"The future of our industry is inclusion, not exclusion," said Reggie Fils-Aime, Nintendo of America's Executive Vice President of Sales and Marketing, during Nintendo's E3 press conference two weeks ago. I had a bit of a chuckle at that statement, and not because I felt Fils-Aime was being insincere. It's because I believe he's right on the money, but sadly, I don't see a very bright future for his vision.

There's been quite a bit of talk lately, especially at E3 2006, about the need for video games to increase their appeal and reach a broader audience. But that's pretty much all it is - talk. Look at the premiere titles being rolled out for the next generation consoles, and you'll see a striking similarity: epic action titles and first-person shooters worth their weight in bloodshed and bullets. Walking around the L.A. Convention Center, it was clear that for every Brain Age or Spore, there seemed to be five FPSes or action titles that involved severing heads or bludgeoning some type of creature. It's not that there were no original titles out there - there were some, but they were drowned out by the flood of sequels and retreads. They certainly didn't get the big booths at E3; no, those were reserved for gangster games like Saint's Row and Scarface: The World is Yours.

The worst part of all of this is that I'm as big a sucker as the next guy for FPS and action games. Like I'm not going to play Scarface - yeah, right! I nearly climbed up to the top of the Scarface booth at E3 and shouted... well, you know the infamous line. John Woo's Stranglehold? Wild horses couldn't drag me away from that one. I think I've made my feelings about Halo pretty clear in the past - I think it's one of the most overrated games in the history of mankind - but there's no way I'm passing up Halo 3. As for Crysis...well, let's just say that the screenshots, as impressive as they are, don't do that game justice.