Introducing the new E3
- July 10, 2007 5:49 PM |
- By Ian Johnson
by Erin Bell, special to CBCNews.ca
The Electronic Entertainment Expo is dead. Long live the E3 Media and Business Summit.
When the Entertainment Software Association (ESA) announced last year that it was cancelling E3 – at least in its present form – many people weren't sad to see it go. The annual video game industry trade show, where companies made major announcements and outlined strategies for the rest of the year, and which attracted thousands of attendees from around the world, had grown too big for its own good.
By the end of E3's 11-year run, game publishers had grown to resent spending millions of dollars on bombastic demo kiosks and press conferences. The show floor had become so loud and crowded that it was hard to get any real work done, and the infamous scantily clad booth babes that companies used to hock product did nothing to offset the stereotype that games were mindless throwaway entertainment targeted to adolescent fanboys.
This year, the ESA is offering a toned down, renamed and revamped conference running July 11 to 13 in Santa Monica. Instead of the booming laser light show at the Los Angeles Convention Center, companies are hosting private meetings in a cluster of beach-side hotel suites.
The average game player is 33, according to statistics published by the Electronic Software Association (ESA). The fastest-growing demographic of player is women over 40. The industry is making a conscious effort to attract more females into game development. As video games continue to come of age, it seems fitting that the conference designed to celebrate their existence is trying to grow up as well.
Erin Bell is a Toronto-based freelance video game and technology journalist, and is reporting on her fourth E3.
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is a multimedia producer for CBCNews.ca.
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Comments (4)
The E3 of old is dead. Not surprising since the last two were lacklustre at best. There was a time when there were so many good games shown in playable form at E3 that, for many gamers and journalists alike, it was like heaven had come down to Earth for a week...complete with scantily clad "angels". Hehe sorry, couldn't help myself.
Anyway, personally I think this reflects the much longer development time that games in this current generation require. As a result, there are fewer games to be shown in playable form, or at least in a form that won't put-off the average game consumer/retailer. Remember, many gamers are fixated on graphics and games being shown in an early state could potentially doom a project. E3 had gotten to be too large for the current state of the industry.
On a side note, I believe that E3 was responsible for putting Sony behind the 8-ball. They were desperate to show games that demonstrated it's superior horsepower, but none were ready, so they showed pre-rendered movies and passed them off as games. Bad move and sure enough people caught on. Private meetings with investors retailers and possibly a few journalists is the way to go. Tell everyone else when the games are ready to be shown and appreciated.
I think this idea of 2 shows one for the business sector, and one for the public is better.
Claudio
I think Sony is responsible for their crappy showing at E3 the last 2 years no one else. Regardless their system is fantastic, as is the 360(when it is reliable)......The games coming out look amazing
Actually the idea of two shows is a pretty good idea. Public shows draw a huge crowd in Japan and I don't see why they don't have something similar here. After all, this is a bigger market.
And I wasn't trying to knock the PS3 or anything, I was just saying that Sony no doubt was feeling pressured to "keep up" with Microsoft and ended up showing misleading footage of games they were promising. The trailer for Killzone comes to mind. Fantastic footage but the final game, when and if it's released, will look nowhere near what was shown. That being said, existing PS3 games do look great, but I still don't believe the PS3 is the be-all-end-all of video gaming that Sony was touting. The PS3 and Xbox360 are very comparable machines.
I agree with you 100% Claudio...Both sytems are comparable, with 360 being more gaming friendly, and PS3 being more interactive.
The 2 shows will allow the business to be the focus of E3 not the Circus it used to be. That circus aspect can be at the public event.