(12:30PM ET) E3 2014 kicks off with Xbox, today's first major presentation!

Welcome to E3 coverage here on ZAM!

Today’s first media briefing (1 of 4) is from Xbox for 1.5 hours. We’ll be covering every detail, constantly keeping this page up-to-date. Keep a close eye and keep refreshing!

When: 12:30PM-2:00PM Eastern / 9:30AM-11:00AM Pacific — Watch on Twitch.tv!
All Events: Xbox, EA, Ubisoft, Playstation, Nintendo

 Times below are in Eastern Time.

12:28 - Nothing yet!

12:30 - A thundering hype montage appears, music blares. Phil Spencer, Head of Xbox, walks out on-stage to give his introduction.

12:34 - "Today, we're dedicating our entire briefing to games!"

12:35 - Starting off with Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare. First person cinematics. Visuals are solid, lots of glowing lights. Drama suitable to the CoD franchise.
12:37 - Drone swarms, jetpacks, particle effects, oh my!
12:39 - Player rips off a car door to shield himself from the drone swarm. Sweet! Game looks very interesting, even for gamers not typically interested in CoD games.
12:42 - Visuals continue to impress. Great cinematic gameplay demo!
12:43 - Dramatic post-demo trailer. Ooh, a hoverbike! "Power Changes Everything" 

12:44 - Dan Greenawalt comes out to discuss Forza Motorsport 5. Nürburgring, famous racing track, captured at "millimeter accuracy" and being given out for free.
12:46 - Ralph Fulton comes out to discuss Forza Horizon 2. Day/Night cycle, dynamic weather, 1080p. Can create a racing club of up to 1,000 members. RELEASE DATE: September 30th.
12:47 - A trailer blares, music kicks in. The cars look great. No gameplay, but some hype-inducing cinematics.

12:49 - EVOLVE trailer immediately starts. Cthulu-esque monster thrashes around with glowing blue eyes. Brief shots of gameplay look expectedly-dramatic. "#4v1"
 

12:51 - Assassin's Creed: Unity time! 18th century Paris, French Revolution. First time you form your own brotherhood, with up to three friends on Xbox Live.
12:52 - Live gameplay demo! Some nice movement mechanics. Can confirm: looks like Assassin's Creed. Demo seems to show off the multiplayer aspects, with two assassins co-ordinating their effots.
12:54 - Three other assassins involved in the mission. Definitely meant to show off the multiplayer aspect. Plus side: 18th century Paris seems well-captured. Good amount of detail in the setting.
12:56 - The decapitated head part was a little much. 

12:57 - Lots of people chatting about their first games. No discernible reason.

12:58 - Here's Dragon Age: Inquisition. Cinematic trailer with narration. "Chaos has left its mark upon me. I am hunted for the power I wield." Solid trailer, but not much gameplay. RELEASE DATE: October 7th.

1:00 - Overly-serious trailer turns into silly Sunset Overdrive trailer! Character talks to the camera. Lore: "Contaminated energy drink has turned everyone into mutants." Character breaks the fourth wall. Pretty entertaining, actually!
1:03 - Gameplay demo, the shenanigans begin. Player skates around on pretty much anything, bouncing and keeping flow. Comic-style lettering pops up sometimes. Borderlands-style NPC introductions.
1:05 - Chaos Squad 8-person multiplayer.

1:06 - Crazy Dead Rising 3 Arcade trailer-thing. I don't really know what I just watched. What. Oh, it's for Dead Rising 3 DLC! I still don't know what happened.

1:08 - Disney Fantasia: Music Evolved from the makers of Dance Central. Dance Central: Spotlight, digital-only game only on Xbox One.
 

1:09 - Get ready, it's Fable: Legends! Introduces some various characters. Game looks pretty good. Demo shows off some co-op/multiplayer gameplay.
1:12 - Instead of being a hero, you can be a villain and play against other players? This...isn't a typical Fable game.

1:15 - Another quick break, this time where people chat about "hybrid games."

1:16 - Sneaky Project Spark trailer. Looks exactly like we'd want it to look. Shows some of its game-building versatility; shows lots of versatility, actually. Tough to know where something like this will lead.
1:17 - OH SNAP, CONKER ALL UP IN THIS. That was unexpected.

1:18 - Beautiful trailer with a nice art style. NEW TITLE: Ori and the Blind Forest. 

1:20 - Halo music! Halo trailer. Can't contain hype. Looks incredible.
1:22 - Halo 5: Guardians. "Deeply personal journey," for Master Chief; "questions authority."
1:23 - November 11th, 2014: "Play entire Master Chief saga on single console, the Xbox One, with Halo: The Master Chief Collection."
1:25 - Halo 2 is getting the "full anniversary treatment." This is major.
1:26 - "Will contain the original Halo 2 multiplayer, EXACTLY as it shipped 10 years ago."
1:27 - Gameplay demo. It's exactly what you'd want it to be.
1:28 - 1080p, 60fps. Dedicated servers Reemphasized their original engines. Uh, wow.
1:29 - Halo: Nightfall TV series in-production.
1:30 - Great trailer for Halo 5: Guardians Beta, coming this fall.

1:31 - Phil Spencer comes out to cover an assortment of 2015 games.

1:32 - Dark, stylized platformer. Game title: INSIDE. Quite intriguing.

1:33 - Chris Charla talks about ID@Xbox. We've reached the indie portion!

1:34 - Indie mashup trailer! Featured a ton of games: Aztez, Knight Squad, Plague Inc. Evolved, White Night, Earthlock, Cuphead, Hyper Light Drifter, Lifeless Planet, Slash Dash, FRU, Lovers in a Dangerous Spacetime, Mighty No. 9, GraVe, THREES, FenixRage, Woolfe, #IDARB, Hellraid, Below

1:36 - Game trailer, unknown title. Main character in therapy. Therapist's comments juxtaposted against ironic cinematics. Oh, it's the next Lara Croft title! Rise of the Tomb Raider. Nice trailer overall.

1:38 - The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt live gameplay demo. You can visit any viewable portion of the landscape, that's always great. Game looks good, seems to play well. Polished

1:43 - Discussion about rebooting franchises, followed by a mysterious trailer. NEW TITLE: Phantom Dust. "The Battle For Reality Begins." Little detail, but interesting.

1:47 - Here we go with Tom Clancy's The Division! 'Live' gameplay demo. An upbeat holiday song starts the demo off. Quickly fades as we see more of the ruined streets below.
1:48 - Like last time we saw the game, the map (and overall visuals) look tremendous. Some kind of "look into the past" orange-dot visual effect, neat. The demo itself seems quite scripted and "narrated" by fellow players.
1:49 - The voice waveform about players' heads is a very nice detail. Game has a good feel, but not sure it's a typical gameplay experience (with co-ordinated vocal friends).
 

1:53 - Hideki Kamiya introduced to present a new title. A trailer kicks in, no name yet.
1:54 - Guy vs. scaly things. Lots of 'em. Good cinematic visuals. NEW TITLE: Scalebound. as
 

1:55 - "Reimagined open-world gaming experience." Trailer pops up. Announcer's voice immediately reveals that it's Crackdown! Visuals are glowing. Cinematic trailer only, but it's a good watch with some crazy, open-jaw "lolwhat" moments.
 

1:58 - Phil Spencer wraps up the event, with one final mash-up trailer. Looks like this year really was about games! A very solid showing from Xbox this year. Lots of games didn't show up, but plenty of 'em did. Thanks for joining us!

[END]

Colt "ShdwFlm" Casey
Deputy Editor