E3 Monday: What We Didn't See

Today's E3 press conferences from Microsoft, EA, and Ubisoft yielded plenty of interesting points, to be sure, but there were also things at each of them that I expected to hear--and didn't.

Metal Gear Solid 4 Port: As predicted, the Metal Gear franchise came to the Xbox 360--in the form of MGS: Rising, starring everyone's favorite cyborg ninja Raiden. But where was the straight port of MGS4 everyone assumed was waiting in the wings? It seemed like a no-brainer cash-in for Konami. Perhaps there's news yet to come at E3 on this one.

2K Boston's Next: We were fairly sure we'd see some sign of the next game from Irrational--excuse me, 2K Boston--at E3, and we figured Microsoft's press conference made the most sense as the place to debut it. But if Ken Levine is planning to present at E3 this year, he didn't do it at the Xbox briefing.

EA's Partners: EA's outreach-focused Partners program has business deals with a stunning array of influential independent developers--Valve, id Software, Epic Games, and Grasshopper Manufacture--and we heard nothing from any of them today. Where were further updates on Left 4 Dead 2, Rage, and the new and as-yet untitled games from People Can Fly and Suda 51? BioWare ruled the EA press conference today, but I expected more from some of these other heavyweights.

Beyond Good & Evil 2: This out-of-left-field sequel could have appeared today, after a supposed proof-of-concept video hit the 'net a few weeks ago. But no sign of the game showed itself. Ubisoft has never really taken ownership of this next game from Michel Ancel and crew, so it's not too surprising we didn't see it.

Assassin's Creed 2: After waiting through a two-hour press conference, including in-depth presentations on Ubi's new fitness games and its tween lineup for DS and Wii (shudder), we were finally graced with... a CG-only trailer that looked cool but gave no hint at all as to the gameplay of this hotly anticipated sequel from Ubi Montreal. Let's hope we see more of the game on the E3 show floor. We'll be speaking with director Patrice Desilets later in the week, so you can at least look forward to that.

Anything you hoped to see come out of today that didn't materialize?