Without Sony, E3 will be smaller next year than in 2018…

„As the industry evolves, Sony Interactive Entertainment continues to look for inventive opportunities to engage the community. PlayStation fans mean the world to us and we always want to innovate, think differently and experiment with new ways to delight gamers. As a result, we have decided not to participate in E3 in 2019. We are exploring new and familiar ways to engage our community in 2019 and can’t wait to share our plans with you,” Sony‘s statement sent to GameInformer, said.

This move doesn’t necessarily mean that the Japanese company would follow the EA Play or the Nintendo Direct example – SIE’s senior vice president of communications, Jennifer Clark, told the following to Polygon: „We will not activate or hold a press conference around E3. We will not be programming around E3. We are looking at events as a whole and how we can speak more to our fans and continue to wow them. The timing of [the skipped 2018 PlayStation Experience] and E3 didn’t allow for that. But lots of exciting things to come, and we hope to share shortly. Some of our biggest games will have key milestones next year so we will work hard to blow those up.” (The last sentence means they want to get the games done.)

Kotaku also thinks that Sony skipping E3 might mean the PlayStation 5 is set to launch in 2020, and that Death Stranding, The Last of Us Part II, and Ghost of Tsushima might be released either in the second half 2019, or 2020.

Microsoft and Nintendo are both excited about Sony‘s move – Phil Spencer, the head of Xbox, wrote the following on Twitter: „A lot to share with fans at E3 2019, [which is] always a high point of the year to witness the industry’s creativity and the energy of the community.”

So it seems Sony has pulled the handbrake for the sake of the PlayStation 5. We have yet to see if this move will pay off for them or not…

Source: Gematsu, WCCFTech