The Top Ten Action-Adventure Games of E3 2011

The exhibits have are being broken down and packed onto the trucks to be shipped back to their respective homes to wait for another expo, the army of workers from each publisher given only two short days to take down what was, for a cosmic blink of the eye (four days) the City of Games on the edge of the Continent, and here at Gaming Update we are sifting through the mountain of notes, photos, and contacts that we acquired at the Expo -- and we thought we would share with you our Top Ten Action-Adventure Games of E3 2011!

What's that you say? Wait a minute Jethro, why not the Top Ten Games of E3?!

First, don't call me Jethro... And second, there will be a Top Ten Games of E3 piece, we promise, but at the moment we are still fighting over what goes on that list and in what position, and as we only have the one hotel room to trash there just is not enough furniture to throw out the windows to decide! It was a itsy-bit easier to do when we broke them down by genre, you see?

What we are saying is that picking just ten games was not easy -- the criteria that we used was a mixture of our own impressions and those of the many fans that we spoke with while visiting the lines to get the average gamer's view of the show and the games. So here, for your reading pleasure, are the Top Ten Action-Adventure Games of E3 2011 in reverse order, starting with Number 10!

Numero 10 -- Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception

Drake's Deception is the third game in the Uncharted series, and was created by Naughty Dog for the PlayStation 3, as the direct sequel to Uncharted 2: Among Thieves.

While the game was actually revealed to the media on December 9th, 2010, its official public debut did not happen until the 2010 Spike Video Game Awards on December 11th, where gamers got their first good look at it via its debut trailer. The first demo of actual game play premiered on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon -- a TV talk and variety show (December 14th, 2010) which was quickly recorded and taken viral via YouTube and the Web, to sate the veracious appetite of gamers the world over!

The game takes protagonist and hero Nathan Drake -- and his mentor Victor Sullivan -- around the world to some pretty unlikely and surprising places -- like the Rub' al Khali desert -- as they search for a legendary lost city. The main plot is heavily influenced by the archaeology and anthropology adventures of writer T. E. Lawrence (Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Edward Lawrence, CB, DSO 16th August 1888 -- 19th May 1935), a British Army officer renowned especially for his liaison role during the Arab Revolt against the Ottoman Turkish Empire.

Better known as Lawrence of Arabia, he was the bastard son of Sir Thomas Chapman. his mother being Sarah Junner, who was the governess for Chapman's legitimate children! A student at Oxford's Jesus College, Lawrence had a life-long fascination with archeology and anthropology, and his studies of those subjects was largely the reason that he was co-opted by the British military to undertake a military survey of the Negev Desert while doing archaeological research in the region. As a result of American journalist Lowell Thomas' sensationalistic coverage of the revolt and the part that Lawrence played in dealing with it, he became a legend in his own time on both sides of the Atlantic, which explains the rather heavy influence that his legend has in the game and, not surprisingly, as part of the make-up of its main character.

Chloe Frazer and Elena Fisher make a return in the game, which promises to be a great desert adventure, and if the demo at E3 is anything to go by, there is substance to that promise! The game world that we were shown was richly rendered and full of surprises -- though as it turns out there were more surprises for the development team than there were for the gamers and press who saw their very professional demo at the show!

In the days before the team from Naughty Dog set up their exhibit at the Expo all sorts of unexpected bugs cropped up -- including the ocean going missing from the segments in which you exit the cruise ship to begin the adventure. How do you lose an ocean? The answer seems to dwell in the realm of the Gremlins according to Justin Richmond, the game's Director, who not only managed to help find the missing ocean, but stomp most of the rest of the bugs that were tossed through the wormhole.

Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception is a PS3 exclusive and is set for release in North America on November 1st, 2011, in Europe on November 4th, 2011 and in Australia at some point before Christmas 2011, there is no official word when the rest of the world will get its localized versions yet.

Nombre 09 -- Gears of War 3

Gears of War 3 is our pick for Number 9, and is a title that we have seen previously at PAX East and other events, which has provided a clear demonstration of its evolution as the most impressive title in the series to date. An Action-Adventure Third-Person Shooter developed by Epic Games and published by Microsoft Games Studios exclusively for the Xbox 360, Gears 3 tells the final chapter of the current story arc detailing the adventures of our favorite COG unit as they battle an insidious and deadly alien invasion that has changed the world for the worse.

The player once again play assumes the role of Marcus Fenix, protagonist, hero, and all-around swell fella who also happens to be the driving force for the Gears, which consists of the well-known, well-loved characters from the previous games, and some new faces as well! Gears 3 introduces four new playable female characters, Anya Stroud, Samantha Byrne, Queen Myrrah, and Bernadette Mataki, who is a character from the Karen Traviss novels Gears of War: Aspho Fields and Gears of War: Jacinto's Remnant .

Gears 3 features primary game play as Marcus, but also has the player swapping out to play other characters in the game temporarily to move the story forward, including soldier Jace Stratton, and Stranded Leader Griffin, who is in command of a group of human survivors, and who is voiced by Hip-Hop star Ice-T. In addition to the new co-op multi-player mode Beast, the cooperative story-mode play for the campaign returns in Gears 3, and it has been confirmed that the game will be supplied with a dedicated network of servers, which should eliminate the drops, latency, and game-breaking network errors that plagued Gears 2!

The story in Gears 3 picks up eighteen months after the fall of Jacinto, when the Gears have moved to the island of Vectes and are living aboard a converted aircraft carrier called the Raven's Nest. COG has officially disbanded now that there is no formal organized government or resistance to the alien infestation, and the imulsion that powered Sera's cities has infected and mutated members of the Locust, turning them into a new form of enemy called Lambent, which have evolved into a new enemy threatening both the Locust and humanity -- though that does not mean that we are going to make nice with the Locust... Among the human refugees in Vectes are a group called 'The Stranded' who sought shelter there along with other human survivors of E-Day, and who will factor in the story line and events as they unfold.

The third installment of the Gears of War series opened at E3 to incredible interest, and was one of the longer lines at the show, with fans of the series eager to see what is coming. As we played through the demo and compared it to what we saw at PAX East, we were pleased by the addition of new enemy mobs, including Savage Grenadier, the Digger Boomer, the Siege Beast, and the Kantus Knight on the side of the Locust, and Drudges, Polyps, and Lambent Stalks on the side of the Lambent -- some of which were actually present in the PAX demo, but are more fully presented here.

Originally due to be released in April of 2011, Gears 3 was delayed and has a new release date of September 20th, 2011 -- which worked out good for gamers, who got to participate in an online Beta of the multi-player side of the game on XBOX Live in April of this year.

Nummer 08 -- BioShock Infinite

BioShock Infinite is an upcoming Action-Adventure First-Person Shooter from Irrational Games for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and Windows PC platforms. The third and final game in the BioShock series, Infinite is not a direct sequel or even a prequel to previous games, but rather it is a completely separate and new story that takes place at an earlier time in the history of that alternate reality.

The game features similar game play elements and themes, so fans of the series will be instantly at home, but in place of Andrew Ryan and his Utopia of Rapture, the game world consists of a flying city called Columbia that has become a geopolitical nightmare for the US government, who built it as a secret military project with the aim of creating a floating battle platform that could be moved anywhere in the world as needed, to extend the might and the military presence of the United States when foreign enemies needed a little reminder of just who they were dealing with.

The threat presented by the platform was only useful if its true nature remained largely unknown by those outside of government, but when its secret was revealed, the powers that be disavowed any involvement in the project, which was then co-opted by men who envisioned it as the base for a different type of utopia. With its new purpose well in hand and the existence of its massive weapons still mostly a secret, the location of the floating bastion became a blurred matter, which is where our story begins.

The player takes the role of a former Pinkerton agent, Booker DeWitt, as he attempts to rescue a woman who he is told is trapped aboard the collapsing air-city in 1912 -- though Booker does not have all of the details or the true story behind the woman he has been sent to rescue, and only learns them once he is committed to the effort and has gotten on board Columbia!

Booker's efforts are further hampered by several factors, including the civil war that has broken out on Columbia between different factions of citizens divided by socio-economic lines; each is trying to seize control of the city from the powers-that-be in a case of the have-not's vs. the have's, and when Booker arrives that struggle has basically been distilled down to three factions -- the ruling government of the city and two resistance groups, one called Vox Populi (Latin for "voice of the people"), who are seeking a uniform application of equality as the public face of their movement but have a more sinister agenda in private, and another unnamed group that moves in the shadows, and whose influence is felt in the game but largely goes unseen. It is thought that the third group will come to the fore in one of the DLC expansions that will later be released for the game.

Although you are quickly able to locate the woman that you came to rescue -- Elizabeth -- your attempts to carry out your mission are further hampered by the violent resistance of her servant and captor, a mechanical entity called Songbird, who was designed by its creator to feel betrayal when Elizabeth tries to escape, and act to prevent that by "defending" her from anyone who is assisting her.

The direct threat posed by Songbird is only one of many issues that cause trouble and complicate your escape from Columbia, with the others including the fact that Elizabeth is a central element to the civil war that is raging in the city, as each faction seeks to use Elizabeth to turn the tide of the conflict in their favor, and her emerging special powers that are similar to those experienced in the previous games, but that include the ability to manipulate tears in the space-time continuum that at one point in the demo had us stepping into what appeared to be the New York City of the 1990's, where Revenge of the Jedi was featured on a theatre marquee!

The demo at E3 began part-way into one of the mission sections, and featured Booker using the Skyhook Device that allows him to latch on to the overhead tracks of the public transportation system and slide along it independently -- and important and even crucial ability considering the state of the city and its transportation infrastructure. As Booker we destroy an armed dirigible that is attacking us, and then deal with a large number of the opposing Vox Populi and City Troops, both of which seek to take Elizabeth away from you.

BioShock Infinite is set for a 2012 release on the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and Windows PC platforms, but you can look for an in-depth game preview and continuing coverage from Gaming Update in the coming months!

Maara 07 -- Assassin's Creed: Revelations

Assassin's Creed: Revelations is the third and final game that completes the story of the arc for this part of the Assassin's Creed story, and was developed and published by Ubisoft, bringing together the many threads that relate to the story of its three protagonists -- Desmond, Altair, and Ezio.

Desmond Miles is the modern day descendant of a long line of Assassin's who were members of the society and guild that dates back to the earliest of civilized culture, with origins in the Middle East, but that has over the ages spread throughout the world. At the time of the first Crusades the Templar became the hated enemy of the Assassins, and seek their utter destruction even to the present day, when they have taken the faceless form of a global corporation.

Fans of the series who played the previous games know that the Templar -- under the guide of the Abstergo Corporation -- have developed technology that allows them to travel back in time using the DNA Memory of test subjects -- of which Desmond was one of the few success cases -- where they can mine the memories of events that occurred to the people who are Desmond's distant relatives stretching all the way back to the Middle Ages.

The playable characters of Altaïr ibn La-Ahad and Ezio Auditore da Firenze are two of the Assassins that Desmond descends from, and factor predominantly in the mystery surrounding certain artifacts whose location is lost to time but that, through the memories locked inside Desmond's DNA, can still be found. The artifacts have supernatural powers imbued in them, and may well be part of the materials that created the planet and the universe. They certainly have religious value and substance, which is why The Church was heavily involved in their custodianship.

After escaping with the aid of an Assassin group who has their own memory access device, Desmond continues the original quest to locate the artifacts by accessing the memories of Ezio and Altair, taking the player back to Constantinople (modern-day Istanbul) in 1511 AD, where he has his adventures within the four districts of the city and where he eventually discovers the location where Altaïr sealed up an ancient artifact that may be the key to ending the Templar and Assassin war forever.

The events of the previous two games suggested that Desmond was fighting on the side of the good once he escaped the Templar's grasp, but all may not be as it appears -- and now that he is trapped in a comatose state inside the Animus Device, he must carefully reassemble his memories to figure out what his true situation is, and what to do about it!

The hand's-off demo at E3 showed us a much older, much wiser, and much more powerful Ezio, and a world that has undergone a very impressive set of changes. Motion and the meld between CS and game play is far smoother than it ever was before, and the world itself has become hauntingly real, making immersion a very brief act on the part of the gamer! New moves and kit have been added to the game, and the effects of many of the previous items like Smoke Bombs have been tweaked, making for a much more active and interesting application of combination moves inside the veil of smoke that they create -- and that is just one element of the improved game play in Revelations!

Players may feel the pangs of sadness at the realization that Ezio is nearing the end of his life, as old age creeps upon him, but his bad-ass abilities and skills as a Master Assassin that have been gained over a lifetime of action, and the new respect that he has earned more than make up for the presence of those Autumn years.

The game is set to be released for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 on 15th November, 2011 and is certainly one of the titles that we will be keeping a close eye on and playing with as that release approaches! Stay tuned to Gaming Update in the coming weeks and months as we bring you an in-depth preview, analysis, and game review!

Numer 06 -- The Adventures of Tintin

Certainly one of the big surprises at E3 this year is the Action-Adventure game The Adventures of Tintin, which is being created by Ubisoft Montpellier together with the producers of the film, and published by Ubisoft.

Based upon the upcoming 3D film The Adventures of Tintin: Secret of the Unicorn that is set to release this year, both the film and the game are based upon the series of comic books that were created by Belgian artist Georges Remi in the early part of the 20th Century. The film is directed by Steven Spielberg, and produced by Peter Jackson, who both actively participated in the creation of the game, which features the instantly recognizable world of that young Belgian reporter and his companion, a white terrier named Snowy.

Our first exposure to the game came at Ubisoft's Press Conference on Monday afternoon, when we saw a short film that was produced using the game engine and CG cut scenes, and was more than enough to wet our appetite and send us scurrying to the Ubisoft exhibit on the show floor the following day.

At a hand's-off demo that began with a video of director Spielberg, and produced Jackson, we were shown four action sequences in full 3D that instantly set the stage and introduced iconic characters from the comic strips -- which we expected to see -- before shifting back to the 2D platformer that the game largely consists of.

The demo was a very nice introduction to a style of animation and a game world that instantly provokes feelings of nostalgia for the pre-war era -- and when we say pre-war we mean pre World War I! This is odd, since none of us in the audience at the demo were alive in that era, so there really is no connection that should evoke such feelings, but the game does, which is a mark of the effectiveness of the story tellers who created it.

Due to the time constraints that are ever-present at E3 we were only able to experience a tiny slice of the game, but what we saw impressed -- and Gaming Update will be closely following this title and bringing you coverage to keep you informed. The fact that what little we saw impressed us enough to place this game in the Number 6 slot of the Top Ten Action-Adventure Games of E3 should tell you that we have something special here -- and our continuing coverage of the game will affirm that!

The Adventures of Tintin: The Game is presently scheduled for release in North America some time in December, and in Europe in October of this year, just in time for the Christmas Season. Keep your eyes on Gaming Update in the coming months, as we provide additional news coverage, as well as preview, and review features on this game!

Numerus 05 -- Dead Island

Another surprise at E3 -- though it should not have been considering that we have been bringing you news and coverage of the title for months -- is Dead Island, the upcoming open-world Survival Horror and Action-Adventure game in development by Techland for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 3, and the Xbox 360. Check out the E3 Game Profile for Dead Island written by Intern Peter Boots-Faubert for a closer look at the reailty of a tropical holiday gone wrong, and stick with Gaming Update for continuing coverage of this title as it approaches its September 2011 release date.

The adventure is centered around the challenge of survival on a zombie-infested island when a mysterious virus outbreak turns most of the inhabitants into brain-eating zombies who insist upon having you for dinner! With its major emphasis upon melee combat -- the idea is to make use of the objects that you find within the game world -- Dead Island provides a fresh take on the zombie genre, so if you are worried that it is just another zombie game, fear not!

The fact that we have placed this title at Number five in our Top Ten Action-Adventure Games of E3 should tell you that the hand's-on demo left us impressed and eager to play more of this game, which features in addition to a wide open world for game play, access to the story mode via cooperative multi-player play that supports up to four-players (online only), which means that this is one of the games that you will put in your regular play rotation this year that is meant to be played with friends!

With its sharp focus on melee combat that incorporates customizable weaponry, vehicle combat, and rich RPG elements, the Palms Resort located on the fictional Banoi Island in Papua New Guinea is going to be one of our favorite places to spend the day in the sun, soaking up rays, swimming in the ocean, and... Oh yeah! Killing Zombies!

Stay tuned to Gaming Update for a full and comprehensive Game Preview as well as ongoing coverage for Dead Island, a title we suspect will very quickly launch itself as a cult classic and make its way into your regular game play rotation this Summer and Fall!

Idadi 04 -- The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

With its monumental following and established presence as an RPG and Action-Adventure series, The Elder Scrolls games are not simply an automatic entry in the Top Ten List -- like any game they have to earn their place here, though clearly The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim (pronounced sky-rim) has made the cut and then some!

While it is designated as a role-playing game by developer and publisher Bethesda, it neatly fits into both that and the Action-Adventure genres, and is the fifth installment in The Elder Scrolls action role-playing game series, following The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion as a direct sequel.

Gaming Update has kept a close eye upon the this one since its announcement and the press briefing earlier this year, but as details have been closely kept and slowly released, our experience with the game at E3 was really the first time that we were able to quantify its place in the firmament of the gaming heavens.

Set two hundred years after the events of Oblivion, and taking place in the homonymous land of Skyrim, the game introduces many first to the series -- for instance we get to ride horses in this one, and while that may not seem like a big deal to anyone who has NOT played the previous games, and so is unfamiliar with the huge world in the games and the amount of travel it necessitates as part of the process of completing the quests and missions that are its bread-and-butter, we can only say that your first exposure to the game series in this title is a lucky one for that.

As your adventure begins you find yourself in a land that is torn by civil war following the assassination of its king, while the god Alduin -- who takes the form of a massive dragon -- has arisen to destroy the world. As you are the last living Dovahkiin (Dragonborn), and the only person in the world able to harness the special magic of the dragons -- the only power that has a hope of defeating him -- you must fend off Alduin and save Skyrim from destruction!

Previously our only exposure to the game was through the trailers and PR materials, so the demo and presentation at E3 was a very welcome thing indeed, and though it largely retains the traditional controls and feel of the previous games, its game world and characters, not to mention the awesome mobs you will be facing, have been completely created anew, with loving detail and a balance in challenge and play that is both refreshing and reassuring, making the campaign accessible for players of all skill levels.

Skyrim is scheduled to be released on November 11th, 2011 worldwide (11/11/11) for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and Windows PC, and Gaming Update will be closely following its progress to release you can be sure! Stay tuned to our site over the course of the next few weeks and months as we bring you a very detailed game Preview, Skyrim news, and some feature pieces that are planned to explore the wondrous expansion to one of the deepest fantasy game series ever created!

Rhif 03 -- Saints Row the Third

There comes a time in every great game series that exists in a tightly-contested genre where it must declare itself as an original or be marginalized by the field of similar games, where it is easy to be crushed by the giants who invariably emerge in such a competitive atmosphere.

When the first two games in the Saints Row series released, they did so facing some serious competition in the form of Rockstar's Grand Theft Auto franchise, a game series that has made bigger studios tremble in fear and pee their pants -- we are just saying -- so the decision to branch-off the third title in the Saints Row series comes as no surprise, or rather, comes as a wonderful surprise, because it nicely carves out a niche for the game that will firmly establish it with a competitive edge that is almost impossible to dislodge.

What are we talking about?

Rather than continue to seek out a position as one of the large open-world Action-Adventure RPG games that embraces the gangster lifestyle -- a genre that is very well covered already by the GTA games and, more recently, period games like Mafia II and LEGO Harry Potter Years 1-4 (OK, we threw that last one in just to see if you were paying attention) -- the game wizards behind Saints Row the Third went entirely in the other direction!

For a more complete notion of what we mean by that, and what the newly redefined phrase "over-the-top" now means, check out our recent E3 Game Profile for Saints Row the Third , and then stay tuned to Gaming Update in the coming weeks and months as we bring you a comprehensive Preview and news about what may well be the best casual gangster destruction game ever made!

Weighing in at Number 3 in the Top Ten Action-Adventure Games of E3, the hand's-off demo of Saints Row the Third provided us with a solid first-look at both the incredible freeplay mode, in which destruction and the wholesale slaughter of pretty much anyone you don't even like a little bit was capped-off by a demo of the new challenge modes (a timed destruction challenge that uses a tank!) and a demo of a mission in which you rob a bank with a helicopter, there was more than enough in the presentation to confirm that an instant classic is on its way, and cement its position as one of the Top-Three Action-Adventure Games for E3. It will be interesting to see where it places in the over-all Top Ten list, and the Top-Ten Shooter List, which we are still in the process of fighting over here at Gaming Update.

Keep your eyes on our site over the course of the next few weeks for an in-depth Preview and ongoing news coverage for the title, as well as special feature coverage that will include some interviews and a scientific examination of the human canon truck and what it means to be launched from it!

Szama 02 -- Hitman Absolution

It is not often that the mere mention of a game title causes our hands to tremble and our arms to shiver, but Hitman Absolution is a game that has that power. Perhaps you had to be sitting in the theatre when the demo and preview played out to fully appreciate why -- and perhaps it will help if you experienced the previous games in the series when they were first released, and busted the genre of the Shooter and Action-Adventure game wide open... And if you were not blessed to have experienced that special time -- what we at Gaming Update like to call the Hitman Era, well, how lucky are you to be introduced to the series through this newest sequel? Really really lucky, that is how lucky!

The Hitman Series consists of the following games:

Hitman: Codename 47 (2000)

Hitman 2: Silent Assassin (2002)

Hitman: Contracts (2004)

Hitman: Blood Money (2006)

The series was THE games that defined the modern day assassin, and brought gamers into the new millennium with a deep and engaging storyline and the opportunity to get to know a character who is at once an enigma and, if you are a veteran of the series, ghost to the world governments and law enforcement agencies. If you saw the movie that was loosely based upon the series, you know that Agent 47 is not a typical man -- Freud might say that he was truly a Superman, at least with respect to his iron-like control over his emotions and the urges that tend to get the rest of us into trouble.

The simple reality is that after our introduction to Agent 47, we were given new adventures every two years until the release of Blood Money in 2006 -- which is arguably the best game in the series -- and then they stopped. When 2008 arrived and no Hitman game appeared we would not be exaggerating to say that there was great disappointment in the gaming community worldwide! Certain that a new game was coming, we all waited patiently and, again were disappointed in the following years, until a large chunk of the community started to believe that there would be no new game.

Taking solace in replaying the first four, we kept the faith, and now that faith is being rewarded in what we suspect will be the sequel that cleanly blows away Blood Money as the best game in the series like a point-blank headshot from one of Agent 47's Silverballers!

The first look we had of the game was provided in the Square Enix booth at E3 (Square acquired IO Interactive in 2005, and this will be the first Hitman game created under the new regime), in a hand's-off demo and presentation that left us itching to garrote our host and take control of the console, so that we could scratch an itch that has been driving us crazy for five long years!

Clearly we did not do that, but what we did do was sit through the presentation twice, just to be sure that we had absorbed everything that we could from it!

The next chapter in the story of Agent 47 is a complete dep[departure from all that came before: The Agency is no more, and the reliable infrastructure that provided Agent 47 with kit, transportation, and safe houses is gone with it. Agent 47 is no longer the ghost-like enigma that he once was, because the government and the police are not only aware of his existence, but know what he looks like and are actively hunting him with a motivated need to kill him.

Taking out the Vice President in the last chapter of the saga appears to have been the proverbial straw, and that camel's back is shattered and not simply broken, finding Agent 47 alone in the darkened confines of a derelict library in Chicago, Illinois, USA, in which an army of Chicago Police backed by federal agents is now searching for him.

With none of his high-tech equipment available to him, 47 must make use of anything that he can find or steal from the (hopefully) dead bodies of the cops who are hunting him, and as the demo unfolded we watched him use incredible stealth abilities and experienced the new "Intuition" System that, for the first time in the series, allows us to see the world directly through his eyes and play the game AS Agent 47!

The route through the library to its exit via the rooftop is a convoluted and dangerous path that eventually leads to safety, but not before 47 must literally pass through the very heart of the opposing force, moving into and through the building in which they have established their command post before he loses himself in the crowd on the elevated train station platform, nicely setting the stage for the story to come and ramping up our expectations!

Stay tuned to Gaming Update in the weeks following E3 for a detailed Preview and news coverage, as well as in-depth feature coverage on the game that will finally answer some of the deepest mysteries of the series, and define the future of Agent 47 for once and for all! Hitman Absolution is scheduled for release some time in 2012, and as soon as we have more precise details we will share them with you!

Number 01 - - XCOM

This new re-imagining of the classic 90's fantasy-sci-fi series XCOM is truly the surprise of E3, and in spite of our advanced familiarity with the original series, the hand's-off demo for this one caught us completely by surprise, as it turned out to be nothing like what we were expecting and, as you can see by its placement at the literal top of the heap, a very special game indeed! We are not saying that it will be Game of the Year, because the niche that it will appeal to is likely too narrow for that to happen, but it is certainly possible that it will place in the Top Ten, and based upon the amazing demo we saw at E3, it already has our full attention!

The premise for the original series -- and what is being called the series reboot in the form of the game we saw at E3 -- is a hostile extraterrestrial invasion of the earth during which the player is charged with battling and defeating it by a coalition of nations. The original games in the series included:

-- UFO: Enemy Unknown (1994)

-- X-COM: Terror from the Deep (1995)

-- X-COM: Apocalypse (1997)

-- X-COM: Interceptor (1998)

-- X-COM: Enforcer (2001)

The new title -- which is being called simply XCOM -- has the player positioned as the leader of the DoD team of special agents who are charged not simply with battling the enemy, but recovering its tech so that the brains back at Central Command can decipher and make use of it, incorporating it into the tech and weapons that will one day help us win the war, as well as gather intelligence on the enemy, and complete special missions for Central Command like rescuing scientists, recovering specific bits of tech, and learning what the situation is like deep behind enemy lines.

If you are old enough to have played the original games you may be surprised at how the focus and the approach has changed in this newly-imagined adventure, but you certainly will not be disappointed. If you are entirely new to the series and this is your first game, well then you are in luck, because the blokes over at 2K Marin have come up with a most excellent adventure whose game play and game world go far beyond anything that we might have imagined!

The hand's-off demo was presented in a specially-constructed theatre built into the 2K exhibit space that took us back to 1963, and as we sat there surrounding by period technology we were introduced first to the enemy through captured film that was shot by a teenager and later recovered by XCOM Agents, and then to the XCOM Agency itself, which is really a special unit of the Department of Defense that has been entrusted with the responsibility to gather intelligence and technology from the aliens, and deny them the things that they want by taking it away from them.

The reason why XCOM caught us completely by surprise is because 2K kept the lid on the game very tightly, and its unveiling at E3 2011 was its first official reveal to both the media and the public, so we had no way of knowing how special the game was, though we were aware that it was being made...

Gaming Update will be closely following the development and the progress of this title towards its projected launch date of March 6th, 2012, when it will appear on the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and Windows PC, and will keep you informed, so be sure to stay tuned!

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There were so many other games that qualify as part of this genre that it is not funny, and while they could not all make the Top Ten list, nonetheless they are going to be very awesome additions to your gaming rotation in the months to come, and so are worthy of mention here... BloodRayne: Betrayal, Fable: The Journey, Mass Effect 3, Prey 2, and Risen 2, are certainly worthy -- as are many more -- and they all would have been in the list if there were more than ten numbers in a Top Ten List...

You will often see us say that This Year is going to be a Great Year for Gamers -- and every time that we say that we really mean it, so at the risk of saying it too often and rendering it a less potent declaration -- This Year Is Going To Be A Great Year For Gamers! Yeah!