This was a pretty cool way to spend an afternoon. Not only did I get to meet some really cool Microsoft people, I was also able to check out a bunch of upcoming X-Box releases like Knights of the Old Republic II, Star Wars Battlefront, Fable (which looks awesome), ESPN NHL Hockey 2K5, and other stuff from Electronic Arts, Ubisoft, THQ, Activision, Tecmo, LucasArts, ESPN Videogames, Buena Vista Interactive and Microsoft Game Studios.Halo 2 was there, and it looked amazing. The new weapons and destructible vehicles are awesome, and the Ghost at least has a new “turbo” mode which lets you boost away from enemies and enemy fire.

I only got to play a few minutes of Battlefront, but it was pretty cool. The level that was available was a Clone Trooper level, which was kind of neat. I’m sure it will be amazing when you have the ability to play the full game.

What really impressed me however was Fable. I’ve heard loads of good things about it, and since it’s made by Big Blue Box and Uuber AI genius Peter Molyneux (who created one of the coolest games of all time Black and White). I knew it would be good. What surprised me was how easy it was to just pick up and play. Within two minutes I was intuitively doing stuff with the character. This is going to be an amazing character based game, where everything you do will have repercussions on how you are treated, and how your character looks.

It was a load of fun, and the swag was pretty cool too. Just getting to see Halo (which comes out in November) was worth it for me, but seeing other stuff which I’m looking forward to makes me even more excited.