Why E3?
The bastardized, watered-down version of E3 has come and gone, and journalists have started comprising their lists of how next year's E3 can be improved. But do we even need an E3? This year wasn't packed with megaton announcements, instead focusing on games only being released this year. It was focused on the media being able to play a few games that have already been announced, only two or three months before their release. To what end? How does this benefit companies? Was it them just throwing us a bone because we expect E3 to wow us? Us, of course, referring to the gamer community. We are a demanding sort, picking through every announcement, every press release, trying to find tidbits of information about games that aren't even released yet. It's a culture of impatience, and I believe that the game companies just plain don't need E3 any longer.
Sure, I could talk about how the show could be improved for my own comfort level. But at that point, aren't we just going through the motions? Almost every PR rep I talked to at the show mentioned big announcements being held for Leipzig, or Tokyo Game Show, all of them holding back those precious gems of information we all desire.
It's a big party. It's a great party, filled with free booze and food, schmoozing and networking. It certainly benefits the careers of games journalists, but for the most part the companies represented at E3 could most likely do without the fanfare. E3 is dead, obsolete, and most likely won't return. E for All, coming in October, will reinforce this. Just imagine big game companies holding out their huge announcements for E for All, a show that is essentially a huge arcade - the very reason the original E3 was shut down. Imagine the outrage!
We are all going to look back at 2007 as a very interesting year for gaming indeed.
What say you?!