Click here to read this week\'s twoplayer comic.For GamesFirst, E3 is more than just about games. Our writers are spread out across the country, with a core group in Idaho, a core group in New York, and a number of satellite writers that make due all by themselves in different parts of the world (including China). In many ways, that\'s really nice; keeps us flexible. On the other hand, it means we don\'t necessarily see the people we work with face-to-face on a daily basis. E3 is a time of gathering, where we all get together and hang out for a while. Shawn, our editor-in-chief, is a pretty huge fan of Sony\'s new PSP. I am too, but I also am a fairly big fan of the Nintendo DS, which Shawn has some pretty significant reservations about. He\'s bringing his PSP, and I\'m bringing my DS. We\'re going to set them side by side and see if they can make friends. When I was a child, my brother and I would get those little firework tanks during the 4th of July and line them up nose-to-nose before lighting them. After the little firecrackers inside had gone off and the smoke had cleared, we found out who had survived. Then we blew up the survivor with an M60. When Shawn\'s PSP meets my DS, we\'re expecting a similar sort of confrontation, except we probably won\'t be blowing up the winner with an M60? most likely. We won\'t be blowing up my DS, at least, that\'s for sure.
And speaking of E3 - it\'s almost here. Well, technically, it\'s already started. Sony has their press conference today a little following noon, about 45 minutes before I arrive at the airport in L.A. Grrr. Their \"me first\" shoving match with Microsoft scheduled me out of the conference. Every year, the E3 people send out a press release that details what you can expect to find at E3, counting up the number of banners, the amount of this, the amount of that; everything that sounds impressive makes it into the count. For the fun of it, I thought I\'d share some of it with you.
Apparently this years E3 will sport 1.7 million pounds of equipment hanging above our heads as we walk the show floor. They\'re quick to point out that it is the equivalent of 250 elephants, which only helps to make me more nervous. I wouldn\'t be thrilled about the prospect of walking underneath 250 elephants for three days, either. Chances are, one would eventually fall on you or crap on you, and both could be lethal.
There\'s going to be more than 5,700 monitors, screens and plasmas displays on the show floor.
In order to provide power and information to all those exhibits, the E3 people have blanketed the floor with over 20,000 feet of power cable and more than 200 miles of high-speed data cabling and fiber optic cabling. That means that if you choose a cable at random on the floor and start gnawing on it, you\'ve got a roughly 2% chance of being electrocuted, and a 98% chance of having a Microsoft MTV infomercial beamed into your forehead. Chew at your own risk.
There will be more than 110,000 square feet -- 2.5 acres -- of vinyl Banners at E3 2005. Two banners hanging outside of the LACC weigh 600 pounds each, as if the 250 elephants over our heads weren\'t enough.
Enough crate wood will be used during exhibitor moves to frame a 15-story building, requiring more than 87 forklifts to transport.
The show floor will cover more than 540,000 net square feet, the equivalent of 2,700 city blocks.
E3Expo 2005 will host more than 400 exhibitors from 90 countries.
E3Expo 2005 will debut more than 1,000 never-before-seen products, and will showcase more than 5,000 products in all.
That\'s it for now. I haven\'t even got there and I\'m already exhausted. We\'ll keep you posted as new stories happen, and be sure to check out our E3 moblog.