Sony Win E3 2019 – By not showing up!

Okay so this may come across as negative and a little cynical but I feel that Sony deciding to bow out of this year’s E3 was a smart progressive decision. Below I will list the reasons why:

 

Dated Format

For years E3 has struggled to keep up with media consumption. The old tact of presenting a huge trade show was primarily to sell products to whole sale outlets and also to get the journalists in to report on whatever they saw. You needed to sell your wares to the Gamestops and the other major outlets of the world and hopefully they buy into your hype and put your products on their shelves. You also rely on the journalists writing heavy praise about what they saw. That was the real reason for this multi-million expensive event being held once a year and unfortunately, the format hasn’t progressed over the years even though the market has completely changed.

Nowadays, we have YouTube and bloggers and a million websites to spread the gaming news to the consumer on a daily basis. We also no longer really buy products from stores anymore (RIP Gamestop). We can now get all the news, releases and reviews all the time all year round. You no longer need a spectacle or event to attract the consumer and each big publisher can produce their own polished new release video. Both Sony & Nintendo (Nintendo being first) have adopted this idea through their own direct videos with great success. Big shout out to Nintendo this year for dropping ‘Breath of the Wild’ sequel at the end of their direct….talk about show stopper!

Also, the need for floor shows has also gone away as our access to games companies has become more intimate and immediate. You don’t rely on game journalism to provide all your information, you can watch your favorite YouTuber or Twitch streamer play and endorse the games you’re interested in.

All of that said, I’ve always enjoyed E3. I feel it’s a brilliant showcase to save your big news dumps for and have always looked forward to it. The conferences especially always bring some hype. But it is definitely unnecessary and news for gaming should be all year round (and is)!

That’s E3 in general and also a list of great reasons why Sony may have bowed out along with EA but lets look at this year’s E3 in particular!

I won’t go into huge details but I will give a quick roundup and opinion on the conferences and news reveals from this years E3 :

 

Microsoft Conference

I’ll start with the big one. Everyone said (including me) that this was Microsoft’s year to shine. With no Sony Conference to compete with, it would make sense for Microsoft to bring out the big guns and steal all the main stage limelight. Did they do it? Of course not! This conference was really tame. They boasted 60 new game releases and almost all of them were mediocre. I am struggling now to remember any but a handful of games. There just is very little exciting coming soon from Microsoft which isn’t surprising. Their biggest title Halo was announced for next console which I’m sure was a bitter sweet reveal for Xbox players. The highlight of their presentation was the specs and release window for their next gen console but again, Sony have already taken the sting out of this announcement by revealing their own so I wasn’t overly impressed by their news. Keyword for both companies is solid state drives and quick loading times which is a dull thing to boast about but whatever. Nobody is boasting must have next gen games as we’re in that weird spot between consoles and it’ll be next year before we see anything exciting for us gamers.

 

Bethesda

Just forget it! These guys are clueless! This was one of the worst conferences I’ve seen in many years. They should have followed EAs lead and just had some videos or game play to share instead of wasting airtime with a bloated conference. Anyone impressed by Fallout battle royale is clearly an idiot and their lack of acknowledgement of their recent failings is laughable. There was nothing here worth seeing!

 

Ubisoft – AKA The Tom Clancy Show

Watch Dogs, For Honor, The Division, Ghost Recon….wait….what year it it again?? Yes, although some of the above looked impressive, it is all sequels and DLC for existing Ip’s. Nothing particularly jaw dropping although WatchDogs Legion has caught my interest with it’s futuristic London and ‘recruit a team’ game idea with permadeath. Apart from that though, there really wasn’t much fanfare for anything else.

 

Conclusion

The whole thing was just….Meh! Which is a sign that things need to change. So again if you ask me who won E3? The cynical me has to say….Sony! The upbeat version of me would say…KEANU REEVES..what a legend!! He was breathtaking!!!!!

 

What do you think? Is it time to bury E3 out the back garden? Is Devolver Digital’s show still parody when it’s so close to the truth? Did I get any of my crazy predictions right? You can check the link below to find out :

 

https://geekgasm.org/2019/06/02/e3-2019-pauls-crazy-predictions/