3 ms·

With rumors of Sony and Microsoft's consoles coming out at the end of this year, does anyone know if this event would have any impact on that? I'd imagine being

by smaili 7y ago

With rumors of Sony and Microsoft's consoles coming out at the end of this year, does anyone know if this event would have any impact on that? I'd imagine being able to leverage this sort of event for generating buzz and interest helps with their sales to some extent so I'd be very curious to see if they decide to delay their release.

Trasmatta 7y ago
Sony was already skipping E3 anyway.
grecy 7y ago
Nikon delayed their D6 DSLR, and I imagine it will get difficult to even produce things like that at the volume they'd need for a launch.
dtech 7y ago
Many publishers were already doing their own thing around E3, both in time and location. Sony was not even participating in E3 2020. It is far far less important than it used to be for the industry E3 2019 might have well been the last one.
jayd16 7y ago
I doubt an e3 cancellation would cause a delay but the virus has made sourcing hardware a lot harder. If they do keep dates they'll see shortages.
JonathonW 7y ago
Unlikely-- E3 (like the other big trade shows in general) has been getting progressively less relevant industry-wide each year, in favor of more direct-to-consumer messaging (like Nintendo's Nintendo Direct presentations). Sony even announced they weren't participating back in January, before all this COVID-19 mess.
- georgeecollins 7y ago
  This is true. Big companies were the first to pull out of GDC as well. I think the big players feel they have to spend a lot to keep up and they don't get a lot out of it. I believe the smaller companies are the ones that tend to benefit from the big conferences, because it gives them a chance to talk to people all over the world who might not otherwise be available. Speaking for myself, these cancellations are understandable, but a big problem for my work.
  - blackearl 7y ago
    I've heard it was more important, at GDC at least, for indies because you have legendary devs walking around who can help small teams get deals or contacts with bigger networks. Make a demo that catches the eye of the right person and it can be really helpful.
    - georgeecollins 7y ago
      Exactly-- you meet new teams you may want to do business with. Devs meet people who want to invest. Not exactly helpful for EA or Activision, but big help to others.
mikewhy 7y ago
Sony had already cancelled, so there's no difference to them. I don't see either company delaying the release due to E3 being cancelled. Other supply line constraints from the same root cause, maybe.
blackearl 7y ago
There's been a shift to siloed announcements anyways. Nintendo Direct have been recurring chunks of announcements, I don't see why Sony and MS wouldn't start doing the same.
- mikepurvis 7y ago
  Sony: https://www.playstation.com/en-us/explore/state-of-play/ https://www.playstation.com/en-us/explore/state-of-play/ Microsoft: https://news.xbox.com/en-us/insidexbox/ https://news.xbox.com/en-us/insidexbox/
ErneX 7y ago
Sony skipped last E3 and also this one. They did not like the new direction the event was supposedly taking. Geoff Keighley also decided to not do his E3 Coliseum show that he used to host for multiple years.
smcgaw 7y ago
I think supply chain disruptions for manufacturing the new hardware and disruption to development of the launch games are probably more likely to affect the release plans.
- joshschreuder 7y ago
  Yeah I'm with you. Not only that but if there's any sort of self-isolation, people aren't going to be going to the shops to queue for a new console even if there are no disruptions to the supply chain.
sumofi 7y ago
There are not many people actually going to e3. I was always curious why it matters at all. As a consumer you have to wait ages and as a journalist you are there a day earlier or have invites. It's much cheaper to invite all relevant journalist on a global scale. But honestly? If I'm able to watch the release show from companies like Ms Sony and co live on YouTube I will do that. I assume this creates more then enough buzz already.
- rtkwe 7y ago
  E3 was for the longest time just an industry show and it did that pretty well there's a lot of interesting stuff that happens just because you have so much of the games industry in the same place. One of my favorites are the couch interviews put on by Giantbomb. They get all sorts of names big and small to come and chat every night. That's the kind of thing a purely digital media strategy can't really replicate.
piptastic 7y ago
Not only that, but people will need new stay at home entertainment more than ever for a while.
walrus01 7y ago
Personal opinion, I don't think the potential consumer purchasers of the next-generation xbox or PS5 are going to be swayed one way or the other by anything that comes out of E3. Or even whether E3 exists or not. Assuming both intend to ship for sales Christmas 2020, towards september/october of this year we're going to see a heavy marketing push with video trailers for the games they will launch with. Very similar to how Halo 3 was promoted with the launch of the Xbox 360.

by smaili 7y ago

Trasmatta 7y ago

Sony was already skipping E3 anyway.

grecy 7y ago

Nikon delayed their D6 DSLR, and I imagine it will get difficult to even produce things like that at the volume they'd need for a launch.

dtech 7y ago

Many publishers were already doing their own thing around E3, both in time and location. Sony was not even participating in E3 2020. It is far far less important than it used to be for the industry E3 2019 might have well been the last one.

jayd16 7y ago

I doubt an e3 cancellation would cause a delay but the virus has made sourcing hardware a lot harder. If they do keep dates they'll see shortages.

JonathonW 7y ago

Unlikely-- E3 (like the other big trade shows in general) has been getting progressively less relevant industry-wide each year, in favor of more direct-to-consumer messaging (like Nintendo's Nintendo Direct presentations). Sony even announced they weren't participating back in January, before all this COVID-19 mess.

georgeecollins 7y ago
This is true. Big companies were the first to pull out of GDC as well. I think the big players feel they have to spend a lot to keep up and they don't get a lot out of it. I believe the smaller companies are the ones that tend to benefit from the big conferences, because it gives them a chance to talk to people all over the world who might not otherwise be available. Speaking for myself, these cancellations are understandable, but a big problem for my work.
- blackearl 7y ago
  I've heard it was more important, at GDC at least, for indies because you have legendary devs walking around who can help small teams get deals or contacts with bigger networks. Make a demo that catches the eye of the right person and it can be really helpful.
  - georgeecollins 7y ago
    Exactly-- you meet new teams you may want to do business with. Devs meet people who want to invest. Not exactly helpful for EA or Activision, but big help to others.

mikewhy 7y ago

Sony had already cancelled, so there's no difference to them. I don't see either company delaying the release due to E3 being cancelled. Other supply line constraints from the same root cause, maybe.

blackearl 7y ago

There's been a shift to siloed announcements anyways. Nintendo Direct have been recurring chunks of announcements, I don't see why Sony and MS wouldn't start doing the same.

mikepurvis 7y ago
Sony: https://www.playstation.com/en-us/explore/state-of-play/ https://www.playstation.com/en-us/explore/state-of-play/ Microsoft: https://news.xbox.com/en-us/insidexbox/ https://news.xbox.com/en-us/insidexbox/

ErneX 7y ago

Sony skipped last E3 and also this one. They did not like the new direction the event was supposedly taking. Geoff Keighley also decided to not do his E3 Coliseum show that he used to host for multiple years.

smcgaw 7y ago

I think supply chain disruptions for manufacturing the new hardware and disruption to development of the launch games are probably more likely to affect the release plans.

joshschreuder 7y ago
Yeah I'm with you. Not only that but if there's any sort of self-isolation, people aren't going to be going to the shops to queue for a new console even if there are no disruptions to the supply chain.

sumofi 7y ago

There are not many people actually going to e3. I was always curious why it matters at all. As a consumer you have to wait ages and as a journalist you are there a day earlier or have invites. It's much cheaper to invite all relevant journalist on a global scale. But honestly? If I'm able to watch the release show from companies like Ms Sony and co live on YouTube I will do that. I assume this creates more then enough buzz already.

rtkwe 7y ago
E3 was for the longest time just an industry show and it did that pretty well there's a lot of interesting stuff that happens just because you have so much of the games industry in the same place. One of my favorites are the couch interviews put on by Giantbomb. They get all sorts of names big and small to come and chat every night. That's the kind of thing a purely digital media strategy can't really replicate.

piptastic 7y ago

Not only that, but people will need new stay at home entertainment more than ever for a while.

walrus01 7y ago

Personal opinion, I don't think the potential consumer purchasers of the next-generation xbox or PS5 are going to be swayed one way or the other by anything that comes out of E3. Or even whether E3 exists or not. Assuming both intend to ship for sales Christmas 2020, towards september/october of this year we're going to see a heavy marketing push with video trailers for the games they will launch with. Very similar to how Halo 3 was promoted with the launch of the Xbox 360.