EA Announces Public Pre-E3 Events, Leaves E3 Showfloor

You know. It stinks. E3 used to be crazy. I would get so amped for it and the announcements were awesome to hear even if I personally wasn't into the game. With so much stuff leaking and so many reveals happening at random times I think it's really lost its magic, at least for me. 8(

We are taking our commitment to put our players first further this year by creating a play experience built around them.

I can't help but seeing this as a sign of E3 slowly dying and that makes me kind of sad. Part of me misses that once a year gaming event that E3 used to be but with both Sony, Microsoft, Nintendo and now EA having their own conferences outside of E3 it would have to change in some way to still be relevant. I know that both Microsoft and Sony still have their E3 conferences, but they are obviously going to spread out their announcements across their multiple yearly conferences so you won't get that one conference that would just be crazy reveal after crazy reveal.

I miss the old E3.

E3 is becoming ever more needless as time goes on. I think Nintendo has oddly gotten ahead of the curve on this trend with Nintendo Direct.

Need a proper space to announce their hotly anticipated title "Battlefield Hardline 2".

Probably found a way to make more money from it. Classic EA move. $60 to get in, but you gotta pay another $60 for the rest of the experience.

ESPORTS!

Kind of ironic that E3 chose the year they might actually have something to show to do this.

This kind of excites me only because it must mean they are pretty confident in their lineup of games. At least confident enough to sustain their own event anyways. Bethesda had a pretty good show last year. Makes me wonder if this'll put more pressure on publishers to invest on interesting big budget ip if they have their own stage to try and wow people every year (though Bethesda admitted they'd not likely have an event every year, only when they had enough to show)

This is a good thing. I am happy for the developers.

With more companies doing their own events outside of E3, pretty soon they'll need to set up some sort of organisation to avoid scheduling conflicts, and possibly share some resources to reduce costs.

Nintendo Directs are the future

I see this as the future. The major publishers are learning that they don't need E3 to reach their audience. In time, they'll all have their own "experience" and E3 proper will be nothing more than the oddities of Kensha Hall.

That Star Wars Battlefront money must of been lighter than they anticipated.

So this is probably a bad sign for the health of the show then right? How much more time is it before the other publishers start backing out of the show floor?

Simply put, booths and floor space is expensive at E3. A 600 square foot space, plus booth and staff to run it, costs in excess of $100,000. The space that EA has along costs into the seven digits. There is no reason to waste that money when the industry is starting to trend to the safer spaces of publisher controlled events.

The thing about things like PSX, and soon EA Live, is that they get to control the marketing and message that would usually get lost in the hype of press conference day and the insanity that is the show floor.

It's kind of hard to keep companies in a show that they have to pay so much for when they can throw a show for a lower cost and not have to compete for messaging. I'm just wondering what EA has now that isn't sports or a sequel coming out.

I'm curious how this will effect Giantbomb's coverage. If developers and publishers begin hosting their own things before and after E3 proper, that'll make the week or two even longer. Coverage must get more complicated. Unless the publishers stream everything, then Giantbomb never has to leave the office.

This seems like a move that EA doesn't have enough pull for, but it would still be great if all publishers stopped saving announcements for a dumb public event.

Here's hoping this is because they are really confident but I feel it could be the opposite

I'll miss E3.

I get that everyone wants their own spot in the sun, but if this trend continues every summer is going to be a nightmare. I don't want to read a drizzle over the course of a month, and I'm sure none of the journo's want to spend a month covering all that thinly spread news.

Hm. E3 seems to be dying. I suppose it doesn't actually matter. I'll miss it in the same way I miss big jorts.

@ajamafalous said:

No. My problem with Jeff's theory is that as long as publishers and developers pull this "around but not in E3" thing, you can't really argue that the conference isn't relevant anymore. These companies are feeding off the excitement or zeitgeist of the event. If EA were to hold their event with no similar timing to E3, I'd say that would be a larger indicator than what's been actually happening. E3 is certainly changing, however, but that's been true for many years now.

My belief is that it is still beneficial to pool the industries upcoming projects into some kind of event in a short time period (a week) to attract attention from fans and press. If game announcements were just scattered throughout the year, I don't think there would be nearly as much attention brought to them individually as there would be as a group. Personally, I pay a lot of attention to E3. I tend to miss announcements that just sort eek out. Obviously companies are always afraid that their games will get lost in the shuffle of the event, but that's why they surround the conference with their own releases events.

E3 news already?

Their showing at E3 is always intensely disappointing. Seems like this would be a good choice for EA, maybe less so for other companies. FIFA and Madden aren't huge E3 hits. No one goes there to see that.

This move has been a long time coming, EA is just the first amongst the big-boy publishers.

At least they didn't sit in an empty booth for two years I guess!

This, more than any other conference E3 pullout so far, makes me wonder if publishers are really going to step away from the event because they don't want this one big event where they have to compete for attention, and then inevitably see an article about how "so-and-so lost E3". Like 2014 when EA had literally fucking nothing to show other than some Mass Effect concept art, incredibly early prealpha Mirror's Edge stuff, and that Criterion game with the ATVs and wingsuits that will probably never come out because it was barely at the concept stage.

After the success of other publisher events i'm just surprised that E3 is still a thing. Thing it's only a matter of time till everyone pulls the plug.

Jonathan Blow (Thekla Inc.) can take over that space. It would be a much better use of space if EA insists on putting out crumby 'hollow feeling' Battlefield games, half-hearted, uninspired Madden games, and SimCity games that are just weird, broken money grabs.

Maybe, it time for EA to sit in the corner by itself and think about its life choices.

Kind of a bummer but I like the shake up - I just want to see Wilson lean into the evil CEO thing all the way;

It begins.

@austin_walkerAs past E3 attendees can tell you, this booth has been one of the largest on-site for years, so I'm curious what company (if any) will step up to take that space.

Ubisoft sounds most likely.

Wonder if they will take this show on the road. If they're serious about reaching out to the fans then i'd assume they would want to hold these events in as many big cities as possible.

@cooljammer00: God, that felt so bleak at the time.

yfw E3 becomes the hottest indie gaming show in town.

Good, their presentations are always terrible anyway. Also an E3 without Madden or Fifa being rammed down our throats for half an hour, excellent!

I'm sad E3 is slowly dying.. I hope the trend of 4-6 different conferences within days of each other at least continues for years to come.

Honestly the Nintendo E3 shows after leaving the live stage is always at least entertaining even if the news may be lackluster. If EA is willing to pull the more entertaining stuff that cannot be done live then this might be a good move.

@white:

I love E3, especially attending it every year, but the ESA has only themselves to blame for companies leaving the E3 to pursue their own events. That's what happens when you charge millions for booth space. Even the smaller spaces are unreasonably priced.