The End of E3?

Ground Glass writes "Next Generation is reporting that E3 as we know it is finished. The games industry has lost its most glamorous show." Update: 07/30 21:18 GMT by Z : A reader wrote in with a link to an Ars Technica story saying that the event is to be downsized, not cancelled. From that article: "At the end of the day, the reason is very simple: ten years ago, you needed a big trade show to generate buzz and hype. It used to be that COMDEX was a special event because so much new stuff was unveiled, and this was the only way to see it. Now, however, information comes down the pipe faster than ever, and companies are wondering if there's really any benefit to spending the big money on displays only to share the floor with other competitors looking to out-wow attendees." I guess we'll see in a day or two what the future of E3 looks like.

Gamespot is reporting it as well

[Suddenly_Dead]

http://www.gamespot.com/news/6154897.html [gamespot.com]

Well, there goes that.

Re:PAX to fill void?

[badboy_tw2002]

Remember, E3 is NOT supposed to be a convention. Its a PRESS event. GDC is a convention. It has "convention" in the name even. The general public is not invited, though generally anyone who wanted to go could get in. I've always thought its a pretty terrible event and generally not a good face for the industry as a whole. Most of the real stuff happens behind closed doors, and a lot of the big publishers have their own press days anyways. The real losers here are the small developers or hardware manufacturers (yay Kentia Hall) who are trying to a) get exposure, b) get funding. The indy show at GDC doesn't really fit the role unfortunately, but it tries. I think what's really needed is a serious event for indie developers where both publishers and press attend without some dufus walking around in elf armor.

Re:I welcome the exit, if true...

[MBGMorden]

What idiot whould put in "hacks" and have to strip them out before begining real work again? You can make copies of a source tree. Fork the code, get it ready for E3, and keep the untouched code in the main development cycle.

Re:I welcome the exit, if true...

[RomSteady]

A lot of companies want the work to go on as long as possible before forking to reduce integration downtime afterwards.

While a pure branch with regular merge-ins from the main tree is ideal, there are many times where it can be impractical.

They actually HAD something like that recently...

[Svartalf]

...I was just broke and couldn't attend. It was called the Texas Independent Games Development Conference [txindiegamecon.com] and it had all kinds of people that were sponsoring the thing- according to the promoters, it was a stunning success and they're doing it again next year (And I HOPE to be able to attend the next time...). It was intended for Texas indie studios for the large part, but it's a good start in the right direction- and I don't think we need to see something like GDC or E3 (GDC's good for meeting up with the tech companies supplying the resources to make the games happen and seeing the people face- but if it were to shrink or go away, it'd only be mildly annoying. E3, on the other hand... That was a massive resource sink, in all honesty- it may be that it is its time to go.)

Re:PAX to fill void?

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually PAX should be moving to a larger space next year.

Oh, and by the way, last year Nintendo brought their E3 kit to PAX.

Re:Massive damage = walkout?

[ichigo 2.0]

Here's the funny vid [youtube.com] he is referring to for those 40% that modded him troll. I liked the "innovative gameplay" and "realtime weapon change" myself. 30% Redundant? Maybe. All this sony bashing is starting to sound redundant.

Re:PAX to fill void?

[Overloadplanetunreal]

The C stands for "conference" not "convention".

Multiple Stories

[Fo0dNippl3]

GameSpot's story on this says that E3 is downsizing and moving. Other sites say it will be split into publisher specific expos. Some sites are even saying it's cancelled completely. I think the "cancelled" camp are just sensationalists trying to get hits. A downsize seems more likely.

Re:What will it become?

[RsG]

We tend to abbreviate EEE as E3. Ergo CCC turns into C3... I admit it took me a minute too. :-)