A discussion on the E3 Expo. Is it time to evolve, or maybe expire?
Greetings!
So this is me trying to form a cohesive structure to all the thoughts I've been having regarding the Expo after watching all conferences, day 1 impressions and reading reactions. I also have attended the show in the past (2004-2006) so have a bit of first-hand experience on the subject too. Now granted, this could just be this year only, but I definitely recall having similar feelings last year though not as pronounced.
Basically, I am wondering if the E3 show is really worth it anymore as a means of "Marketing" (because that is what it is) and exposure. And if, in its current format, is still a worthwhile, viable means of advertising for the game industry in today's super digital age. (and yes, I do remember the show going through a bit of change a few years ago too, which wasn't well received).
I wonder all this because, from the way I've been watching things, it seems as though the big publishers are the only ones getting exposure, and these guys are more than capable of holding their own events and such that would market their titles. I mean, is there any small developer or publisher that is getting recognition and coverage at the show? Even Japanese publishers/developers seem to have backed off on the show, as there is barely any presence from them outside of Nintendo.
Also, from my own admittedly limited experience, developers themselves don't like E3. It's usually an inconvenience involving messing up the preplanned milestone schedules and adds a ton of work on top of a usually already filled workload.
And well, back to this years show in particular, there really was nothing earth-shattering or ground-breaking announced. Again, could just be this year in particular, but I could swear I have noticed a trend of publishers in recent years playing it safe and scripting everything down to a t. The "Big 3" certainly did not go out of their way to give any word on their future plans, not even a tease.
So, I suppose I just want to have a discussion with everyone about your thoughts and opinions about the show, its format, and what you think it should do in future years. What positives does it still retain and what might need fixing (if anything).
So yeah, hopefully somewhat coherent. :poly142:
So this is me trying to form a cohesive structure to all the thoughts I've been having regarding the Expo after watching all conferences, day 1 impressions and reading reactions. I also have attended the show in the past (2004-2006) so have a bit of first-hand experience on the subject too. Now granted, this could just be this year only, but I definitely recall having similar feelings last year though not as pronounced.
Basically, I am wondering if the E3 show is really worth it anymore as a means of "Marketing" (because that is what it is) and exposure. And if, in its current format, is still a worthwhile, viable means of advertising for the game industry in today's super digital age. (and yes, I do remember the show going through a bit of change a few years ago too, which wasn't well received).
I wonder all this because, from the way I've been watching things, it seems as though the big publishers are the only ones getting exposure, and these guys are more than capable of holding their own events and such that would market their titles. I mean, is there any small developer or publisher that is getting recognition and coverage at the show? Even Japanese publishers/developers seem to have backed off on the show, as there is barely any presence from them outside of Nintendo.
Also, from my own admittedly limited experience, developers themselves don't like E3. It's usually an inconvenience involving messing up the preplanned milestone schedules and adds a ton of work on top of a usually already filled workload.
And well, back to this years show in particular, there really was nothing earth-shattering or ground-breaking announced. Again, could just be this year in particular, but I could swear I have noticed a trend of publishers in recent years playing it safe and scripting everything down to a t. The "Big 3" certainly did not go out of their way to give any word on their future plans, not even a tease.
So, I suppose I just want to have a discussion with everyone about your thoughts and opinions about the show, its format, and what you think it should do in future years. What positives does it still retain and what might need fixing (if anything).
So yeah, hopefully somewhat coherent. :poly142:
Replies
Kinda like all those computer trade shows where Asus, MSI & Co show they newest tech so investors will invest, consumers stash some cash away to buy the new toy when it's out, other companies will buy licenses, make distribution deals or order parts from them.
There's a lot of this going on behind the scenes on E3, and the better your show is, the better those deals will be.
In 2007/2008 they even tried to remove the party element and created a second Expo called E For All (http://www.1up.com/news/expo-officially-axed).
I remember someone here posting a while ago that E3 is just a "wankfest for publishers and the media", I kind of have to agree.
I have been thinking this for some time now. Im only intrested about the UE4 launch today.
But seriously people should be moore reluctant to getting hyped. That only ends in dissapointments and flamewars. Especially fully CG trailers...that just like a publisher jerking off in your face for a minute.
The author completely eviscerates this years show in particular, with paragraphs such as this: or this: Judging by prior posts and other feedback I've gotten, I imagine most industry people will read this article and go "so?" or "it's been that way for some time".
Like I said, I've attended a few E3's and have followed the conferences pretty much every year. But for some reason this year just left me without any excitement and even kind of a bad taste in the mouth that I cannot recall having with prior years. Maybe I've reached that arbitrary point in time when I've become "old".
Aside from the feeling, that Wii-U, Smart Glass and whatever this PS3-Vita connection is called (everything Asynchronys gaming) is a big mistake for the companies. Shane of GT said something i really agree with, the 3rd parties seem to dont want to redo controls for a 2 year old game just to release on a console whichs sales potential no one can see now, thats why Big N already presented the old school controller. And i expect that for all the other concepts. Devs can't be bothered, it is a lot of work, especially if it goes outside the walled garden as the smart glass supporting Windws Phone, Android and supposingly even iOS, to add deep support for your game to make use for your Phone, tablet or whatever (especially since this is another device aside from the regular controller you have to keep track of). If i want info about a movie iam watching i get the free IMDB app, Info about a musician i check the wiki page on my smart phone not big of a deal. Especially for PS3 since you NEED a Vita. i just see this as a wrong development, with a decent idea behind it.
So really from big announcements the SE engine really excited me, UE4 is awesome, Watch Dogs, Hawken, South park the game.
However, ask yourself this, we live in a world where they put Transformers in the movie Battleships, can we honestly expect anything more out of the game industry?
Actually, ask yourself this: imagine the artists that could feed their families from the salary they got from working on games like these, who here hasn't worked on a movie cash-in or equalent?
There will ALWAYS be a market for these kind of products, and for now it's a big market.
We're first and foremost developers and artists on polycount, after that we're gamers.
The world is always like this I think. imho 90% of any given genre or medium is trash. I'm ok with that, it lets the true gems really stand out. I don't care how many battleships or transformers they come out with. As long as I get to go see my Dark knight rises, The hobbit, Inception and other amazing films. I wont be playing shitty games so I guess if it keeps the industry afloat then I'm ok with it.
Now quality and rehashing is one subject, but the thing that's really getting to me now is the trend of showing off gore and violence as though it were the main focus of everything. I love violent video games but I play them because they are fun, not because they are violent. The fun part for me isn't watching a ton of organs and blood explode out of a dude... no the fun part is the challenge of playing the game. If it has a little gore, I'm fine with that.
The fact that people want to see more of this sick obsession with blood and gore is kind of scary when looking at our culture as a whole. If I saw any of this stuff happen in real life id be traumatized forever... I don't think putting it on a pedestal is the right direction for our industry.
On a side note, I'm very interested in some of these games as a whole, it's just how they were portrayed at E3 seemed to be a bit skewed.
Something to look forward to really.
But for games, there are not that many games even today, that are REALLY bad. I mean uninspired, old news, rehashings but really bad? Just considering fresh games no remakes, HD Collections or some crap, the games today are not bad but it just feels the fresh winds in there. I mean every CoD was fun, it felt like the same game every time, but not like bad games. Funnily the worst games seem to be those build around a gimmick of a console (anything related to Kinect). I mean since companies went away from (mostly) tie in games, we dodge quite some bullets. I mean we even see several decent license games. So there is not so much to complain about quality in games.