hell, in Move’s case, it already happened last year with DanceDanceRevolution – what’s to stop it from happening again?) That would, of course, be in addition to Hottest Party 4 on Wii, and at least one “normal” version for everything else.

Above: Now slightly more confusing yaaaay

Obviously, DDR doesn’t have quite the same head of steam behind it that it used to, and at this point, five new DDRs seems unlikely given that Konami’s already made the bulk of its announcements for this year. But it could still happen, and the thought that it might fills us with dread as the coming week of craziness looms large.

Jun 3, 2011

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No plane ticket? No press credentials? No worries!