The Company Responsible For E3 2020's Creative Direction Just Resigned

E3 is dead.

No coming back.

HA, good. Deserves it.

lol on the bounce.

If E3 2020 does get cancelled, there will probably be another 6 month general Direct drought (March to September if there's a general Direct in March).

It's over 3 months away. Silly to make any decisions this far in advance.
I guess the only trouble is for people who have to buy plane tickets.

@Grumblevolcano Nintendo doesn't do their Direct from E3, so hopefully they'd carry on with their usual schedule for the Direct even if E3 is cancelled.

I think the other video games event such as PAX or Treehouse can be a substitute of E3 2020 if this year E3 got canceled.

As soon as you know the ship is sinking, get out

I don't mind E3 getting cancelled this year due to the coronavirus, but i do not want them to end it forever, the E3 event is actually an important event that really does make a huge positive impact to the benefit of the entire video game industry, not having it anymore and switching every announcement to digital will potentially have a negative domino effect on the industry.

E3 - The Tulsi Gabbard of Gaming Conventions

@Xeno_Aura The Direct does exist because of E3 though, it would look bad on Nintendo (even to investors in the July investor meeting) if everyone else is revealing stuff but Nintendo's completely silent. With E3 out of the way, Nintendo would be able to be silent with it not looking bad on them because everyone's revealing stuff at different times.

We have Nintendo Direct. We'll be fine.

(Probably selfishly) I'm not too fussed about any of this as I think we'll get a Direct around then, am not too bothered about other companies, and don't really watch all the treehouse stuff.

@The_Mysteron
Ah that mythic Nintendo Direct. Great old days.

Hundreds of individual announcements staggered at 3:00am on a Tuesday night in random months of the year means, basically, most of the information never gets to the people who want it.

I used to choose my games and consoles, often years after they were released, by just browsing retail shelves, and retailer websites to see what things maybe I missed in a given genre or something.

Then I discovered E3 and watched each year, a fixed calendar week, as every major company showed me everything they were planning. It changed what I buy, and how much of it I buy. I planned and scheduled what releases I wanted to buy rather than creatively looking years later and finding something that piqued my interest. The internet doesn't accomplish that planned, scheduled, announcement window of what's coming. Nintendo has a few directs a year. Sony does whatever they do...I don't even see the rest of their stuff. XBox has a few things like Nintendo and monthly information, I mostly just find out about it from @ThanosReXXX and @GrumbleVolcano after the fact. Ubi, 2K, Bethesda, would have whatever announcements they have whenever they have it and I'll know about none of them. I'll see a screenshot when the game is $10 and maybe buy it, maybe not, because they hype will be dead on it.

E3 then draws retailers to create an E3 showcase....all at once, all the upcoming announced products are highlighted together on retailer websites and stores. You can see at a glance everything you want like a kid in a candy store. E3 and retail form a link from consumers to the industry.

E3 is a presentation that you tune in to find out what's up from everyone all at once. Without that, you'll follow your one or two favorite brands, and the others blend into the background noise. You may or may not hear from them via viral word of mouth. Retailers go back to staggered single game listings throughout the year. We lose a lot of the industry's cohesive marketing. Everything the ESA was built to achieve for a collective industry push falls apart.

Following that, their lobby falls apart too.

@NEStalgia And life will never be the same again. People that don't get the importance or rather: weight of E3 or say that they won't miss it, simply don't understand, and I doubt they ever will. Some simple recorded video presentations or trailers do not a live event make, especially not one that still creates SO much buzz in the industry, regardless of its diminished attraction.

Turns out influencer bs + corona is quite the killer combo.

@ThanosReXXX "I don't care about E3 it's obsolete" is at this point a mixture of "I live and breathe social media so I know everything from everywhere from tweets and follows the minute they happen, and anything else is just surplus" - people that really don't get that anyone that doesn't live and breathe social media is entirely unaware of almost EVERYTHING that's mentioned on social media. It doesn't reach you, it just stays in its bubble.

The other half is simply Playstation fandom bleating. "Sony shunned E3, so it was always stupid anyway! I've been told we don't need it anymore, so it must be true!"

I guess it's working for PS, but personally, I'm a PS fan as well as Ninty/XBox fan, and I'm unaware of almost 100% of what Sony has done since E3 2018. It's like they haven't existed at all for me. Not because I'm uninterested, but because they don't have any channels that actually reach me anymore, so they're invisible almost entirely. Meanwhile Nintendo, XBox, Ubi and Bethesda reach me every June, which piques my interest for more NDs and XOxx events. Sony has SoP now, but I don't know when they are. And they didn't bother with their PEX either. l'm not sure how a marketing strategy that involves making the customer search for where you're trying to market to them and when rather than actively reaching them works....somehow it seems to for them.

My Sony money has gone into other hobbies for the past 18 months. If you're not there when I'm looking who wants to sell me something, I only assume you have nothing to sell me and move on. I'm going to buy Persona 5 Royal for PS. Which I didn't even know existed until @Ralizah mentioned it in an unrelated conversation. And that's something I actively strongly have an interest in.

Well at least the Nintendo E3 direct will be good as always.

I, for one, would be terribly disappointed if E3 ever were to be completely cancelled. Since I've started working, E3 week has become like a celebration to me. I put in for a full weeks worth of vacation (Monday - Friday) for E3 week. I tune in on multiple devices to watch the conferences, game interviews, gameplay demos, etc. My daughters hop onto the streams with me when they are here, and we all enjoy the news drops together. E3 week has always been a time of excitement, never knowing what news will drop at any time during the week. Seeing the excited crowds at E3...the lines of people all smiling and having such a great time sharing the love and enthusiasm for gaming and game news that I have...is always a truly special time of the year for me. E3 is the penultimate coming together of industry glitz and glamor. I for one would be very, very sad and disappointed if this community event is ever completely cancelled, and nothing steps up to take its place.

@ThanosReXXX @NEStalgia The Direct drought shows exactly the importance of E3. Over 6 months without a general Direct but people knew there'd be guaranteed Nintendo news in June because of E3 but if E3 gets cancelled it's no longer guaranteed we'll get Nintendo news in June outside of possibly a Pokemon Direct showing off Isle of Armor DLC.

@NEStalgia Yeah, that just about sums it up. As for Sony... well, you already know my view on them.

@Grumblevolcano Yup, that's a very good point. Here's hoping it's not going to get canceled. Of course, general health is far more important than any type of event, but still...

@Grumblevolcano Eek. yeah.

Shame the whole Corona outbreak thing is putting a final nail potentially into what was already a high stakes event this year. Unavoidable, but horrible timing for this event.

@Hagemaru E3 hasn't been good many years now. Better to end it

Christ, the Game Awards is so nauseating. Hope E3 sticks around. I utterly adore the Treehouse.

@NEStalgia don't you have gaming websites you check regularly like Nintendo life but about Playstation?

TWO THOUGHTS:
1. Nobody is irreplaceable.
2. Due to the coronavirus I suspect that E3 this year will be cancelled or postponed and companies will do Internet presentations in Nintendo Direct fashion. (As a matter of fact, many expos have already been cancelled or postponed in Europe and elsewhere).

@Hagemaru The hate was there well before Sony bailed. When you start bringing influencers and internet "celebrities", you've lost the plot.

Game over for E3.

Really sad to see so many on here not care about this event being in trouble. Maybe it's an age thing. To those of us who grew up gaming in the pre-social media age this was and always has been the highlight of the gaming year. The only week when you KNOW big announcements will be made. A trailer for that big game you're excited about will be released. The internet and social media made it easier to follow all of this. It shouldn't be a reason for it to disappear. I remember the days when live streams weren't common and you had to know where and when in order to watch. No replays in those days. We shouldn't just shrug and say oh well. I'd rather have a guaranteed week of announcements than staring at social media hoping someone releases a new trailer.

Unfortunately E3, as we know it, is on a life respirator. Technically even Microsoft isn't truly on location as they present in their own building across the street.
I still believe that E3 is a good platform for developers / publishers / gamers to come together so a scaled back E3 is likely. Lets not forget it is still the most watched conference and its a launch vehicle for holiday products.

I don't think it's too late for E3 to retain it's relevancy. Best option would be to cancel this year, and immediately start preparing for 2021. If they can pull it together and iron everything out ahead of time, they can get back on top.

My first time being obsessed with E3 reveals was watching X-Play on TechTV (and to a lesser extent G4-TechTV, then just G4, and then the giant nothing that followed) I do so miss those days.

Entertainment should be fun, not work. There's not enough time in life to do it all. I check NL partly because I follow NL news first, and partly just because I like the community here. I don't really check any other gaming news websites, and all the fluff, and all the terrible communities. Most of the gaming press has gone "BuzzFeed" style, including NL, and mostly picks at rumors, speculation, individual scattered announcements harvested from PR.

Spending 5 days a year like a full holiday, wrapped in a fun event, filled with presentations direct from the producers, and the media all simultaneously having tons of exclusive information, interviews, questions, scandals etc is a fun, easy, reliable way to get your year's gaming information. If anything piques my interest there, I might check on it periodically.

Scouring the internet and monitoring a ton of sources all the time, all year long, to find scraps of relevant information amidst rumor mills and fluff is a laborious and otherwise unfun exercise.

E3 is the one chance the creators are there to present directly all in one time period, and the retailers and press are cross-promoting in concert with the very organized stream of information.

Year-round sporadic information is just that. Sporradic, and loaded with filler. Definitely not the same. E3, I'd say, increased my spending, awareness, and involvement with video game products considerably. Without E3, I think all of those drop considerably as I'd end up looking almost entirely inward at Nintendo only because its' "in front of me" more, and probably end up spending a lot less money overall, as I'll be aware of a lot less products overall. The sense of hype and urgency will be absent.

as long as they are still going forward with having it all about influencers and streamers then i don't care what happens behind the scenes, i won't be watching it

I think we're nearing the end of an era, in that I think E3 is about to die in the not too distant future. I'm not personally happy about this, if it happens.

The only thing E3 has been for the past few years is unsubstantiated hype and trailers and announcements for announcements for games 3 years in the future.

It was just announced that SXSW is canceled because of Coronavirus concerns.

@Raccoonius The end of an era.

Good Lord, this is starting to evoke shades of the Fyre festival. What on earth is happening behind the scenes here? I don't think E3 is as irrelevant as some say it is, but I think its previous status as the unmissable gaming event of the year is long past.

I stopped caring about E3 two or three years ago. I just don't need to focus on it. everything hits the web sooner or later and I can get at it in my own time frame.

All I want is for Nintendo to have a "biggest Direct," and for it to happen at the same time each year with plenty of official media announcements beforehand. I never really cared about the competition or the ritz, or the cheesy stage shows; I would just miss the hype for the biggest Nintendo presentation of the year, and I'd miss being able to look forward to it months in advance.

@Nicolai hey can we play splatoon 2 together I’m up for private battles (but always for password 8888) or salmon run! My friend code is SW 5980 8302 8417.
Hit me up on TikTok at Nrush.1

@Nicolai hey can we play splatoon 2 together? I’m up for some private battles (password always 8888) or some salmon run, etc. My friend code is SW 5980 8302 8417
Hit me up on TikTok at Nrush.1!