“I had many golden moments at E3, but none so golden as running in to Peter Molyneux in the Valve meeting room. He enthusiastically greeted me and invited me to come up and check out Milo, Lionhead’s application developed for Microsoft’s Project Natal controller. As you doubtless know by now, Project Natal is Microsoft’s entry into the motion controller scene. The catch being that there actually is no physical controller and through the use of cameras, the player himself/herself becomes the controller.

Milo is an ingenious use of Project Natal, utilizing the voice and face recognition features of the device as well as the motion control. Upon entering the room, Molyneux talked a little bit about the project and then allowed me to give it a try. I stood in front of the screen and saw a serene Fable like environment with a young boy (Milo) swinging on a swing. As I moved towards the screen, the scene in turn moved closer. As I backed up, the scene moved further away leaning forward and to the side, I was able to look at the peripheral views of the scene. Kneeling down afforded me a look up in to the tree. Pretty impressive so far.

The next thing I knew, Milo realized I was there and hopped off his swing to come and greet me. He recognized that I was wearing black and nodded with empathy when I described how my day was. I could see the word recognition coming in to play: when I said the words good or happy, Milo would smile and nod. Eventually he tossed me a pair of goggles which I "put on." This basically consisted of me circling my eyes with my fingers to simulate goggles. Once they were on, I was able to jump in the nearby water and do a little splashing around. The water was very responsive to my movements and was definitely an amazing display.

At this point, another journalist insisted that he get an on camera interview with Peter, thus ending my time with Milo. However, I left with the feeling that I had just witnessed something miraculous. I am well aware that there were some "tricks" and scripted moments employed in the demo I saw, but for software this early on in the process it’s understandable. It did give me an idea what the years ahead will hold for video games and I will admit that it was in turns fascinating and just a little creepy, If Molyneux and Microsoft can pull this off, we will all be looking at the future of gaming. A future where we will no longer be tethered to a controller and our in game companions will be as real as our family and friends.”

Of course, the pedo potential for this is HUGE. Everyone can have their own virtual boy and of course, the internet is already swarming with ‘Milo, take down your pants’, ‘I’d masturbate with him’ and ‘I’d show him my penis’. -- Kahran

Another valid aspect was mentioned by cosmicbus: Peter Molyneux love to talk about huge things but every so often the actual game turns out to contain only half of his ideas ‘cause the rest was just to ambitious for the reality of tech today. Some people have even suggested that the demo in the video above was manipulated by someone controlling the boy. However, it will defiantly take a while until we will be able to interact in such a way with an AI but at least we have something to look forward to.

Why is the issue of sexual orientation so explosive that the very act of saying the word "gay" or "lesbian" is sometimes against the rules? Bioware found itself on the wrong end of this controversy when a community manager gracelessly began locking threads that discussed the issue, and then claimed that there simply were no gay or lesbian characters in Star Wars. Maybe those words don’t exist in galaxies far, far, away, but the characters often do: Bioware themselves created a game with a character who laid down with another woman as with a man. Sony was a part of a similar controversy after the words "gay" and "Jew" were edited out of Home, the company’s social online service for PS3 owners. And Microsoft made headlines when the company banned a player who self-identified as a lesbian, claiming any notice of sexual orientation was against the terms of service.

In some ways it’s unfair to take the world of gaming to task for its immature handling of gay and lesbian issues. After all, it’s hard to find a game that takes any kind of relationship seriously. This is an art form that knows how to show two people killing each other nearly perfectly, but seems to turn into a bunch of fifth-graders when dealing with a kiss, much less when that kiss is between two men or two women. It’s clear that something has to give, although companies only seem to pay attention after receiving the wrong kind of attention for their policies.

Read on…

The World Ends with You, released in Japan as It’s a Wonderful World (すばらしきこのせかい), is an action role-playing game developed by  the team behind Kingdom Hearts for the Nintendo DS handheld. Set in the modern-day Shibuya shopping district of Tokyo, Japan, The World Ends with You features a distinctive art style inspired by the aesthetics of Shibuya and its youth culture.

The story begins with the main playable character, Neku Sakuraba, finding himself an unwilling participant in a mysterious game. Neku, with an eclectic group of allies, must complete assigned missions within a seven-day time limit, or be erased from existence. The battle system uses several features of the Nintendo DS, including combat that takes place on both screens, and attacks performed by certain motions on the touchscreen, or by shouting into the microphone. Elements of the Japanese youth culture, including fashion, food and cell phones, also form key aspects of gameplay.

Even more interesting than the game is the fanart ;) In this case made by CrystalDragon.