It’s E3 week! That special time of year when gamers everywhere have to be glued to their computer just to keep up with all the announcements, press conferences, previews, trailers, etc.

Shockingly, the staff of completionist.com weren’t invited to any of these press conferences, but we’ve still managed (through cunning and stealth… and Google) to pick up a few interesting bits of information.

Highlights:

The Rock Band 2 setlist (all of which are Master Tracks) has been announced. Pinball Wizard and Eye of the Tiger! In other Rock Band news, if you are a zillionaire (or at least have $300), you can get a “Premium” drum kit, instead of using the standard one like some sort of chump.

Um, yes please. There are also rumours the new sets (both standard and premium) will be wireless, but I can’t confirm that 100%. We have people working on it, though.

From the Square Enix corner, Final Fantasy XIII will be coming out on the 360 as well as the PS3. I’m sure this is interesting to somebody somewhere.

Oh, and this just in…. Spore will be awesome. In case you didn’t get that from the last 3 years of E3.

There are of course tons and tons of other announcements, but the one that I really want to talk about comes from Nintendo. They made this announcement just a few hours before the Microsoft press conference. FYI – I love Nintendo. I love them so much that I put up with crap from them that I wouldn’t tolerate from anyone else. I’ve been known to defend obvious and terrible flaws in a Nintendo product, just because I want it to be perfect. On a recent trip to New York City, I skipped out on the Statue of Liberty, but went to Nintendo World twice. That being said, we’ve had our rough patches in the past. There was a fatal flaw in Mario Party 4 that I can’t even speak about because I will fly into an uncontrollable rage and probably break/kill something. My last major issue was with the control in Boom Blox. I love the Wiimote, and recognize that it’s innovative and cool, but sometimes I either don’t want to use it (Super Monkey Ball), or I do want to, but it’s not working as well as I’d like (Boom Blox). So for me, Nintendo’s announcement that they are making an attachment for the Wiimote called the Wii MotionPlus, is exciting.

Essentially, the device attaches to the bottom of the Wiimote, and makes it more accurate.

“The Wii MotionPlus accessory attaches to the end of the Wii Remote and, combined with the accelerometer and the sensor bar, allows for more comprehensive tracking of a player’s arm position and orientation, providing players with an unmatched level of precision and immersion. Every slight movement players make with their wrist or arm is rendered identically in real time on the screen, providing a true 1:1 response in their game play. The Wii MotionPlus accessory reconfirms Nintendo’s commitment to making games intuitive and accessible for everyone.”

This announcement has been receiving mixed reactions. Some people, like me, are happy that soon they will able to play Boom Blox without losing the cursor every few minutes. Some people seem concerned about the rubber cover no longer fitting, but I would imagine the MotionPlus will come with the updated one shown above. The most outrage over this product seems to come from people who believe that Nintendo had the capability to make the Wiimote this accurate to start with, and just chose not to so they could sell us more stuff later on. Personally, I don’t believe that. Not because Nintendo is incapable of making insanely expensive peripherals that shouldn’t be necessary (e-reader anyone?), but because it just doesn’t make sense. If they had this technology in the first place, they could have packaged it in with the original console. I know that their core marketing concept was that the Wii was cheap, but the console is STILL selling like gangbusters, so I doubt an extra $30-$40 on the pricetag would have made a huge difference. My guess is that when the Wii launched, they hadn’t quite perfected the Wiimote technology, and now they have. Simple as that. It’s not like the Wiimote is unusable as is. Millions of people are using it right now. I think Nintendo proved with both the stronger strap, and rubber cover freebees, that they are willing to correct a serious functionality problem out-of-pocket. This is just an upgrade for people who want one, and are willing to pay for it. I am one of those people.

The 1Up report on this seems to suggest that only certain games will utilize the accessory, and that this will divide the market. I can’t find anything in the statement or anywhere else that says only certain games will support this feature. My hope/belief, is that buying one of these will improve the overall performance of your Wiimote with all games. Especially Boom Blox.

Here’s some other exciting news from E3:

• God of War 3 is coming to PS3
• Resistance is coming to PSP
• Wii Sports Resort, a sort of sequel to Wii Sports, will be packed in with the Wii MotionPlus
• Activision announced a Guitar Hero DS sequel even though the first one only came out three weeks ago
• Nintendo announced Wii Music, a music game containing 50 playable instruments
• Nintendo revealed Animal Crossing: City Folk for Wii
• Grand Theft Auto is coming to the DS
• The XBox 360 is getting a new dashboard including Mii-like avatars
• Rock Band 2 will have ‘Float On’ by Modest Mouse, ‘E-Pro’ by Beck, and ‘Teenage Riot’ by Sonic Youth!!!