Sony at E3 2012: ‘Beyond Two Souls,’ Call of Duty on Vita, and PlayStation comes to HTC

Back in March, we had our first glimpse at Heavy Rain developer Quantic Dream’s new “performance capture” technology — one that, unlike many current methods, lets you capture facial, voice, and body animations simultaneously. “Kara,” as the tech demo was called, was an impressive and emotionally-engaging leap forward from Heavy Rain. But it wasn’t until this week at E3 that we saw the fruits of this technological labor in Beyond: Two Souls, the next full Quantic Dream game for PlayStation 3 starring a stunningly lifelike representation of Ellen Page. And the results are impressive.

Speaking at a presentation of Beyond: Two Souls in action, QD founder David Cage explained how Page became involved in the game — before even she knew it. “When I started writing the script,” he said, “usually what I’m doing is I get a picture of existing actors without necessarily having them in mind to have them in the game. It’s just to help me having a face to look at their eyes and say, “I know how he’s going to react in that situation.” It helps me. And the first pictures I got for Beyond were of Ellen Page.”

Yesterday at E3 Sony announced a partnership to bring PlayStation Mobile — previously known as PlayStation Suite — to HTC’s phones. While no specific devices were mentioned at the event, the HTC One X on stage gave us an decent idea of what to expect. Sony has since revealed that HTC’s One series will be the first third-party products to don the PlayStation Certified moniker, specifically, the HTC One X, One S, and One V.

Sony wasted no time showing off its new relationship with HTC. We spotted the HTC One X, One S, and One V running what’s purported to be PlayStation Mobile (née PlayStation Suite) behind glass at Sony’s E3 booth. Unfortunately we couldn’t play with the units, and the screens shown were more proof of concept with some minor idle animations and menus. The appearance of HTC’s One series is more symbolic than anything — all three of the well-received devices were presented on the foreground with the Sony products (Xperia S, Vita, Tablet S, and Tablet P) behind them. Notably absent? The Xperia Play — not that we’re surprised at this point.

A day after Sony announced a number of new titles for PlayStation Plus, the company released a complete list of games for its new “instant game collection.” For $5 per month, you get free download access to a list of at least 10 games. The US list includes big names like inFamous 2 and LittleBigPlanet 2, as well as Virtua Fighter 5: Final Showdown, Ratchet and Clank: All 4 One, Just Cause 2, Saint’s Row 2, Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light, Hard Corp: Uprising, Choplifter HD, Zombie Apocalypse Never Die Alone, and Sideway NY.

As for the EU, Motorstorm Apocalypse is available alongside inFamous 2 and LittleBigPlanet 2, and the following games will be replaced with new titles periodically: Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine and Chime Super Deluxe are available until July 18th, Darksiders and Renegade Ops are available until August 15th, and Outland and Oddword: Stranger’s Wrath HD are available until September 12th. The PlayStation Plus game of the month — which will change, well, every month — is Virtua Fighter 5: Final Showdown. Sony also announced “PlayStation Plus Presents,” which will offer indie game titles for free for 8 weeks after launch, beginning with the release of Retro/Grade “later this summer.”

One more little tidbit from Sony at E3 is the PlayStation Move Racing Wheel; a new add-on driving peripheral that uses the Move controller’s motion tracking, which should give you more precise control than Nintendo’s Wii Wheel. The controller’s folding arms (image below) give you the choice of a steering wheel or handlebar-type controls, and the device even builds in race car paddle shifters and a motorcycle twist throttle, making it one of the most versatile driving controllers we’ve seen. The Move Racing wheel is launching for $39.99 this fall, likely around the same time as Little Big Planet Karting.

At Sony’s E3 press conference this evening, Naughty Dog unveiled a new gameplay trailer for The Last of Us.

The trailer follows protagonists Joel and Ellie through an abandoned hotel buried in overgrown weeds and a flooded first floor. Joel leads the way with Ellie on his heels, chattering idly to fill the silence. As they climb to the next floor and round a corner, Joel spies someone rifling through the doors of battered dresser. Within seconds Joel has choked the stranger and pockets the goods for himself.

Sony has just announced it will be partnering with HTC to create PlayStation Suite-certified phones — a program it is renaming PlayStation Mobile. While no specific phones were mentioned, the new HTC One X was held up as an example of the collaboration, as well as being featured in a slide promoting the partnership. PlayStation Suite was announced last year, and the developer program went into open beta this past April. The focus up until this point, however, had been on Sony Ericsson — now Sony Mobile — devices. The move to third-party partnerships, particularly with a manufacturer of HTC’s stature, changes the program’s potential drastically, and could open up a significant new venue for PlayStation Mobile gaming. We’ll be visiting Sony during E3 to see what devices they’re showing off in connection with the program — and to see if we can try our hand at some PlayStation gaming on a One X.

Sony and Ubisoft just took the wraps off Assassin’s Creed III: Liberation, the first game from the franchise built from the ground-up for the PS Vita. The game will feature the first playable female assassin in the series’ history, as well as some sharable goods across the PS3 and Vita. The game will launch on October 30th of this year, and will be made available as a special bundle featuring a brand-new “crystal white” PS Vita, plus a 4GB SD card and the new game. We already knew the white Vita was coming to Japan, but its nice to see it make its way to the US as well.

Developing... Check out all the news as it happens in our Sony E3 2012 live blog!

Sony has just announced that Hulu Plus and Crackle apps will be available on the PS Vita “soon.” Both streaming video services are US-only, and have been available on the Playstation 3 for some time. Sony has been pushing apps on the Vita — Twitter, Facebook, and Foursquare all have a presence on the potent portable since launch or shortly thereafter. The two video streaming apps will join the recently-announced YouTube app for PS Vita, which will launch later this month. Hulu Plus and Crackle both appeared onscreen alongside mainstays like the MLB.TV, Amazon Instant Video, Vudu, Sony Music Unlimited, and a curious ESPN logo. We’re not going to assume quite yet that means that Watch ESPN or any of these other services are coming to the console, as Jack Tretton said “we’re bringing many of these services to Vita,” but we’ll be keeping an eye out.