• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

E3 2023 Has Been Canceled

nush

Gold Member
I don't know how long it will take for the industry to put itself back on track, but the delays are quite massive.

I'm optimistic in hoping its been an opportunity for the industry to stop and say "What the fuck are we doing?". Then come up with something new.
 

Rykan

Member
I don't know if I'm really upset about it that much.

The only good thing about E3 were the big three Press conferences. Those were spectacular and carried the most exciting announcements…well sometimes, anyway.

The other part of E3, which is mostly just booths and play demo's, is hilariously unnecessary today.
 
I went 4 times in 2005 & 2006 then again in 2017 & 2018. It was so exciting as a gamer. It was Disneyland and Las Vegas and Christmas in June all wrapped up in games. I'm so sad it's gone.

I'm guessing Xbox and Bethesda probably aren't coming down here now that there is no E3, but it would be soooo cool if they came anyway and they did their showcases live from the Microsoft Theater in front of a live audience. Not going to happen but it would be awesome.
They did it last year kind of. I was in attendance but it was a recorded show. Phil made an appearance too.
 

NikuNashi

Member
I don't know if I'm really upset about it that much.

The only good thing about E3 were the big three Press conferences. Those were spectacular and carried the most exciting announcements…well sometimes, anyway.

The other part of E3, which is mostly just booths and play demo's, is hilariously unnecessary today.

Im off to Evo Japan tomorrow to check out the booths and hopefully play some demo Street Fighter 6.
 
I'm optimistic in hoping its been an opportunity for the industry to stop and say "What the fuck are we doing?". Then come up with something new.
What exactly do you mean by that? Are you not happy with current industry trends? If so, can you please elaborate? And what new thing do you want them to come up with? And no, I am trying to be condescending, it's a legimate question that I am asking so I can understand exactly what you mean.

I think 2023 so far has been a pretty solid year. Yeah, there were a lot of delays from last year sure, but there are a lot of great games already out this year with more coming imo.

Hogwarts Legacy
Resident Evil 4 Remake
Wo Long Fallen Dynasty
Dead Space Remake
Octopath Traveler 2
Hi-fi Rush

Next month is Dead Island 2 with Jedi Survivor then Zelda in May and in June Diablo IV, Street Fighter 6 and Final Fantasy 16. Plenty of high quality titles imo to look forward too.
 
Last edited:

Northeastmonk

Gold Member
Im off to Evo Japan tomorrow to check out the booths and hopefully play some demo Street Fighter 6.
That sounds like fun.

I feel like the industry has cycled its people and its fans over the years. It’s much better to pick and choose your favorites without following the same social media outcries of yesteryear.

The industry has outgrown that type of thing or at least operates on a much higher level. We have a lot of those people we’ve talked about for years - leave the industry or they’re just not doing the whole center show thing anymore.

You don’t need Reggie getting up there with a GameBoy micro or announcing a price cut to their console. Outside of Phil Spencer, all those big hitters aren’t even with the company anymore. I’m ok with Jim Ryan speaking at low key Sony CES shows and Doug Bowser answering questions in typed up interviews.

I’ll miss the E3 coverage. I never got to go to E3. I always wanted to attend the TGS. I remember hearing about certain journalists attending every year. It all sorta feels like the necessity of it all isn’t there anymore.

Games are great, they look and play better for the most part. We get games we have wanted for years. We didn’t need E3 to tell us about them. I remember seeing the trailer for Elden Ring during the MS show, but that could have been a Tweet or YouTube video.
 
Last edited:

lh032

I cry about Xbox and hate PlayStation.
Sony destroys E3 and make exclusive showcase on youtube.
Watch out jimbo.
 

farmerboy

Member
Where can I get that E3 type engagement with a big publisher showcase now?

Little 20min state of play type things aren't cutting it anymore
 
You’re talking about the game awards chief . That to me always delivers something.

I’m talking about his summer games fest, which you know had nothing.
Oh, my apologies then. Yeah, Summer Game Fest is a bit boring.

You didn't specify that it was summer game fest that's why I got confused lol.
 

ahtlas7

Member
Geoff isn’t a good booth babe replacement, then again I’ve never seen him in skin tight short-shorts.
 
Last edited:

Danjin44

The nicest person on this forum
talking about his summer games fest, which you know had nothing.
Here is the thing if publishers or developers have nothing to show then we still get nothing regardless if was in E3 or summer games fes or any other other showcase

To developers and publishers it less stressful to decided their own time and show off their games when they are ready to show instead of wasting time scrambling something to show for E3 or other showcases.
 

DelireMan7

Member
End of an era. E3 was always a huge time for me as a gamer. Checking every day all the new announcements and so on.

Guess it will never come back like that.
 

Fredrik

Member
This sucks. Geoff’s show is a snoozefest and so is all the annoyingly long mini shows with mostly crap from pubmishers.
Only upside, maybe we can get big news all year now and don’t have to wait until the summer? Where’s that Starfield event MS?
 

SkylineRKR

Member
In digital age an E3 is totally unnecessary. I understand the sentiments behind it, but in the end it was mostly only for press and you would be at the mercy of shitty outlets like IGN. The outlier for me was GameTrailers, they did good.

A digital Sony conference would be the same for me. Its just not being recorded from an expo. Its about games getting announced. It doesn't really matter how. I was fucking hyped when FFXVI was being premiered at the Playstation 5 showcase in 2020.

But I understand the sentiments when I think about Peter Moore joining the stage, or Hirai showing a new product. E3 was also great meme material. However, times have changed.
 

SJRB

Gold Member
Yeah Keighley dunking on E3 to plug his own show is not only pretty tasteless but also kind of ironic because his Summer Game Fest had never been even remotely as good as a proper E3 ever was.
 

hinch7

Member
Good luck with all those half baked Digital shows 🤣
I'll probably only tune into the main three. And maybe Square Enix, Capcom and EA (for Mass Effect 4).

On topic.. its a shame but E3 has been dead for years. Publishers don't need that platform to show off their games.
 
Ed Bassmaster Nascar GIF by Insurance_King
 

Sybrix

Member
It really sucks that E3 is dead now.

It was always so much better having Sony/Microsoft/Nintendo/EA/Ubisoft etc having their own shows over a 3-day period.

Now we get pre-recorded YouTube videos where sure we get the games but the live shows were so much better, it felt way more exciting and with it being live.... the inevitable plethora of memes and gifs.
 

Mozza

Member
No digital event has matched any of the fun or excitement of the conferences and convention style feel the live events have had and always feels like a poor man's Nintendo Direct. PS Experience also disappearing was a disappointment.
I always felt the conferences were cringe fests, put on for gaming journalists. The really sad part of this, is the loss for the general public to play incoming games.
 
Damn it. Just after Sony finally figured it out how it is supposed to be. 2015 and 2016 were those which had nice announcements, decent pace and not much cringe with useless celebrities or overly fake PR-guys or wasted time for an idiotic fancy location change.
I won't miss the in person event, no way I ever would be there (or go to any of the nearer small events) but this one week of the industry showing us what's coming was great fun, despite the shows more often than not sucking in their presentation style.
But now we are stuck with Directs, State of Plays or Embracer coming up with new names for their so far mediocre distribution arms and cringe like older E3 years and overall the feeling that "greatness does not await".
I wouldn't mind if all had just one "proper" event every year, whenever they want, but those microshows just never have any punch behind them (and are anyway leaked by some dumbasses spoiling the surprises).

Anyway, Devolver without even having many games, probably will have the best not E3 show this year, like the last years, unless Sony regains self awareness and actually promotes their now available machine properly or MS starts firing on all their acquired cylinders beyond hammering down that everything is on GP.
 
Last edited:

AV

We ain't outta here in ten minutes, we won't need no rocket to fly through space
Take it out back and put a bullet in it. It's a relic.

Sony 2016: God of War, Days Gone, The Last Guardian, Horizon, Spider-Man
Sony 2017: God of War, Days Gone, Shadow of the Colossus, Horizon, Spider-Man

This is what happens when publishers are forced to have juicy shows annually when they simply don't have enough juicy content to fill them, and it's one of the reasons Sony bounced a few years later. It's just not sustainable now that video games are such behemoths that they take half-decades at a time to develop.

Yeah, the cringe was fun. Yeah, it was nice to have a tidal wave of news. But half of the time it wasn't even news, it was just more trailers for things you already knew were coming. State of Play and Nintendo Direct isn't perfect but it's better, even if less fun than "I made a bingo card and got a crate of beer in for the big show".
 

nush

Gold Member
What exactly do you mean by that? Are you not happy with current industry trends? If so, can you please elaborate? And what new thing do you want them to come up with? And no, I am trying to be condescending, it's a legimate question that I am asking so I can understand exactly what you mean.

Historically the purpose of trade shows, that's what E3 is actually supposed to be. Historically (Repeated for emphasis) was to show off product to retailers and get orders for the holiday season. It just turned into a big dick waving circus by all the publishers. Do Sega really need a 20ft statue of sonic (That will be thrown into the trash after 3 days) to let retailers know there's the next Sonic game coming out this year, just like the last years?

Marketing departments burn money and everyone else pays for it. One of the franchises I worked on which was fucking huge and as far as everyone is concerned was a massive hit. We were on sequel whatever number. Huge sales, awards, great reviews after the holiday season I felt something was a little off in the corridors of the office. Having the chance a few month later when sequel whatever number +1 I had the opportunity to have a candid conversation with my good colleague from the operations department, who I only got to see a few times a year.

My opener was "That last game didn't make any money did it?" Oh yes, I was sure right because he went off "No, because the fucking marketing department treated it like a license to print money and spent every bit of money we should have made on the game promoting it" He continued "Right now the only value this franchise has to the company is reported revenue" Got to keep those share holders happy, made more sequels anyway. That's the story of one of the most expensive games ever made, and Shenmue didn't cost $70 million.

And that kids is why you are paying $70 a game now. You're footing the bill for 20ft Sonic statues being thrown in dumpsters. That's why you don't have Sleeping Dogs 2 because the game "Under performed". It's why you don't have an honest gaming press because all they want is that marketing money to keep flowing. And why you don't have E3 because nobody was going to lose a game of chicken when their competitors were still in the game.

God bless Nintendo and the Wii U for them saying fuck this shit, it's a bomba and we're not throwing good money after bad.

Now they can come up with something new, in answer to your question.
 

AV

We ain't outta here in ten minutes, we won't need no rocket to fly through space
People can shit on the live stream shows all they want, but this place still goes into an absolute frenzy every time we have one and it happens multiple times a year.

The hype factor is still there for those who look for it.
 

the_master

Member
Very sad.

It used to be a very special time when you'd get to be amazed 5 times a day with the new announcements.
When the big companies pulled out... it was a death sentence.
Now a days we have lost this incredible high intensity time for games in exchange for a more continuous and mild flow of news.

At my age, I would really like one big E3 event each year, but I guess it can't be helped
 

PeteBull

Member
Last amazing E3 i trully enjoyed was back when holy trinity showed up, , back then former ez allies, aka GT were great, quick vid out of it, we all remember and will always remember :p

Famous Bosmans- You maniacs! while he is kneeling on the chair =P
 

SkylineRKR

Member
Last amazing E3 i trully enjoyed was back when holy trinity showed up, , back then former ez allies, aka GT were great, quick vid out of it, we all remember and will always remember :p

Famous Bosmans- You maniacs! while he is kneeling on the chair =P


Yeah this was great. I remember seeing WoF and thinking... what a dud. But then the FFVII+Shenmue 3 combo.

However, this also shows us that many announcements are better than the games itself. Shenmue 3 is a turd, and FFVII R is fun but also has most of its charm sucked out of it, its a fairly useless remake imho. And TLG was also shown I think, which I enjoyed but to me the weakest of the trilogy.
 

deriks

4-Time GIF/Meme God
Official say of a thing that everyone knew a while ago

I loved back in the glory days, so it's kinda of a shame, but I guess this is how the world moves

Next
 

Danjin44

The nicest person on this forum
Yeah this was great. I remember seeing WoF and thinking... what a dud. But then the FFVII+Shenmue 3 combo.

However, this also shows us that many announcements are better than the games itself. Shenmue 3 is a turd, and FFVII R is fun but also has most of its charm sucked out of it, its a fairly useless remake imho. And TLG was also shown I think, which I enjoyed but to me the weakest of the trilogy.
I definitely disagree with FFVIIR and TLG, I personally LOOOOVED those games and welll worth the hype for me.
 
Last edited:
Top Bottom