Although the Entertainment Software Association (ESA) owns E3, another company was supposed to organize this year’s event. They are trying to save their credentials.

Gamesindustry has an article by Christopher Dring, the site’s gaming B2B editor. So he’s looking at the business side of things. Since the site is owned by the same ReedPop that was going to organize E3 this year (and it’s the same team behind PAX and New York Comic Con, for example, so it’s an experienced company), you’d be hard-pressed to find a better person on the subject than him.

If you had to sum it up, you could say, “the gaming industry didn’t want this E3,” end the sentence, then go have your lunch, which would be apt on April Fools Day, but we won’t leave it at that (that’s not why we get paid), so here’s Dring’s explanation: “Companies were talking about taking up huge spaces. The E3 team was looking at how we could expand into the car park and use the extra areas that hadn’t been used for years. The pitch, I felt anyway, was good. It had the business and consumer components separate (or at least, as separate as was possible in that venue), it was more affordable, they were going to sort the wi-fi, improve the food, add a stronger digital component… it was everything everyone said they wanted. But in the end, they didn’t want that either. In hindsight, perhaps E3 should have been more radically different. A heavier focus on digital, with the physical show, focused squarely on the business side, without the reliance on booths to entice people in. But some might argue that’s almost a different event entirely.”

Even in February, ReedPop said E3 was full steam ahead, even when no contracts had been signed. For example, the Ubisoft, Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo foursome backed out of the event because “we don’t have our games ready; we don’t have the code; we can’t be extravagant in this economic climate; the timing is not quite right” – the usual excuses. (Sony was going to skip the event anyway, let’s not deny that.) And for Microsoft, it would have been a bit two-faced to hold the event in Los Angeles a few months after firing 10,000 employees.

According to Dring, ReedPop moved more slowly than expected, and perhaps a different communications strategy should have been used. E3 has had its troubled years (2007 and 2008; the former was a press-only event), but perhaps it has to be said that time has moved on without E3. There will be replacement events: for example, this year, there will be PC Gaming Show, Future Games Show, Ubisoft Forward, and Xbox Games Showcase, but there will likely be a Nintendo Direct and a State of Play, too…

Source: PCGamer