New E3 Show Announced - Smaller and Invite-only

fiorenza writes "The ESA has announced the date and venue for the new E3 show, which is to be renamed the E3 Media and Business Summit. The show has move moved from May to July, and next year will take place on July 11-13 in Santa Monica, California. Doug Lowenstein, the president of the ESA, said that past attendees wanted a smaller more formal show that would be oriented to the media instead of the consumer, so it will now be invitation-only and many of the 'events' will actually take place in hotel suites. It looks like other gaming shows will need to step in if the glitz and glitter of E3 is to be saved."

What's the purpose of E3?

[LionKimbro]

This is a serious question.

I have read [gamasutra.com] that PAX [pennyarcadeexpo.com] is not, cannot, be a replacement for E3. [e3insider.com]

I can accept this; I just wonder aloud: "What is the purpose of E3?" What essential role did it play?

First Comdex, and now E3 :(

[Targon]

The problem with these shows going "behind closed doors" is that there will be zero reason for any company going to the show at all, in any form. The same companies can easily just invite the press to their own events at different places if all they want is a place to show reporters their recently announced products.

As for the "booth babes" being either good or bad, it depends. The web sites that show them as a feature in the reporting are a big part of the problem since the idea really is to show off the products the company will be selling. For those who attend the shows though, they were considered a part of the entertainment and atmosphere of the show to attract people to their booths.

The cost for vendors to go to the shows may have gotten out of control, and moving the location somewhere else may have been in order, but the nature of the shows should not have been changed in my opinion. It's FUN to go to these type of shows in person, and they will be missed by those who really did understand that the shows really were about seeing the new products that were being developed, and not just about being a source of information.

A part of the problem may also be that the game market has been imploding with more sequels that show off the next generation of the same crap we see today for the most part. New graphics and effects engines may have a certain "cool" factor associated with them, but they don't change the gameplay all that much. When physics processing gets to the point where you can blow a hole in ANY wall(perhaps with repeated shots or explosions), and allow the player to move through that hole it will finally make a PPU worth buying for the average gamer, but until then, it's the type of thing that won't make the average person want to buy one as just one example of a hyped product doing nothing for gameplay.