World in Conflict, the PC based Cold War conflict RTS is grinding its gears to make its first big debut on consoles. The developers are billing this tale of the Soviets invading Germany not as an expansion but more of an "enhancement" to the original. The game is essentially the same as the PC version with some key differences such as this time rather than being from the Soviets perspective, we get the US perspective. That makes up the majority of the story changes and other changes have been implemented in the controls and menu system.

RTSs are traditionally menu deep affairs much more suited to the many keys of a PC rather than the limited buttons of a game controller. From what I could see, the developers (Massive and Swordfish Manchester) seem to have done an admirable job in making the switch from PC to consoles and have completely reworked the control and menu system to suit console specific controllers. FPS like camera controls allow you to navigate quickly and easily and a tracking reticle makes it easy to pinpoint that specific enemy. A new, simpler menu interface adds to the ease by making it unnecessary to dig through layers of menus to find the one you want. You can also take to your Global War Room to compare your victories and battles with fellow players from around the world.

Whether or not World in Conflict will successfully make the jump from PC to consoles (where many others have failed) remains to be seen and I will let RTS aficionados be the ones to make the final judgment. My personal experience with such games is admittedly rather limited, but I do wonder how the depth of a PC menu system can be truly duplicated in a console version. It seems a herculean task but if they can pull it off it could mean more successful console RTSs in the future. Look for World in Conflict to made available for your PS3 and 360 later this year.

The Ghostbusters game is still early in it's development so we didn't get to see a whole lot of it at Sierra's Spring Event but what we did see was mighty impressive. First we were shown a little sample of what the Infernal Engine is capable of. The setting was the New York Public Library reading room which should be familiar to any Ghostbusters fan. The fully rendered backgrounds were gorgeous and we watched as a thousand boxes were moved about the room simultaneously, objects were sliced using the Proton Pack and slime tethers were used to link objects together and hang them from the ceiling. The whole time this demonstration was happening, more and more objects were being dropped into the environment to show exactly how much this hearty engine could handle. More boxes, people and even cars fell from the ceiling, filling the room with thousands of objects without a hiccup in the frame rate or a slowing down of the action. At one point a monster was created using hundreds of books that came flying of the library shelves only to be taken down, book by book by the power of the Proton Pack.

Soon we moved to an outside street scene where we observed some of the amazing crowd technology that will be employed in the game, particularly in a Thanksgiving Day parade that we unfortunately didn't get to see previewed. I will say though that the crowd technology in Ghostbusters is the best I have ever seen. With a camera perched high above an intersection, we were able to see fifteen hundred people at once, all moving with their own individual AI, moving aside if they bumped into each other and never passing through or getting stuck all jittery in a corner. We came down to ground level and were shown some crowd reactions which were also impressive. Some ran screaming into the night while others gave you a wide berth to do your ghostbusting and yet even others stayed around to watch.