Today was the first actual day of TGS activities. We knew that we needed to cover as much as possible in the first two days. Days three and four are open to the public so it will be a lot harder to get to the front of the lines and actually see things. Here is the report of our first, hectic, frantic, wonderful day.

I woke up this morning at 7:00am after going to bed only a few hours before. In my half-awake daze I stumbled into the bathroom and saw this written on a cup:

As I said I was still half-asleep so I had to think about this for a minute. Does “disinfected” mean it is safe to drink from or is it a warning? I asked SeanOrange (who I was sharing the room with), “Hey, is disinfected good?”. He answered, “I think it’s better than infected.” Made sense to me.

After a quick breakfast of non-infected water and a stick of chewing gum we got on the train to the convention center. It was less than half an hour away and as we pulled into the station we could spot many people with backpacks and cameras. We were in the right place.

After registration we waked to the main conference room to see Kaz Hirai’s Keynote. We went with a bit of trepidation since Ken Kutaragi’s presentation last year was incredibly boring and we knew that the show floor would be mostly empty during this hour. Still, we decided to go, but had Pictochat ready just in case.

The presentation was not at all like Kutaragi’s. It wasn’t about vague concepts and smug smiles from a confident electronics leader. It was a speech that seemed to be made to reassures nervous third parties and investors that Sony was still on the right track. That the brand was still moving forward. It made no mention of the competition and stressed that high tech hardware was the real future of gaming. Some of the press was nodding their heads along with his bullet points, but others seemed to have a look of disbelief. Kaz knows this is a very important year for the Playstation 3 and I for one am excited to see what the year holds.

After the keynote we headed down to the show floor. The first booth we passed was Konami. As I looked at the booth a man holding a tote bag asked me “Would you like to do yoga? If you do yoga you get a towel!” How could I say no to that? I walked myself up to a yoga mat next to a few other people and waited for the short demo to start. However this was no ordinary demo, all of a sudden the lights came up and music started playing. I realized I was actually right in front of a stage and I would be demonstrating the game to about a hundred people with cameras that were setting up behind me. It was too late to get away now.

Three women cam on stage to demonstrate the game “Dokodemo Yoga DS” by teaching us volunteers to stretch in various humiliating ways. As I moved into a position that had my butt straight up in the air and I saw the flashbulbs going off all around me from who knows what world press I though to myself “Everyone has a price”. Everyone has a price at which they will sell their dignity. For me that price was a tote bag and a free towel. Luckily SeanOrange was having some problems getting his press photo pass at the time and didn’t document this moment of shame.

Despite the embarrassment of the stage demo I went to talk to one of the ladies afterwards. She showed me the software and how you are to emulate the Yoga motions of a cell shaded on-screen character. There were even exercises made to be done while sitting in a chair at work. The title “Dokodemo Yoga” means “Yoga Anywhere” My main question was how you could do the exercises and keep track of the movements you needed to do by looking at the relatively small screen of the DS. Rather than just answer my question she actually demonstrated how she uses the software. I asked about neck strain but she said it was no problem. I was hesitant about a Yoga DS “game” when I first heard about it, but after seeing it in motion, I think it is really something, with the right marketing, that could become very popular.

After this game I did a run around the show floor making note of what games I wanted to try and trying a few like No More Heroes. Some of the games I (and Jools) played will have impressions up soon.

It was now time to head over to the SNK booth, which is traditionally one of my favorite booths at the show. I had about an hour to play some of the new SNK games like Metal Slug 7 and King Of Fighters: Maximum Impact 2 RA. I wanted to get in some good KOF time because the next item on my schedule was an interview with the games lead artist Falcoon. That interview will be posted on 4cr soon. Needless to say, it was a good experience.

After a bit more walking around the show closed down for the day and we realized that we had actually forgotten to eat dinner and were starving. We went to an Indian restaurant near the station and refueled. There was talk of karaoke but it was quickly dismissed in favor of getting back to the hotel and getting some of this information typed up and posted.

With another full day of TGS ahead of me, I am now off to bed where I will dream of all the great games I will be playing and reporting on tomorrow. Until then, goodnight.