E3 2008: Penny Arcade’s Summary of the Three Press Briefings

If you’ve been holding out on watching the Microsoft, Nintendo and Sony press briefings from earlier this week, Penny Arcade has cooked up a comic strip today that summarizes them up very nicely.

As for the backstory, check out Tycho’s blog post for today. The gist for Sony’s panel goes like this:

There is nothing I hate more than a foregone conclusion. Beneath every vicious (that is to say, factual) statement I have ever made regarding the company, there has existed the indubitable truth of their ultimate victory. This certainty extends, yea, even unto the company itself, which is why they have done so little to earn your love. The rumble-free controller with built-in batteries, the one that turns off while you’re updating your console every other week, that one that inexplicably loses signal from time to time but everyone is too chivalrous to discuss it, the one that is now obsolete because two years ago they tried to save money on something they knew they would have to pay anyway – this “six axis” is the icon of a system coasting on global brand inertia. Announcing features that your competitors have had for coming up on two years does not a riveting presentation make. Exclusive PSN content (like a movie length Ratchet and Clank game, or thatgamecompany’s Flower) are still the company’s most compelling asset.

Hilarious and bound to piss off fanboys. Gotta love something that has those two traits.