Author's Note:  This is meant as a reference for people who might want to see some quick info about these games, rather than reading through a dedicated article on each game announced or shown.  I wacthed this conference live online; I was not there.

Here is brief rundown of the game-related stuff from Microsoft's press conference. 

Halo 4

This started as a live action trailer showing the launch of a new UNSC ship, the Infinity. It is a giant warship, home to over 10,000 people, and is the first ship in a generation built for exploration rather than outright war. In what (may be) its maiden voyage, the ship comes under attack from an unknown enemy that somehow transports the ship to the planet Master Chief is on. The ship crashes some 80 kilometers from him and he tries to head for it.

He fights what look like normal Covenant Grunts, but then a group of robotic, AI-controlled enemies attack. One of them drops a weapon that Cortana says is of Forerunner design. The gameplay and environments look great. It ends with Cortana's voiceover: "I entered service 8 years ago. AIs deteriorate after seven." It then shows her going a little crazy and yelling that none of them will make it off the planet.

Splinter Cell: Blacklist

Sam Fisher is back. This time a group of Middle Eastern countries have formed a blacklist of nations that have troops in their region. Takes place on the Iran/Iraq border (not sure if that is whole game or just the mission shown). They say that unless the troops are removed they will take the war to America (and presumably others). Sam is shown in gameplay. The stealth looks good and the action and movement look very fluid. Sam looks a bit younger than he did in the last game. The game will feature Kinect support. In the demo, the guy playing yelled "Hey, you!" to get a guard to come over to him. He then pulled the guard over the edge of the building. Ships Spring 2013.

Forza: Horizons

This was just a pre-rendered trailer. The cars looked amazing. They said this is open-world. It looks like some of the roads are really long and not necessarily just closed tracks. They also showed nighttime driving (no word if some areas are always in nighttime or if it's an option in the menu) and driving through a city. There really isn't much to go on here.

EA Sports

Joe Montana came on stage to demo Kinect voice commands for Madden. Looks like you can start the play by calling hike, though there was about a one second delay between calling it and the game responding. FIFA has more robust voice commands it seems, allowing you to call passes and tell a teammate when to make a shot. Madden may have similar stuff, I didn't catch all of it.

Bing movie searches, etc.

¡Ahora puedes hablar con tu Xbox en español!

Fable: The Journey

New trailer with a voice over about evil or something. No gameplay, just a cinematic trailer that wasn't even very cinematic. The guy on stage called it a "bold new direction" for Fable. Release date for holiday 2012.

Gears of War: Judgment

The trailer didn't show much. Someone was being arrested I think, and it looks like a fight is happening, but you can't even see the enemies. No real data on story or gameplay here. Release date in 2013.

The Wreckateer

Think Angry Birds for Kinect. You launch a giant ballista at castles. Moving your arms in different ways changes what the shot does (adding spin, splitting into multiple shots, one lets you hold your arms out and actually "fly" the shot in. Summer of 2012.

South Park: The Stick of Truth

Matt Stone and Trey Parker came on stage to talk a little about this, and they totally made fun of the conference. The trailer looks just like an episode, you play the new kid, who is the promised "savior" of South Park. The trailer has epic music and sounds and looks so dramatic. Jesus is definitely shown in the trailer, too! They said this is the first time they've ever had to actually map out the city. Not much new info here. They said they had to get back to making it and left. No release date.

Dance Central 3

It sounds like they're teaming up with celebrities to put their own dances in the game. Usher came on stage and performed a song, and for most of it they didn't even show footage from the Kinect while he was doing it.  This is not how you should advertise your new game, Harmonix.

Call of Duty: Black Ops 2

The conference nded with a trailer (cinematic and gameplay) of this. The guy on stage said the franchise "has made its home" on the 360, and the 360 will be getting the DLC first. Looks like a Call of Duty game.

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Obviously it's too early to decalre a "winner" for E3, but Microsoft started out strong With Halo and Splinter Cell, and swiftly did away with that strong start by focusing on things that had nothing to do with video games.  The middle of the conference was about nothing other than using Kinect to search for movies, Bing, ESPN, and other non-related things.  If the conference had been only about games, it would have taken half the time.