No Blizzard At E3 2009

One of the biggest surprises out of the ESA's E3 exhibitor announcement on Monday was the reappearance of Activision Blizzard, which famously withdrew from the conference last year and instead held its own press event offsite. Sure, some other heavyweights such as LucasArts were also E3 no-shows in '08, but as it currently stands, you don't get much bigger than Activision, so that particular absence was profoundly felt.

The Activision part may be returning to the bigger, better, more badass E3 this year, but the Blizzard component is not. A rep for the company confirmed to us that Blizzard itself won't be appearing at the show, which I shall now prove with the following quote.

Blizzard Entertainment will not be attending or participating in E3 2009.

See? Those are certain terms, friends. Of course, the annual BlizzCon has practically become a cottage industry in itself, so ol' Blizz already has a ready outlet from which to dispense major announcements on Starcraft, Diablo, and WOW. But BlizzCon is typically later in the year, so if you're scrabbling for news on those games early in the summer, well, you may be out of luck.