How the Grinch ESA Stole Canceled Christmas E3
Matt posted in The Industry on August 2nd, 2006

The news leaked out this weekend. I anxiously awaited the ESA’s press release silently chanting “say it ain’t so, say it ain’t so”. I figured people were being alarmist! E3 cancelled? No way! How could they be so foolish? How could they ruin the biggest event in gaming? Then the official press release came out, and I felt like crying. More information soon followed that the next E3′s attendance will be cut to 5,000, a small fraction of its typical 70,000 attendance. I have a very strong feeling that the game development community is not going to be included in that 5,000. With a number that small, they can only accommodate the large press and the buyers for companies.

E3 is the most exciting time in the game development community! As soon as E3 was over this year, I anxiously started counting down the days until the next E3. Not only do I go to E3 all three days, but I read all the E3 coverage on all the websites for over a month afterwards. So, where will I go to play all the games in development? Where will I be able to show off the game I’m working on to all my friends? Where else will they show off vaporware consoles? Luckily, the ESA has an answer for that. I can just go to either the Games Convention in Leipzig, the Tokyo Game Show… and others around the world.” That’s great! So,  instead of going to a game convention in Los Angeles (where I live), I should go to some other country for their games convention. Thanks ESA for the valuable advice!

Sarcasm aside, the main problem appears to be money. Apparently, EA is leading the charge of publishers who don’t think they are getting all their bang for their buck. Yeah, maybe they are right. Maybe it wasn’t necessary for Vivendi Universal to recreate the famous stairway set from Scarface inside the LA Convention center. Maybe Activision didn’t need to build a large half pipe in their booth. Maybe everyone doesn’t need to invest in 10,000 Watt sound systems that prohibit conversations or even hearing the audio for the games you are playing. (Although, I don’t know what EA is complaining about because in the E3s I attended, their booths always seemed to be the most bare bones out of any of the major publishers.) So yes, I think cutting costs is a very reasonable idea. Maybe some people enjoyed watching people skate inside E3, but I went to play games. Sure, the photo ops on the Scarface stairway may be fun (I didn’t bother with it), but I’d agree that it’s not going to sell many more copies of the game. Unfortunately, they seem to be going WAY overboard with the cost cutting measures, and this is a REALLY bad idea.

E3 generates a lot of hype, which is very helpful. For example, I wasn’t really all that excited about Gears of War until I saw CliffyB demo it. Because of my excitement, I’ve written about it in my blog, told friends about it, discussed it on forums and mailing lists, and probably generated some hype for it. That’s just me. Multiply that by the thousands of people who saw CliffyB’s demo. There’s no other good way to do something like that. I don’t think you can make a video of someone demoing a game and create the same experience. There’s something to be said for actually being there, and also it’s interesting to see how the game is being played first hand, since a lot of smoke and mirrors can go on in demos.

It also generates a lot of hype because it’s such a big event, consumers get more excited about checking out game press. I’m sure there are many people who don’t really follow game press except around E3 time. Because of this, publishers gain a lot of interest in some of their titles. For example, if someone never read the game press, but started reading it around E3, they can find out about new titles that they wouldn’t ordinarily hear about. For example, I was at E3 all three days, and I didn’t even notice the Rule of the Rose trailer. There was some post E3 coverage of that game that I read, and now I’m really excited about it! So, if there isn’t a ton of information being released, or it’s all videos and very few people get to play it, then people aren’t going to be as interested in reading the press.

People claim that it allows game developers to focus more on developing the game. Well, I know regardless of whether 70,000 people get to see my game, or just 5,000, I’ll still have to work my butt off to make a great demo. Just because less people see it, doesn’t mean that we don’t have to do a demo. But, if I’m working triple digit hours a week, I’d prefer more people to see the game than just a few. Also, it’s nice to get feedback from other developers. I have friends who work at other companies who’s opinions I really respect. Outside of E3, there’s no way to get feedback from them about the game I’m working on. With non-disclosure agreements being what they are, it’s pretty much impossible to get an outside opinion on your game except through E3. I think this type of feedback helps improve the quality of games and is valuable to the industry. Does it help the bottom line? Better games certainly can, but it’s very difficult to establish a direct correlation, so the people in finance might not see it that way.

The other advantage of E3 is that it allows innovation to spread faster. If game developers can play other games, it can inspire them to improve their own title with ideas from others. I’m not trying to say that they should copy the games they play at E3. There are very few completely new and revolutionary ideas in the game industry. Even the Wii controller is an evolution of previously executed ideas. Microsoft as well as others had a motion sensitive controller long before the Wii was announced, and there’s been IR based light guns that allow aiming. I’m not trying to say that Nintendo completely ripped them off. Rather I’m saying that every idea needs inspiration and that inspiration usually comes from products in the same field. Also, by seeing what other people are doing and improving on it, or adding your own twist you can make a product that’s unlike or better than your inspiration. For example, the folks responsible for Shadow of the Colossus may have been inspired by the giant final boss fight in Serious Sam: The First Encounter. I don’t think anyone would accuse Shadow of the Colossus of being a rip off of any game (especially Serious Sam), but I imagine the idea came from another game either directly or indirectly. Now, Shadow of the Colossus may be a bad example because it was in development for a very long time, but it’s very possible for game developers to get the inspiration by playing another game and incorporate it into a title already in development. If game developers don’t have that opportunity to play the game that inspired them a while before it’s released, then their innovation will be delayed until the game is released.

It is very interesting that they mention the Games Convention and the Tokyo Game Show. You’d think that these are evidence that big game extravaganzas are popular and that having one in the United States would be worth their while. With E3 being nerfed, maybe there’s room for another convention to rise in its place. Comic Con has more and more video game companies demoing stuff, although it usually isn’t the latest and greatest games like E3. Nintendo only showed DS stuff, and Sony didn’t show any Playstation 3 games. Maybe the organizers of Comic Con will take the initiative and make a special game convention spin-off. The problem with that is if it’s open to people outside the industry, it’s going to be even more crowded than E3 or Comic Con, and both were really crowded. That would be even more difficult and expensive to try to accommodate all those people, but the Tokyo Game Show’s  attendance is 160,000 or more, so I guess it can be done. Also, TGS isn’t open to the public every day, so maybe that’s the format that this new game show could take.

All in all, I think the decision to effectively cancel E3 and replace it with something that is a faint shadow of its former glory is a bad one. I could be biased because I love E3, but I really think that it was good for the industry. Sure, it was overly extravagant, and they could easily cut costs without ruining the show, but reducing the size to 5,000 is a big mistake. Allowing developers to see what everyone else is working on increases the exchange of ideas, which is only a good thing. The hype surrounding it can renew people’s interest in the new games coming out and make them aware of new ones. If it’s only a few press outlets, then there won’t be as much information out there, which means less hype. I only hope that the ESA realizes the folly of their new strategy soon, or someone else takes the initiative and creates something even better than the old E3.