E3 Report

Publishers unveil the best and brightest new video and
computer games at the world's biggest arcade
By Marc Shapiro

"SO MANY GAMES! SO LITTLE TIME!"
That cry was often heard during the Elec-
tronics Entertainment Expo at the Los Ange-
les Convention Center this past May. On hand
for this combination of a three-ring circus and
Dante's Inferno were more than 400 com-
panies displaying more than 1,700 new titles.

Round any corner and there were games
to play. Turn around and you were likely to
see pop culture types as diverse as former
pro football player Terry Bradshaw, leg-
endary Marvel honcho Stan Lee and older-
than-dirt shock rocker Alice Cooper touting
software with which they were involved.

Companies like Nintendo, Sega, PlaySta-
tion, Acclaim and others put on a big visual
feast, presenting larger-than-life booths,
banks of games, and more lights, cameras
and action than you could shake a joystick
at. Needless to say, when the dust settles
you'll find tons of science fiction, fantasy
and action games to pine for.

Sony PlayStation

Real-time flight simulation and Klingon and
Romulan adversaries highlight Star Trek:
Starfleet Academy, in which you pilot the
U.S.S. Enterprise through various missions
en route to graduation. Featuring appear-
ances by original "Star Trek" characters Kirk,
Chekov and Sulu, this game is available in
late '96 from Interplay (price to be
announced). Also available for Windows 95.

A hot war breaks out on a cold planet in

Fox Interactive's Aliens vs.
Predator. You can play an Alien,
Predator or Colonial Marine.
It's a thrills and chills romp
complete with 3-D graphics,
bone-chilling sound and buck-
ets o' blood. Available in early
1997 for PlayStation, Sega
Saturn and Windows 95 (cost
to be determined).