E3 Cancelled?!

July 30, 2006 on 6:11 pm | In General Gaming, Industry

Well, according to Next-gen.biz anyway.

Edit: And they were apparently quick to judge. Please read comments below.

Read on.

The Entertainment Software Association (ESA) shindig has been a staple of game industry life since the mid-1990s. However, we understand the larger exhibitors have jointly decided that the costs of the event do not justify the returns, generally measured in media exposure.

Publishers believe the multi-million dollar budgets would be better spent on more company-focused events that bring attention to their own product lines rather than the industry as a whole.

Well placed sources say the news that larger exhibitors were pulling out had prompted urgent meetings among publishing executives. They decided that, without the support of the larger software publishers and hardware manufacturers, there would be no point in continuing.

ESA president Doug Lowenstein will likely announce the news some time within the next 48 hours, possibly on Monday. It's likely that the ESA will seek to limit the damage by organizing some form of lesser event in May, possibly even with the E3 brand, but this will be no more than a fig-leaf. The days of an industry event attended by all the major publishers, spending big money, are gone.

Calls to ESA staff are not being returned at present

I always find it interesting when potential bombshells like this are released on Sundays, typically the day with the lowest viewers and ranter-conversations.

I would personally not be surprised if this were true. The event is too big and probably generates too little business to be worth it. It's become the mainstay of the new-gen "journalists", basically, anyone who can hit a Kinkos and print up some business cards. Over the past two years, all important information was released in exclusion pre-show hype announcements anyway. The value of spending zillions to send people there didn't seem to add up, even to me.

Further, the shows with actual value seem to be happening more often throughout the year anyway. Seems like every few months there some sub-industry trade show going on, speaking volumes of the diversity that is the "video games" business.

Finally, this is video games after all. If this industry can't find more efficient ways to have important business meetings with developers, publishers and retailers beyond carting everyone to the left coast, nobody can.

And here I thought goings-ons at work was going to be the only reason why the forthcoming week was going to be interesting.

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Update: traveling around, looks like F13 and Slashdot have already picked this up, with discussions in place.