The biggest gaming event of the year is always E3, the Electronic Entertainment Expo. It's hosted by the ESA, the Entertainment Software Association. This current year has seen a number of top publishers pulling out of E3 as exhibitors, and it has opened up a possibility that a lot of gamers would potentially love.
According to Wired, with Electronic Arts, Activision, Bandai Namco, Sega and Disney opting out of exhibitor booths at this year's E3, it has set pause in the direction of the event by the ESA's top brass. In fact, while the show will still go on they have been considering doing something that gamers have historically longed for: making E3 open to the public.
Rich Taylor from the ESA explained to MCVUK that could consider opening E3 to more than just businesses, allowing the general public to purchase tickets to attend the event, saying...
The consumer question is certainly part of the equation and one we will be taking a hard look at, […] You saw last year, certain companies brought along some of their most valued customers. We will probably end up doing that again this year, and there will be some additional elements on top of that, that may or may not come.
Wired makes the argument that opening up E3 to the public is probably a good decision for the ESA to make. Opening up gaming to the public is something that the organizers of GamesCom have done, and it's now considered one of the biggest trade shows of the year, housing a total of 345,000 guests, both from the public and the private sector. The event in Cologne, Germany has become a massive spectacle and is usually considered to be the European E3, capping off a second half of the year with big announcements and reveals. GamesCom has quickly found itself being amongst the top three expos of the year, alongside E3 and the Tokyo Game Show.
On the opposite end of the spectrum, however, E3 only managed 52,200 attendees from the business sector, but a lot of the big news coming out of the event is usually from the stage conferences and mid-show announcements. There's also all the footage and streaming that takes place when major trade publications attend to capture footage and land exclusive interviews.
Opening up E3 to the public would definitely add to the attendance levels of the event but it would also add a number of other issues to the equation, such as a convention center being large enough to actually house all of the participants, as well as ticket prices and whether or not exhibitors can control footage and photos being taken of games and products still in development. For instance, there are a lot of games on display at E3 that have NDAs when it comes to sharing photos and videos publicly, just the same as there are stipulations and mandates on what publications allow to go to print based on what they capture at certain booths. In other words, there's a lot of logistics involved.
Nevertheless, if the ESA decides to make E3 go public, it could drastically change the way the event is viewed and the way gamers interact with their favorite developers and games.
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