Sony‘s media lounge is replete with Red Bull, which is a damn good thing because I’m roughly two-thirds of the way through a daylong marathon of meetings and I’m operating on just five hours of sleep (which anyone who knows me will tell you is about half of what I require just to entertain the notion of basic human decency). I’m freakin’ wiped out. But I will not let you down.

I saw a million games today (and I rocked ‘em all). It all started with Microsoft‘s keynote address at 10 a.m., which included the following nuggets of goodness:

* Xbox Live is breaking down the boundary between developer and gamer by setting up an easy way for fledgling developers to upload their user-generated games. It’s sort of like a YouTube for indie games (or, at least, the ones developed using Microsoft’s free XNA toolkit).

* “Ninja Gaiden II” drops on June 3, and we watched a playable demo of one of the game’s levels. Based on that, you can expect tweaked-but-familiar gameplay, sweet visuals and gobs of blood spattering all over the place. One cool feature: The ability to record clips of your most ruthless carnage and upload them to share with friends.

* We also saw a playable demo of “Fable 2” (no release date yet to my knowledge), hosted by Peter Molyneux himself, which had some other pretty cool “next-gen” features. In the game, you can earn money by gambling at pubs you enter. But the gambling game, which is called “Keystone” (sort of like craps crossed with roulette), can also be downloaded as an Xbox Live Arcade title—and any money you win on XBLA is imported into your “bank account” in “Fable 2.” It’s pretty rare for developers to create content that’s portable from one game to another (only exceptions we can think of: importing “NCAA” draft classes into “Madden” and importing weapons from previous versions of “Ratchet & Clank”), but it’s a great idea that needs to be explored more. Maybe this will provide a spark.

* “Gears of War 2” is officially announced and scheduled for a November release. They showed us a dramatic 15-second clip of guys chainsawing the hell out of each other, so ... basically they showed us nothing. But, hey—it’s “Gears”!

Anyway, I mentioned all that stuff during a phone-in appearance on this week’s Spudcast! I also talked a little about some of the other games I’ve seen, including the new “Gran Turismo” (PS3), “Wii Fit” (Wii), “Super Smash Bros.” (Wii) and “The Force Unleashed” (multiple platforms). Lots and lots of cool stuff.

Check it out here:

Couch Potatoes, Episode 29 [mp3]

Other stuff I didn’t get around to mentioning:

* Also at the keynote, Epic showed us some of the upgrades they’ve been making to the Unreal Engine. For those who don’t know, the Unreal Engine is a game engine that’s been used to develop some great titles, including “BioShock,” “Gears of War,” “Mass Effect” and “Rainbow Six: Vegas.” They took some scenarios from the original “Gears” and rebuilt them using the new engine, then showed us a side-by-side comparison. The differences in light and shadow effects, water effects, destructible environments and high-density crowds were fairly stunning. Finally I feel like we’re getting closer to seeing games that feel every bit as “next-gen” as the systems we’re playing them on.

* I saw a demo of “LEGO Batman” a few minutes ago and if you were a fan of “LEGO Star Wars” (or if you just like Batman), I think you’re really gonna dig it. It’s an all-original story (approved by DC Comics) that features loads of cool villains, and they did a really masterful job of translating the gameplay from “Star Wars” to fit the Batman universe. My favorite touch: One of The Joker’s weapons is a joy buzzer that electrocutes people when he shakes their hands. Brilliant.

* I played “Spore” on DS! Probably gonna be awesome, but even on the pared down, comparatively pusillanimous DS version, it’s not exactly the kind of game you can get a good feel for after spending just a few minutes in a crowded expo hall. Presumably I’ll get to see more tomorrow at an event where “Spore” mastermind Will Wright (“The Sims,” etc.) is the guest speaker.

* Tons and tons of other fun stuff, but ... ummm, I’m totally surrounded by people drinking cocktails and eating appetizers right now, so ... uhh, bye.