Speaker 1: Welcome to text Tuff, a production from I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host,
Speaker 1: Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with iHeart Radio and
Speaker 1: I love all things tech and I owe you guys
Speaker 1: an explanation because I had intended to have a brand
Speaker 1: new episode published today. It was going to be about
Speaker 1: hard drives and solid state drives. But ironically, though not
Speaker 1: really because it didn't involve my hard drive. I lost it.
Speaker 1: There was a power issue as well as an internet issue,
Speaker 1: and the combination of those meant that my audio file
Speaker 1: was corrupted and I could not I tried to retrieve it.
Speaker 1: Trust me, it was not finished when the issue happened,
Speaker 1: and I wasn't able to retrieve it or recover it.
Speaker 1: And the same is true for my notes. I was
Speaker 1: saving directly to the cloud. I did not realize that
Speaker 1: my Internet connection had dropped out, so I didn't have
Speaker 1: a full version of my notes. I had an incomplete version,
Speaker 1: which meant that I needed to you know, rewrite stuff,
Speaker 1: so that put me behind schedule and I never want
Speaker 1: to go without publishing an episode, so in order to
Speaker 1: tide me over until Wednesday's episode, which will be the
Speaker 1: hard Drive in Solid State Drive episode. I thought we
Speaker 1: should listen to a classic episode, and when choosing, I
Speaker 1: figured a good one would be how E three Works.
Speaker 1: This episode originally aired on June twenty nine. Now. E three,
Speaker 1: for those of you who do not know, is a
Speaker 1: big trade conference that centers around video games, and of
Speaker 1: course this year in twenty twenty, they canceled the physical
Speaker 1: conference fairly early on, uh not not too long after
Speaker 1: it became clear that COVID was going to be a
Speaker 1: really big problem, and so there was no physical conference
Speaker 1: this year. Instead, companies released information, some around a more
Speaker 1: virtual E three type schedule, but others kind of did
Speaker 1: it just on their own, you know, their own timing,
Speaker 1: And a lot of people have come up with some
Speaker 1: ideas about whether or not this means E three itself
Speaker 1: is a thing of the past, if it's ever going
Speaker 1: to return. I'll talk more about that after the episode airs,
Speaker 1: but first let's listen to this classic episode, How E
Speaker 1: three works. E three and its history and its place
Speaker 1: in video games. Um, it's something that if you've never
Speaker 1: been and you only have followed the news that breaks
Speaker 1: regarding E three, you may not be fully aware of
Speaker 1: exactly what it's supposed to be. It is a trade show.
Speaker 1: It typically takes place in Los Angeles, California, although it
Speaker 1: has taken place in other locations throughout its history, and
Speaker 1: it's uh like many trade shows, it's really meant for
Speaker 1: companies to have lots of meetings and conferences, but also
Speaker 1: to show off their products. In fact, it's largely become
Speaker 1: a press oriented event where companies are unveiling big new
Speaker 1: ideas to try and get a lot of buzz behind them.
Speaker 1: Sometimes they do it a little too early and you
Speaker 1: might end up losing momentum by the time something finally
Speaker 1: comes out. Sometimes the things they announced never come out
Speaker 1: at all, and I also can become a problem. But
Speaker 1: I wanted to go through some of the history um
Speaker 1: and it's gone through a lot of changes. It first
Speaker 1: debuted back in nineteen So I'm gonna give a history
Speaker 1: and evolution of the show, including some of the big
Speaker 1: things that have happened during particular years. Don't worry, I'm
Speaker 1: not gonna go through full details of every single year.
Speaker 1: I'm going to give overviews of a lot of them,
Speaker 1: but the early years I want to pay special attention
Speaker 1: to because that was back when E three was kind
Speaker 1: of finding its identity. Now, before E three, hardware manufacturers
Speaker 1: and software companies would show off their stuff at other
Speaker 1: types of trade shows, one of the big ones being
Speaker 1: c e S formerly known as the Consumer Electronics Showcase.
Speaker 1: In fact, the Nintendo Entertainment System debuted at CES back
Speaker 1: in ve and uh a Natari computer debuted back in
Speaker 1: the late seventies. Xbox, the original Xbox, debut in two
Speaker 1: thousand one. That was even after E three was formed.
Speaker 1: But the problem with c e S is that it's
Speaker 1: really big and it covers the entire spectrum of consumer electronics.
Speaker 1: Video games are just a tiny little spice of that,
Speaker 1: so they would often be overlooked, and sometimes they'd be
Speaker 1: put in really inconvenient spots on the show floor. And
Speaker 1: for a while C e S and the Adult Entertainment
Speaker 1: Expo we're running at the same time. There were times
Speaker 1: where in order to get to the video game section
Speaker 1: at c e S you'd have to walk through the
Speaker 1: adult entertainment conference to get there, and a lot of
Speaker 1: the companies that were working on video game systems and
Speaker 1: software they didn't take too kindly to that. They didn't
Speaker 1: like that they were being shoveled off to the side
Speaker 1: or put in inconvenient locations. So there started to be
Speaker 1: some discussion among various companies about what they might do
Speaker 1: about that. So in some top video game publishers and
Speaker 1: hardware manufacturers formed a new organization called the Interactive Digital
Speaker 1: Software Association or i d s A. UH. This would
Speaker 1: later on evolve into the Entertainment Software Association or e
Speaker 1: s A. So in heart that association access an advocacy
Speaker 1: group for video game companies fighting for stuff that isn't
Speaker 1: always a benefit to consumers. For example, the e s
Speaker 1: A has supported SOPA and PIPPA, which are two pieces
Speaker 1: of legislation that a lot of people opposed, but they
Speaker 1: also advocate for stuff that consumers appreciate, and one of
Speaker 1: those things was how can we create an event where
Speaker 1: we can have our own trade show and we're not
Speaker 1: overshadowed by other types of technology. So in this association
Speaker 1: partnered with a company called International Data Group that are
Speaker 1: known as I d G to create a new trade
Speaker 1: show centered in Los Angeles. The event took place from
Speaker 1: May leventh to mayt at the Los Angeles Convention Center,
Speaker 1: and the day before the show floor opened, CEOs of
Speaker 1: some of the biggest game companies held a press conference
Speaker 1: to talk about the future of the gaming industry. If
Speaker 1: you follow the three today, you know that essentially the
Speaker 1: same thing happens now where companies will hold a huge
Speaker 1: press event before the show floor opens in order to
Speaker 1: get as much coverage as possible and excite people and
Speaker 1: convince them to come to their booth at the show
Speaker 1: floor and cover their products. And sometimes these events are amazing,
Speaker 1: and sometimes they are cringeworthy. You will sit through there
Speaker 1: and you'll hear some of the worst forced humor, particularly
Speaker 1: when you have executives who aren't really used to giving
Speaker 1: a lot of public speeches, and they'll do terrible setups
Speaker 1: and punchlines. I mean worse than mine, at least with mine.
Speaker 1: It's a natural delivery. The jokes are bad, but I
Speaker 1: know how to deliver them. So sometimes you get a
Speaker 1: great presentation that's really compelling. Sometimes you get a presentation
Speaker 1: that's pretty painful to watch. Usually the trailers help, the
Speaker 1: movie trailers, or rather the video game trailers help. They
Speaker 1: can move things along, even if the stage production part
Speaker 1: is a little hard to watch. So what was like?
Speaker 1: What was that first E three actually like? Well, I
Speaker 1: wasn't there, but I've read a lot about it. That
Speaker 1: was a big year in video games. N That was
Speaker 1: when um Sega was touting the Sega Saturn. That was
Speaker 1: their attempt to try and rest the number one spot
Speaker 1: away from the Nintendo uh, which ultimately actually would fall
Speaker 1: on Sony's shoulders, not Nintendo are not Sega's shoulders. So
Speaker 1: Sega had already launched the Saturn in Japan at the
Speaker 1: tail end of nineteen, but it wasn't scheduled to hitch
Speaker 1: store shelves until September two. However, during Sega's press conference,
Speaker 1: the company surprised the audience by announcing it had shipped
Speaker 1: the Saturn to a few retailers in the United States,
Speaker 1: meaning it was available that day for the retail price
Speaker 1: of three hundred nine dollars four hundred bucks in That
Speaker 1: is not an insignificant amount of money, but it was
Speaker 1: a pretty good mic drop moment to say, you know,
Speaker 1: we thought about scheduling it so it would come out
Speaker 1: in September. It's available now. The first Sony PlayStation had
Speaker 1: also launched in the end of so it was still
Speaker 1: new on the market in Japan, but it was not
Speaker 1: yet out in the United States. So in Sony's press conference,
Speaker 1: they talked about it debuting in the US, and Steve
Speaker 1: Race of Sony said only one thing during the press conference.
Speaker 1: Steve Race came out at the press conference, looked at
Speaker 1: the audience and the only thing Race said was two dollars,
Speaker 1: and that brought the house down. It was a hundred
Speaker 1: dollars cheaper than the Sega alternative. Nintendo, for its part,
Speaker 1: announced that it's next system, which would become known as
Speaker 1: the Nintendo sixty four, would be delayed until nine, so
Speaker 1: they didn't have any hardware to show off. They didn't
Speaker 1: have an enormous press conference at E three, but they
Speaker 1: did throw a big party before the show itself. Uh
Speaker 1: and the company has done some similar things in following
Speaker 1: E three throughout the years. In fact, there's some years
Speaker 1: where Nintendo doesn't really have much of a presence at
Speaker 1: E three, but will hold its own event just before
Speaker 1: E three two, kind of piggyback onto everything. Nintendo also
Speaker 1: had the largest booth on the exhibition floor space in
Speaker 1: the main hall. The second largest booth belonged to a Claim. Now.
Speaker 1: One of the things Nintendo showed off was the Virtual Boy. Yes,
Speaker 1: the virtual Boy, the Migraine making machine that convinced us
Speaker 1: that virtual reality was a long long way away. And
Speaker 1: it also shows how unreliable my memory is. I always
Speaker 1: associate the Virtual Boy as something that came out earlier before,
Speaker 1: like in the late nineteen eighties. My associate with my childhood,
Speaker 1: but actually I was I was older than that when
Speaker 1: it came out. Maybe it was just a child at heart.
Speaker 1: At any rate, the Virtual Boy was a big push
Speaker 1: from Nintendo, and obviously that did not work out so
Speaker 1: well for them. Meanwhile, you had a Claim that was
Speaker 1: showing off licensed games like Judge Dread and Batman Forever.
Speaker 1: But those games were not terribly great. They didn't look great.
Speaker 1: It was it was clear that a claim was not
Speaker 1: incredibly sure that this was alone going to pull people
Speaker 1: into their booths. So they did something pretty innovative. You know,
Speaker 1: keep in mind this is the first E three. So
Speaker 1: what does a claim do for their booth. They get
Speaker 1: hold of the motorcycle from Judge Dread and the batmobile
Speaker 1: in Batman Forever and put both of those in their booth.
Speaker 1: And they also hired a ton of models, uh young
Speaker 1: ladies where ring revealing clothing to entice people into their booth.
Speaker 1: So even at the very first E three there were
Speaker 1: booth babes uh, which is not a great, you know label,
Speaker 1: but that is what people tend to refer to, you know,
Speaker 1: the ladies who have been hired to bring people into
Speaker 1: the booth. Um. Also, at that time, the three d
Speaker 1: O was still around. The three d O famously one
Speaker 1: of the entertainment systems that never really got a good
Speaker 1: foothold in the gaming industry, but it was still around
Speaker 1: at that point, so get's the gecko was there. Three
Speaker 1: d O also decided to get some ladies to try
Speaker 1: and bring people into their booth. In that case, three
Speaker 1: d O went with the San Diego Chargers cheerleading squad,
Speaker 1: so subtle. Also Neo g O c D debut that
Speaker 1: was from s N. K Uh. One of the people
Speaker 1: in attendance a celebrity this is really classy, John Wayne Bobbitt.
Speaker 1: He was famous for um well, there's no reason to
Speaker 1: go into it on this show, but he was there,
Speaker 1: and he was promoting a company that created interactive porn software,
Speaker 1: so a very unsettling kind of thing for some of
Speaker 1: the other companies. They weren't so sure that they wanted
Speaker 1: to have this kind of entertainment included with video games.
Speaker 1: So they actually designed the show floor so there was
Speaker 1: a bordered off section away from general traffic, so that
Speaker 1: it wasn't just incorporated directly into the exhibition hall with
Speaker 1: everybody else. Seka had the biggest booth at the South Hall.
Speaker 1: Sony also had a very large booth. Sony's was particularly
Speaker 1: flashy and expensive. Sony threw a big party, and the
Speaker 1: biggest news about Sony's party was about someone who attended
Speaker 1: the party just to play games, my Chael Jackson. H
Speaker 1: And at that time, Atari was starting to fade from
Speaker 1: the home console market. The Jaguar had underperformed in the market,
Speaker 1: and so the company only had a small booth at
Speaker 1: E three. And if you're wondering what sort of big
Speaker 1: games were shown off in that year, in they included
Speaker 1: classics like Twisted Metal and Mortal Kombat three. Uh. The
Speaker 1: next year in E three was a different story. First
Speaker 1: of all, Sega Saturn had completely flopped in the market,
Speaker 1: and Nintendo's Virtual Boy also was a failure, so both
Speaker 1: of those companies were nursing their wounds. In nine, Sony
Speaker 1: PlayStation was actually starting to gain some traction and become
Speaker 1: competitive in in Nintendo's space. It hadn't overtaken Nintendo yet,
Speaker 1: but it was on its way, and no one was
Speaker 1: really sure at the video game industry was doing well
Speaker 1: or not. There were a lot of fears that with
Speaker 1: all the different video game systems of the market from
Speaker 1: all the different companies, that the industry was heading toward
Speaker 1: another console crash, like the video game Crash of Night three.
Speaker 1: So Nintendo that year announced the in sixty four at
Speaker 1: the show. Remember the previous year they had to delay it,
Speaker 1: So they announced the in sixty four. They're saying it
Speaker 1: would cost two fifty dollars. They also showed off Super
Speaker 1: Mario sixty four and that got a great response. When
Speaker 1: people saw that Mario could move and three dimensions, it
Speaker 1: blew everyone's mind, which is kind of funny to think
Speaker 1: about now, but at the time it was huge. Nintendo
Speaker 1: also announced a game that's widely considered one of the
Speaker 1: best of all time, Golden I, which is based off
Speaker 1: the James Bond film. Now, they just sort of announced
Speaker 1: it and showed a little bit of concept art and
Speaker 1: stuff like that. They didn't really go into much detail.
Speaker 1: That would come later the next year. They also showed
Speaker 1: off a slim down game Boy called the game Boy Pocket,
Speaker 1: and at the Nintendo party they had circud the sole
Speaker 1: a performer is performing stunts and walking on stilts and stuff,
Speaker 1: which was a little weird from what I understand. Again,
Speaker 1: I wasn't there this one either. We'll be back with
Speaker 1: more about E three and just a moment, but first
Speaker 1: let's take a quick break. Sony announced that the PlayStation
Speaker 1: would drop in price to a Now this was controversial
Speaker 1: because the various presidents of the companies had kind of
Speaker 1: come to an understanding that no one was going to
Speaker 1: go to the press event and drop a bombshell that
Speaker 1: would adversely affect the other companies. So why did Sony
Speaker 1: come out and say the PlayStation was going to drop
Speaker 1: to bucks. Well, this is because the person who was
Speaker 1: in charge of Sony at that time was newly in
Speaker 1: charge of Sony's video game market. So his excuse was, hey,
Speaker 1: that was an agreement that my predecessor made. I never
Speaker 1: made that agreement. So Sony says, hey, we're gonna drop
Speaker 1: the price to that kind of put the pressure on
Speaker 1: Nintendo and Sega, both of which would at the same
Speaker 1: event announced that their new consoles would come down to
Speaker 1: UM So that was that was a big deal. That
Speaker 1: put a lot of pressure on those companies. That was
Speaker 1: also the year Microsoft first showed up to E three
Speaker 1: N but it wasn't too promote a console idea. It
Speaker 1: was to pitch Windows as a gaming platform. Now, that
Speaker 1: might blow your mind that in ninet Microsoft is saying, hey,
Speaker 1: let's have more developers create video games for Windows. But
Speaker 1: at that time there were a lot of games that
Speaker 1: were still based on or using DOSS as the operating
Speaker 1: system of choice. So, uh, this was an uphill battle,
Speaker 1: or at least it seemed that way for Microsoft. It
Speaker 1: turned out that before too long it would be impossible
Speaker 1: for you to find a game that would run on DOSS.
Speaker 1: You had to get a Windows installation on your PC
Speaker 1: if you wanted to play games, because all the games
Speaker 1: were made for Windows. I remember at the time I
Speaker 1: was particularly perturbed by this because I was a Doss boy.
Speaker 1: E three changed venues. It actually went to the Georgia
Speaker 1: Dome in my hometown of Atlanta, Georgia. Didn't get to
Speaker 1: go to this one either. At the time, in ninety seven,
Speaker 1: I was not working at How Stuff Works, so I
Speaker 1: was not in the technology field. I would have loved
Speaker 1: to have attended, but I wasn't qualified. Uh. E three
Speaker 1: I should have mentioned earlier is an industry only event.
Speaker 1: It's only been open to the public a couple of
Speaker 1: times and um. Otherwise you have to be either in
Speaker 1: the video game industry or in journalism specifically covering video games.
Speaker 1: Otherwise you are not supposed to go. A lot of
Speaker 1: people end up getting passes to go for various in
Speaker 1: various ways, like maybe they work in marketing, maybe they
Speaker 1: work for a video game retailer, like a retail store.
Speaker 1: But in general, you're not supposed to just have anybody
Speaker 1: show up to these things. They have to have some
Speaker 1: the credentials required to get in so Georgia Dome. The
Speaker 1: trade show held some conferences, some actual panel discussions, not
Speaker 1: just press events and game demos. They actually held discussions
Speaker 1: about emerging trends and video games, including a strange new
Speaker 1: world of online gaming, something that was relatively young in Also,
Speaker 1: there was a type of video game that was really
Speaker 1: starting to get incredibly popular, first person shooters. They had
Speaker 1: been around for a few years several years actually, um
Speaker 1: since Wolfenstein three D came out in the early nineties,
Speaker 1: but they were starting to get some real action, and
Speaker 1: so there were conferences held about first person shooters, particularly
Speaker 1: for the consoles. So why did the company show off?
Speaker 1: Nintendo showed off Golden Eye Double O seven. This time
Speaker 1: they showed a much more detailed demo, and that really
Speaker 1: impressed the E three audience. The four players split screen
Speaker 1: approach was a big innovation for console games. Nintendo also
Speaker 1: showed off a cute game called Conquers Quest about a
Speaker 1: fluffy squirrel, and it was meant for kids, and this
Speaker 1: game would never come out, but it would mutate into
Speaker 1: a totally different, crude and appropriate game called Conquers Bad
Speaker 1: for a Day. More on that in a little bit.
Speaker 1: That same year, Sony announced Metal Gear Solid, which was
Speaker 1: technically a sequel to Metal Gear and Metal Gear two
Speaker 1: Solid Snake. Metal Gear Solid would become the foundation for
Speaker 1: an extremely popular franchise that um, as far as we know,
Speaker 1: has concluded since the creator has left the company that
Speaker 1: was publishing these But that's a that's a story for
Speaker 1: a different day. That would be an entire podcast all
Speaker 1: on its own, and in retrospect, many people felt that
Speaker 1: the thirty three was kind of a letdown after the
Speaker 1: first two and that the Georgia Dome was probably not
Speaker 1: the best venue for the event. Uh that it just
Speaker 1: made the event to spread out too difficult to navigate,
Speaker 1: and it just wasn't ideal for showing off these games
Speaker 1: and the companies. And another black mark for this E
Speaker 1: three this was the E three where Duke Nukem Forever
Speaker 1: was first announced. Now that game would become synonymous with
Speaker 1: the term vapor ware, and eventually Duke Nukem Forever would
Speaker 1: emerge out of development hell in two thousand eleven. So
Speaker 1: announced in but it wouldn't be until two thousand eleven
Speaker 1: that it comes out, more than a decade later, and
Speaker 1: the response at the time was pretty negative. People were
Speaker 1: not impressed, especially considering that the game was spending more
Speaker 1: than ten years in development. So it would be really
Speaker 1: crazy for me to go into this level of detail
Speaker 1: for every single year, for every E three, so I'm
Speaker 1: not going to do that. I'm now going to kind
Speaker 1: of give you just some highlights of each year moving forward. Um,
Speaker 1: and if you want to learn more about any given
Speaker 1: E three, I can always do a full episode about
Speaker 1: specific year if there's something that you think is particularly interesting.
Speaker 1: But for now, let's look at some of the highlights.
Speaker 1: So in n E three was still in Atlanta, had
Speaker 1: grown into a pretty major trade show with something like
Speaker 1: seventy thousand attendees, and companies were going all out. They
Speaker 1: were getting some some big name bands to play their
Speaker 1: parties like in ninety eight and included the Food Fighters,
Speaker 1: UH and the B fifty twos at industry parties, and
Speaker 1: again I'm very sad that I wasn't able to go in.
Speaker 1: Sega ended up showing off the Dreamcast, which was, in
Speaker 1: my opinion, one of the rate consoles of that era. Sadly,
Speaker 1: I don't think Sega ever had a good idea of
Speaker 1: how to market it, how to leverage it, so despite
Speaker 1: the fact that it was a legitimately good contender in
Speaker 1: the console space, it never really got the the market
Speaker 1: support and needed to be a real competitor against Nintendo
Speaker 1: and Sony. Also shown in ninety eight was an early
Speaker 1: version of a little game called Half Life, and it
Speaker 1: is an ongoing joke in video game journalism about whether
Speaker 1: or not Valve will announce Half Life three at the
Speaker 1: next E three um. Half Life is one of those
Speaker 1: games where people have been waiting for the conclusion of
Speaker 1: the story for quite some time, and there has been
Speaker 1: no word on if Half Life three is in development,
Speaker 1: and even if it is, you know when would it
Speaker 1: possibly come out, But there's no word on an even
Speaker 1: existing period, so it remains one of the uh the
Speaker 1: the snipes that were hunting in video game journalism circles.
Speaker 1: Also at Nintendo showed off a game that was the
Speaker 1: legend of Zelda, Ocarina of Time, one of the um
Speaker 1: highly highly critically claimed Zelda games that came out in
Speaker 1: that time that in uh the Mask one was in
Speaker 1: Major's Mask. I think, so that's the next one. But
Speaker 1: oh Green of Time, that was a game that I
Speaker 1: also had um and a lot of people thought that
Speaker 1: that was sort of the right direction for Nintendo to
Speaker 1: move in. E three came back to Los Angeles, so
Speaker 1: it leaves Atlantic goes back to l a uh Sega
Speaker 1: announces that the Dreamcast launch date will be nine nine,
Speaker 1: so September, and we'll retail for one dollars, so it's
Speaker 1: pretty cute. Nintend Know held a press conference that unveiled
Speaker 1: Project Dolphin. Project Dolphin would eventually become the GameCube. They
Speaker 1: also showed off Donkey Kong sixty four, another game that
Speaker 1: was on display was Quake three. Final Fantasy eight was
Speaker 1: also shown off that year, So some big names in
Speaker 1: computer and video games in two thousand there were. It
Speaker 1: was pretty much a game heavy year. Um The PlayStation
Speaker 1: two was announced by Sony. It had already launched in Japan,
Speaker 1: so announced rather for the US shelves because the game
Speaker 1: system had already been out in Japan for quite some time.
Speaker 1: But among the games that were announced were Metal Gear
Speaker 1: Solid two Conquers Bad for a Day. So, now that
Speaker 1: Conqueror game that was originally meant for kids was definitely
Speaker 1: not meant for kids. It had lots of crude humor,
Speaker 1: a lot of cursing, uh, scatological humor, sexual humor, a
Speaker 1: lot of violence. I mean, the violence in that game
Speaker 1: is pretty incredible, even though the characters are very cartoony.
Speaker 1: Um So, Conqueror's Bad for a Day was kind of
Speaker 1: shocking because it was so out of character for Nintendo.
Speaker 1: Um and, and it marks something people were wondering if
Speaker 1: Nintendo was actually going to make a bigger move into
Speaker 1: that realm of video games. Actually it did not. For
Speaker 1: the most part. Some third party Nintendo games get pretty violent,
Speaker 1: but most of the first party stuff doesn't. Also, that year,
Speaker 1: the game C Man was shown off, and C Man
Speaker 1: is one of the weirdest games I've ever seen, And
Speaker 1: again I could do a full show about that, but
Speaker 1: if you ever are curious, you can search for its
Speaker 1: C Man s E A M. A N fish with
Speaker 1: a human face. Nothing nothing wrong about that anyway. This
Speaker 1: was a more subdued E three, and partly because it
Speaker 1: was held the same year as the Columbine shooting in
Speaker 1: the United States, the high school shooting, so there was
Speaker 1: a very different kind of atmosphere at this E three.
Speaker 1: The video game industry in general was under a lot
Speaker 1: of scrutiny at Washington, d C. So it was a
Speaker 1: difficult year for many reasons. In two thousand one, Microsoft
Speaker 1: joins the game for real, this time talking about the Xbox,
Speaker 1: but they didn't debut the Xbox at E three. They
Speaker 1: had already shown it off at C E S. Still,
Speaker 1: they brought it to E three to kind of enter
Speaker 1: the fray along with Sony and Nintendo and kind of Sega.
Speaker 1: People were still talking about Metal Gear Solid two, which
Speaker 1: had been shown off the previous year but still hadn't
Speaker 1: come out. A little game called Grand Theft Auto three
Speaker 1: was shown off in two thousand one. But here's the
Speaker 1: weird thing. No one really paid attention to it at
Speaker 1: the time. No one thought it was going to be
Speaker 1: a big deal. It was mostly overlooked. Nintendo was pushing
Speaker 1: the GameCube pretty hard, but it was still delayed. It
Speaker 1: had not yet launched, and Sega pretty much got out
Speaker 1: of the hardware game that year. Two thousand two, the
Speaker 1: biggest game on the show floor was Doom three, and
Speaker 1: that was only in an early demo build, but the
Speaker 1: game caused shockwaves throughout the show floor, and the reason
Speaker 1: was because the game engine and the graphics engine were
Speaker 1: so advanced compared to other games that they really caught
Speaker 1: people's attention. There were a lot of effects that you
Speaker 1: didn't typically see in games at that time, like reflections
Speaker 1: um so reflective surfaces were showing effective reflections, also destructible environments.
Speaker 1: This was stuff that had not really been shown in games,
Speaker 1: at least not many games up to this point, and
Speaker 1: it really got a lot of people's attention. Meanwhile, you
Speaker 1: had some interesting drama going on at the exhibition show floor.
Speaker 1: EA and Vivendi were fighting each other, Lord of the
Speaker 1: Rings and Hobbit Style, and I really do mean that,
Speaker 1: so e A was showing The Two Towers preview over
Speaker 1: and over again. Uh, because this was the year The
Speaker 1: Two Towers was going to come out. And then Vivendi
Speaker 1: was showing off footage from its Lord of the Rings
Speaker 1: and Hobbit inspired games inside a domed theater and projecting
Speaker 1: it on the top of the dome. So you have
Speaker 1: these two companies kind of Lord of the Rings fighting
Speaker 1: each other in a snarky way. Uh. The Army, the U. S. Army,
Speaker 1: was actually at E three that year, showing off a
Speaker 1: recruitment tool they had developed called America's Army. And if
Speaker 1: that sounds familiar to you, you are probably a fan
Speaker 1: of a certain zombie game. There have been a few
Speaker 1: mods of America's Army, and uh some of them have
Speaker 1: been pretty famous, and including some that are more famous
Speaker 1: than America's Army. But this was the year America's Army
Speaker 1: showed up. Was two thousand two. Also, Battlefield was a
Speaker 1: big hit that year. In two thousand three, Half Life
Speaker 1: two became the big news, so Doom three the previous year.
Speaker 1: Half Life two steals the show in two thousand three
Speaker 1: and sets the stage for people to ask where is
Speaker 1: Half Life three for the next decade, more than a decade. Uh.
Speaker 1: Microsoft also got really good buzz because they showed off
Speaker 1: a preview for Halo two. I remember distinctly watching videos
Speaker 1: of the Halo two reveal and hearing the audience go
Speaker 1: totally bonkers, just like you could tell people are getting chills,
Speaker 1: and it makes you if you're if you haven't been
Speaker 1: to any three and seeing one of these demos, it
Speaker 1: might be hard to imagine how such a thing could
Speaker 1: get a reaction, but it really is contagious. When people
Speaker 1: are getting excited, it's easy to also feel excited as
Speaker 1: a special kind of experience. But yeah, Halo two made
Speaker 1: a big, make a big splash. Doom three had not
Speaker 1: yet come out, so it was being pretty quiet about
Speaker 1: Doom three for the most part. In two thousand three,
Speaker 1: since it had not yet debuted. Sony, however, announced new hardware,
Speaker 1: a PlayStation portable also known as the PSP, and that
Speaker 1: kind of gave Nintendo a bit of a scare because
Speaker 1: Nintendo had their game Boy platform and now there was
Speaker 1: a new platform coming into play. Nokia also was there.
Speaker 1: The phone manufacturer was showing off a handheld device called
Speaker 1: the Engage, which failed to excite the crowd and ultimately
Speaker 1: became kind of a joke in video game circles. Sadly,
Speaker 1: in two thousand four, the PSP was not yet playable.
Speaker 1: They showed it off at the show floor, but every
Speaker 1: PSP unit was tethered there's the PlayStation portable. In other words,
Speaker 1: it was tethered to a pedestal, and it wasn't showing
Speaker 1: a playable game, but rather just a looping video, so
Speaker 1: that got a lot of people disappointed. They did show
Speaker 1: off the PSP working in hands off demos where a
Speaker 1: Sony representative was showing it off, but they didn't let
Speaker 1: attendees try it out. Nintendo that year unveiled the DS
Speaker 1: Portable System that's their dual screen system. Uh and some
Speaker 1: of the games that people got excited about that were
Speaker 1: shown that year included God of War at the start
Speaker 1: of another franchise, Grand Theft Auto San Andreas. This time,
Speaker 1: the Grand Theft Auto game got a lot more attention
Speaker 1: and the SIMS to In two thousand and five, it
Speaker 1: was a huge E three. That's when we started seeing
Speaker 1: the next generation of consoles debut. Microsoft unveiled the Xbox
Speaker 1: three sixty, Sony unveiled the PlayStation three, and Nintendo showed
Speaker 1: off The Revolution, which would later become the Wii, and
Speaker 1: people began to complain about why, like why would you
Speaker 1: change Revolution to we Come On? But they did. Big
Speaker 1: games that year included The Witcher, Alan Wake, the Elder,
Speaker 1: Scroll Scrolls for Oblivion, Quake for Civilization, for Battlefield, to
Speaker 1: Fear Spore. So not all of those games necessarily lived
Speaker 1: up to the hype of E three. Again, not something
Speaker 1: that you should find particularly surprising. This happens every year,
Speaker 1: but it gives you an idea like, these were the
Speaker 1: games that got people buzzing at E three that year,
Speaker 1: and not all of them paid off. Two thousand six
Speaker 1: was not a huge year. Sadly, two thousand six didn't
Speaker 1: have as big an impact as two thousand five, partly
Speaker 1: because two thousand five that's when they had all the
Speaker 1: big hardware announcements, so this was more about games and
Speaker 1: less about hardware. But some of those games included some
Speaker 1: real classics like BioShock and Assassin's creed Man Effect. Those
Speaker 1: are big names in video games and computer games. Also,
Speaker 1: Metroid Prime three and We Sports were shown off that year,
Speaker 1: so it was a good year for games, but not
Speaker 1: one that unveiled a lot of hardware. Typically, I find
Speaker 1: that any three where there's not a new hardware announcement
Speaker 1: feels like a little bit of a letdown among the crowd.
Speaker 1: At least that's been my experience when I have ATTENDITY
Speaker 1: three any E three have been to where they didn't
Speaker 1: talk new hardware. People seem like I was really hoping
Speaker 1: to be surprised by something. Yeah, sometimes it just doesn't happen.
Speaker 1: We've got a bit more to say about E three,
Speaker 1: but before we get to that, let's take another quick break.
Speaker 1: In two thousand seventy three shifted big time. So you
Speaker 1: may have heard about how E three went through this
Speaker 1: transformation like it was a big party getting more and
Speaker 1: more out of control year over year. You had stories
Speaker 1: about booth babes and ridiculous parties with huge amounts of
Speaker 1: money being spent on bands and dancers and um open bars,
Speaker 1: and just that it was becoming a party atmosphere to
Speaker 1: the point where it was starting some people were feeling
Speaker 1: that I I was starting to harm the reputation of the
Speaker 1: video game industry overall. In two thousand seven, E three
Speaker 1: underwent an enormous change. It also had to do with
Speaker 1: decline and video game sales in some areas, so it
Speaker 1: downsized dramatically. First of all, the three moved to Santa Monica,
Speaker 1: not Los Angeles, and it was no longer held at
Speaker 1: a central location. Instead, companies held their own press events
Speaker 1: and various locations around Santa Monica, and attendance dropped. It
Speaker 1: was at about sixty thousand and two thousand six it
Speaker 1: moved down to ten thousand, and that was partly in
Speaker 1: response to criticism of how E three was really becoming
Speaker 1: this out of control party instead of a serious trade show.
Speaker 1: So there was some worry that this shift to a
Speaker 1: more serious E three would eventually kill E three itself,
Speaker 1: and there was a you know, there were a lot
Speaker 1: of other rules in place, like you weren't supposed to
Speaker 1: have booth babes. You weren't supposed to have these super
Speaker 1: out of uh control booths with lots of set design.
Speaker 1: It was supposed to be much more utilitarian. Moving over
Speaker 1: to two thousand eight, the E three conference goes back
Speaker 1: to the l A Convention Center. That year, Microsoft makes
Speaker 1: the move to turn its console into a fully fledged
Speaker 1: home entertainment system. So now the three sixty has a
Speaker 1: new Live component that's been completely retooled. UM Xbox Live
Speaker 1: became a real powerful part of Microsoft strategy, and Microsoft
Speaker 1: even added support for stuff like Netflix starting in two
Speaker 1: thousand eight. This was back when Netflix was using its
Speaker 1: strate g of getting on every platform it possibly could
Speaker 1: in an attempt to make it a universally accessible app.
Speaker 1: But it also helped Microsoft at the time to kind
Speaker 1: of shift from being just a video game console too
Speaker 1: more of an entertainment system. Uh. That ended up being
Speaker 1: a difficult story for Microsoft to tell because at E three,
Speaker 1: generally speaking, your audience just once the video games. They
Speaker 1: don't necessarily want you know, Oh, I don't really care
Speaker 1: if my console also can show movies or access the Internet.
Speaker 1: I want to know about the games. So it's been
Speaker 1: a kind of a difficult thing because there they're certainly
Speaker 1: portions of the console market out there that is incredibly
Speaker 1: interested in the entertainment system parts of the various current consoles. Uh.
Speaker 1: And so maybe E three is one of those things
Speaker 1: where you just concentrate on the games and then other
Speaker 1: events you talk about the non gaming related capabilities of
Speaker 1: the console. Lots of games were on display in two
Speaker 1: thousand eight, including God of War, three, Kill Zone two,
Speaker 1: Prince of Persia, Dragon Age, and Fallout three, one of
Speaker 1: the best games of all time in my opinion. There
Speaker 1: were rumors that that would be the final E three.
Speaker 1: People were wondering if, in fact the whole conference was
Speaker 1: just going to collapse in on itself. But then came
Speaker 1: two thousand nine and it totally wasn't the last E three.
Speaker 1: They had another one, and I got to go to
Speaker 1: this one. I actually attended the three. In two thousand nine,
Speaker 1: UM Microsoft showed off Project Natal, which would later become
Speaker 1: the Connect sensor. Sony showed off its own motion control system,
Speaker 1: which would eventually become the Move Controller system. People were
Speaker 1: arguing that this was in response to Nintendo We, which
Speaker 1: had already introduced motion controls and got a lot of attention.
Speaker 1: The Wei was incredibly successful early on. I'm partly because
Speaker 1: it appealed to people who weren't UM traditionally referred to
Speaker 1: as like hardcore gamers. I personally hate the term hardcore
Speaker 1: gamer and I hate the term casual gamer. But essentially,
Speaker 1: the We appealed to a broader range of people than
Speaker 1: the other consoles did, so in part, the Connect and
Speaker 1: the Move were strategies to try and create a more
Speaker 1: um appealing approach to a broader audience, although you could
Speaker 1: argue how effective or not effective they were. Some of
Speaker 1: the games announced include Left for Dead Too, which wasn't
Speaker 1: really shown off but was talked about, Crackdown to Halo
Speaker 1: O d s T fours A three, The Beatles Rock
Speaker 1: Band was shown off their Star Wars The Old Republic
Speaker 1: was shown off there. I ran into Jack Pottilo and
Speaker 1: Jeff Ramsey at the two thousand nine E three while
Speaker 1: in line for a demonstration of the Beatles Rock Band.
Speaker 1: I remember that Nice Guys by the Way and Connect
Speaker 1: officially debuted, and so did PlayStation Move. There are tons
Speaker 1: of games announced in two but I'm not going to
Speaker 1: go through them because they were almost all sequels. Uh.
Speaker 1: You've heard a lot of sequels already in this and
Speaker 1: that's another issue is that you have video game companies
Speaker 1: that are on the one hand, introducing new intellectual property
Speaker 1: is a good idea because people start getting fed up
Speaker 1: with sequels and there's always the opportunity to create a
Speaker 1: new franchise out of brand new intellectual property. On the
Speaker 1: other hand, the games that have already been established have
Speaker 1: audiences already so it's easier to or at least in theory,
Speaker 1: it's easier to please that audience by coming out with
Speaker 1: a new iteration of that or a new sequel to
Speaker 1: That's that franchise, but was pretty much franchise heavy, or
Speaker 1: rather sequel heavy, so I skipped it. That's when Nintendo
Speaker 1: shows off the Wii U. This, of course, is the
Speaker 1: game system that has the controller with a game pad
Speaker 1: in the middle of one of the controllers, and it
Speaker 1: allows for different types of gameplay, including using the game
Speaker 1: pad is like a site for a gun in a game,
Speaker 1: or a scanner, or sometimes you could do like a
Speaker 1: one gamer versus four gamer kind of thing with one
Speaker 1: person on the game pad controller and the other people
Speaker 1: using the regular we controllers. Uh, it didn't really capture
Speaker 1: the imagination of the crowd the way Nintendo had hoped.
Speaker 1: Sony would unveil the PlayStation Vina in Microsoft didn't have
Speaker 1: any a new hardware, but it did unveil Halo four,
Speaker 1: which got people excited. Um Uncharted three and the tumb
Speaker 1: Ray to reboot both got a good response and are
Speaker 1: both very similar to one another. If you played Uncharted
Speaker 1: three and tumb Ray or it's I like to think
Speaker 1: of them as I think I've unturned three as the
Speaker 1: game called, and then I climbed, and then tumb rater,
Speaker 1: I think it was the game, and then I fell down.
Speaker 1: So but maybe that's just me being snarky. It probably is.
Speaker 1: I'm an old man. BioShock Infinite was unveiled, which had
Speaker 1: an amazing art style and uh concept behind it. You
Speaker 1: can argue whether or not BioShock Infinite ultimately lived up
Speaker 1: to its potential. I think it was pretty good. Um,
Speaker 1: I really enjoyed the game. They also showed off sky
Speaker 1: Rim again, another game that I loved. It took me
Speaker 1: a long time to complete it because I enjoyed playing it,
Speaker 1: but I wasn't too concerned about actually fulfilling the story.
Speaker 1: Mass Effect three also showing off in two thousand eleven,
Speaker 1: another game that both got people excited and ultimately got
Speaker 1: a lot of people angry when they when they finished
Speaker 1: Mass Effect three. Two thousand twelve not a hardware year,
Speaker 1: but definitely a big game year. Watchdogs was shown off,
Speaker 1: although it would be delayed. It would be shown off again,
Speaker 1: but it wouldn't come out until far Cry three was
Speaker 1: shown off at Assassin's Creed three Last of Us one
Speaker 1: of the best games ever. I'm not a PlayStation fan
Speaker 1: in general. I'm an Xbox player primarily. However, I do
Speaker 1: have a PS three and The Last of Us is
Speaker 1: one of the best games I played on any platform.
Speaker 1: Resident Evil six was shown off. Dead Space three was
Speaker 1: shown off, but again not a real hardware year in
Speaker 1: two thousand thirteen. That was the year of the Xbox
Speaker 1: One in the PS four, so a huge hardware year,
Speaker 1: and there were big press events all around these two
Speaker 1: new consoles. Nintendo hung in there with the Wi You,
Speaker 1: but again was not getting a lot of attention. Big
Speaker 1: games that were announced store on display that year included
Speaker 1: Assassin's Creed four Black Flag, another game that I really enjoyed,
Speaker 1: although I think it's particularly it's a little repetitive, but
Speaker 1: so are all the Assassin's Creed games. UH, Diablo three
Speaker 1: Destiny was shown off Halo five, which was a big
Speaker 1: deal that Destiny and Halo five were being shown off. Bungee,
Speaker 1: of course, was the company that had designed or had
Speaker 1: come had built the Halo games originally but had moved
Speaker 1: on to work on Destiny UH and then um Microsoft
Speaker 1: was essentially the steward of the Halo franchise at that point.
Speaker 1: Elder Scrolls Online was shown off, which I got to
Speaker 1: try and I thought was interesting, but ultimately never purchased,
Speaker 1: And it seems like I was not the only one.
Speaker 1: Kingdom Hearts three was unveiled, Mad Max was shown off.
Speaker 1: It would take a couple of years for that game
Speaker 1: to go through a couple of redesigns before it would debut.
Speaker 1: Sint Row Saints Row four rather shown off, Star Wars
Speaker 1: battle Front was teased. Quant Break was teased as well,
Speaker 1: Sunset over Drive was shown off, and two thousand fourteen
Speaker 1: was another game heavy year, with Alien Isolation, Dead Island
Speaker 1: to Dragon Age Inquisition, Dragon Age Inquisition rather Grim van
Speaker 1: Dango Remastered, which I was really excited about because that
Speaker 1: was one of those Lucas Art schemes that I thought
Speaker 1: was really really great. It was. I was very happy
Speaker 1: to see that it was going to come back. Game
Speaker 1: of Thrones game from tail Tale was announced. No Man's Sky,
Speaker 1: which we're still waiting on right now, was shown off
Speaker 1: in two thousand fourteen. Also two thousand and fifteen, UM
Speaker 1: Mortal Kombat X showing off Shadow of More Door showing
Speaker 1: off Ineen two thousand fifteen more games like Assassin Screed, Syndicate,
Speaker 1: Dark Souls three d Oh Sex Mankind Divided, Fallout four,
Speaker 1: which was announced at Bethesda's first ever press conference, along
Speaker 1: with Fallout Shelter, the division dishonored to was shown off
Speaker 1: a little bit or announced cup Head Gears of War four.
Speaker 1: I Am Bred. I Am Bred, one of the most
Speaker 1: important games made in the last decade. Mass Effect Andromeda
Speaker 1: was teased. Overwatch was first shown off. I am currently
Speaker 1: playing Overwatch badly, So if you see me on Xbox Live,
Speaker 1: John B. Strickland is my gamer tag, and you will
Speaker 1: see me fail miserably repeatedly. And Overwatch. They also showed
Speaker 1: off Uncharted four and Until Dawn, which I thought was
Speaker 1: a pretty interesting idea for a game that brings us
Speaker 1: up to this year. And I realized I've just been
Speaker 1: rattling off video games, and if you're not interested in
Speaker 1: video games, I know that this has been a trial
Speaker 1: to listen to, and I apologize for that. But it
Speaker 1: was one of those things where it's kind of interesting
Speaker 1: to look back over E three and here are some
Speaker 1: of these big names being mentioned years before they ever
Speaker 1: came out due to delays, or maybe there were problems
Speaker 1: in production that weren't anticipated. I guess that technically that
Speaker 1: still falls under the term delay. I didn't list all
Speaker 1: the games because there could have been quite a few
Speaker 1: of games that just never came out or haven't come
Speaker 1: out yet at any rate. But twenty sixteen, let's let's
Speaker 1: clear it up. Let's take it on home. Microsoft had
Speaker 1: a big press conference where they showed off the Xbox
Speaker 1: one s also known as the Xbox One Slim, which
Speaker 1: is supposedly smaller than the current Xbox Um Plus. They
Speaker 1: showed off a new wireless controller, so we got some
Speaker 1: new hardware this year. They also demonstrated a cross platform
Speaker 1: program that would allow gamers to play the same games
Speaker 1: on Windows ten or on an Xbox one. Sony meanwhile
Speaker 1: announced that in October it would release the ps VR.
Speaker 1: That's the Sony VR headset what used to be called
Speaker 1: Project Morpheus. So it comes out later this year in October.
Speaker 1: Probably one of the VR headsets that will have a
Speaker 1: decent chance at some early success, because there are a
Speaker 1: lot of people who already own a PS four, so
Speaker 1: purchasing a headset, which I think is going to be
Speaker 1: three dollars if I'm not mistaken. I don't have the
Speaker 1: number in front of me, but people who want to
Speaker 1: buy it, they already have a p S four that
Speaker 1: it will run on. Whereas some of the other VR
Speaker 1: headsets which have been a big, big deal in this
Speaker 1: past e three, like the HTC Vibe and the Oculus Rift,
Speaker 1: if you don't have a pretty strong computer system, a
Speaker 1: good gaming rig, then the purchase price of the HTC
Speaker 1: Vibe and the Oculus Rift is just the beginning. You
Speaker 1: have to go out and purchase a computer too. And
Speaker 1: so the HTC Vibe is eight hundred bucks, the Oculus
Speaker 1: Rift is six hundred. The computer you would need to
Speaker 1: run either of those and a really decent performance setting
Speaker 1: would be about dollars. So you're looking at more than
Speaker 1: two thousand dollars in the case of HTC Vive to
Speaker 1: have a system, and that's before you talk about any games.
Speaker 1: That's just so that you have the hardware. So I
Speaker 1: think Sony's ps VR is positioned in a way where
Speaker 1: it could see more success than some of the alternatives,
Speaker 1: even though you could also argue that being tied to
Speaker 1: a console means that you have a ceiling for as
Speaker 1: as good as it can get, because with PCs, you
Speaker 1: can always upgrade, or you can buy a brand new
Speaker 1: machine that is compatible with your your hardware and continue
Speaker 1: to push the limits of what that hardware can do
Speaker 1: with a PS four unless you purchase a brand new
Speaker 1: PS four that has improved specs, and that may or
Speaker 1: may not happen. You've got a ceiling for as good
Speaker 1: as it's going to get, it will just be at
Speaker 1: the top of the performance of the console, and then
Speaker 1: that's as far as you will go. So there were
Speaker 1: a lot of VR titles shown at this year's E three,
Speaker 1: including Star Trek Bridge Crew, which I think is brilliant.
Speaker 1: I would love to try that out. But there are
Speaker 1: other some There are some other big titles, not just
Speaker 1: VR titles, but titles in general. Uh. Nintendo showed off
Speaker 1: the Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild for a while,
Speaker 1: we were told that that was gonna be the only
Speaker 1: thing Nintendo showed. They also showed some Pokemon, but a
Speaker 1: lot of people were impressed by the Legend of Zelda trailer.
Speaker 1: Other games included Mafia three and Resident Evil seven, Titan
Speaker 1: Fall two, Watchdogs Too, and lots lots more so. Going
Speaker 1: to one of these events can be fun and exhilarating,
Speaker 1: it's also exhausting. It's crowded. Uh. Typically, if you are
Speaker 1: not someone who's exhibiting or have special access to the
Speaker 1: show floor before it opens, your experience tends to be
Speaker 1: waiting in line, first, waiting in line for the show
Speaker 1: floor to open. Then the show floor opens and there's
Speaker 1: an initial rush into the show floor as everyone tries
Speaker 1: to get to specific places, and then waiting in line
Speaker 1: some more so you can get your turn trying out
Speaker 1: the latest video game system. And it's it could be
Speaker 1: frustrating because you usually only get to play for a
Speaker 1: couple of minutes, because the whole point of the demos
Speaker 1: just to give you a feel for the way the
Speaker 1: title works. So it's not um It's not the ideal
Speaker 1: way I would say to experience a first impression of
Speaker 1: a video game, unless you happen to be connected to
Speaker 1: a large outlet where they're bringing the games to you,
Speaker 1: in which case, you know, you get to sit back
Speaker 1: and have more time and less frustration to enjoy the experience. However,
Speaker 1: you do get a chance to see these things first hand,
Speaker 1: and and there's something special about that. There's no denying that.
Speaker 1: I should also say I have never attended one of
Speaker 1: the E three's where people got a free cons owl
Speaker 1: or a free game. I've never been some of the
Speaker 1: press conferences. Occasionally you'll hear, hey, everyone here gets a
Speaker 1: voucher for a brand new Xbox. No, I've never been
Speaker 1: to one of those. I have every year I have gone.
Speaker 1: The announcements have been interesting, but I didn't walk away
Speaker 1: with hundreds of dollars worth of swag. That's not so
Speaker 1: much a complaint. It's just me kind of thinking about
Speaker 1: my lousy timing. Ah, But that's not the reason that
Speaker 1: people should go. People should go because they're trying to
Speaker 1: cover the industry anyway. That's the E three story so far.
Speaker 1: The the conference is pretty much returned to the old
Speaker 1: party crazy sort of approach. Maybe the parties aren't quite
Speaker 1: as over the top as they used to be, but
Speaker 1: the show floor does still have some pretty impressive booths,
Speaker 1: usually with some amazing setting where you know you'll you'll
Speaker 1: go in and they've redone the booth so that it
Speaker 1: looks like you're walking into one of the games, or
Speaker 1: you might see like a life sized mech statue that
Speaker 1: you can get into and get a photo of yourself.
Speaker 1: In it or that kind of stuff. Um, so it
Speaker 1: definitely has returned to the more showy version that it
Speaker 1: was when it first started. There's still some people who
Speaker 1: are asking whether or not E three is valid, if
Speaker 1: it's a if it's something that would that should continue,
Speaker 1: or perhaps company should hold their own press events at
Speaker 1: a time of year that is beneficial to them. In
Speaker 1: other words, go the Apple approach instead of being part
Speaker 1: of a big trade show like E three, Go do
Speaker 1: your own thing, and that way you're not sharing the
Speaker 1: stage with all the other companies. I haven't heard any
Speaker 1: rumors about E three going away, and I don't expect
Speaker 1: it will go away in the short term, but perhaps
Speaker 1: we'll see a difference moving ahead. I think in the
Speaker 1: realm of VR, assuming VR is successful, E three still
Speaker 1: has a very valuable place because as somewhere that people
Speaker 1: can go and get that VR experience and then report
Speaker 1: on what that experience is like. Uh, It's it's harder
Speaker 1: to do that at individual press events, but at a
Speaker 1: big thing like e er, where you're going to find
Speaker 1: a lot of different companies working with VR headsets like
Speaker 1: HTC Vive or the Oculus Rift or one of the
Speaker 1: dozen other ones that are out there on the market,
Speaker 1: you're more likely to be able to encounter that, experience it,
Speaker 1: and then communicated to other people. And that wraps up
Speaker 1: the story about how E three works. Now, there's a
Speaker 1: lot of stuff that I didn't really cover, some of
Speaker 1: which wasn't public knowledge in when I first recorded this episode.
Speaker 1: There have been numerous reports of disagreements at very levels
Speaker 1: of management within E three, or rather the organization that
Speaker 1: throws E three. Uh. There have been a lot of
Speaker 1: allegations of, if not misbehavior, at least poor judgment. UH.
Speaker 1: There's been a lot of debate about whether or not
Speaker 1: opening E three up to the public has done more
Speaker 1: harm than good, if it has impeded journalists and industry
Speaker 1: professionals from actually doing their job since it is supposed
Speaker 1: to be a trade show. There's been talk about how
Speaker 1: the big companies have gradually sort of distanced themselves from
Speaker 1: E three, Sony and Nintendo among them. UH. There's been
Speaker 1: talk about how E three may not come back because
Speaker 1: the this COVID issue was the nail in the coffin,
Speaker 1: as it were, and that more and more companies are
Speaker 1: finding it possible to reach out to gamers, to the
Speaker 1: media directly, as opposed to getting together to do it
Speaker 1: in a conference. The whole purpose of E three originally
Speaker 1: was to elevate the platform of video games, to let
Speaker 1: more people know what was going on, because otherwise it
Speaker 1: was just getting swallowed up in tech. But the video
Speaker 1: game industry is drastically different today than what it was
Speaker 1: when E three was first started, so you could argue
Speaker 1: that E three no longer really has at least the
Speaker 1: same place as it did when it launched. Perhaps it
Speaker 1: still has a place, but it has definitely evolved over
Speaker 1: the years. I think if we were to lose E three,
Speaker 1: the biggest con of that, the biggest downside is that
Speaker 1: that would disproportionately affect independent studios that largely depend on
Speaker 1: events like E three to gain visibility. These are studios
Speaker 1: that are producing titles that don't have the develop mint
Speaker 1: dollars or the marketing budget of the big Triple A titles.
Speaker 1: You're not going to get the same treatment of one
Speaker 1: of these quirky little titles that could be legit a
Speaker 1: fantastic game, maybe even Game of the year material, but
Speaker 1: you're never gonna get the same level of coverage that's
Speaker 1: ay a sky Rim or a fallout, both of which
Speaker 1: are from the same company, or a you know, a
Speaker 1: grand theft auto or or a big ticket title that
Speaker 1: ties into like a major movie or a movie franchise.
Speaker 1: You're just not going to get that same level of
Speaker 1: of attention unless you are part of a larger event,
Speaker 1: especially if you can get kind of taken under the
Speaker 1: wing of one of the really big companies like Microsoft
Speaker 1: or Sony. But that's really the biggest downside I can see,
Speaker 1: because otherwise the event has I think outlived its usefulness
Speaker 1: for a lot of the various players pun intended who
Speaker 1: are involved with the video game industry. Certainly as a
Speaker 1: member of the media, I found it much more difficult
Speaker 1: to cover the event in more recent years than I
Speaker 1: did when I first went. UM. I'm sure that people
Speaker 1: in the industry also find it challenging, especially once the
Speaker 1: general public is allowed onto the show floor. It just
Speaker 1: becomes a crazy, busy, chaotic environment, and it's very hard
Speaker 1: to just get from point A to point B, let
Speaker 1: alone cover video games. So I don't know if E
Speaker 1: three is gone for good or if we'll see you know,
Speaker 1: more virtual events moving forward. I think it would be
Speaker 1: a shame for it to go completely. I do think
Speaker 1: that if it is going to exist as a semi
Speaker 1: public event, things need to change fairly dramatically in the
Speaker 1: way that things work on the floor in order for
Speaker 1: it to be a less frustrating experience. I know that
Speaker 1: there were people who attended past e three's when the
Speaker 1: public was allowed, who would wait, sometimes up towards of
Speaker 1: maybe three or four hours to get just maybe ten
Speaker 1: or fifteen minutes of playtime with a game title. And
Speaker 1: I can't imagine that they walked away from that feeling
Speaker 1: that it was money well spent. If you walk out
Speaker 1: of the convention hall at the end of the afternoon
Speaker 1: and you say, I played, you know, total forty five
Speaker 1: minutes worth of games and I waited for the rest
Speaker 1: of that time, I'm not sure you're gonna feel like
Speaker 1: that was the best use of your time and money.
Speaker 1: So I do think that if it is to continue,
Speaker 1: they need to overhaul the entire experience in order to
Speaker 1: make it one that is beneficial for all parties. It
Speaker 1: doesn't do anyone any favors. If you walk out of
Speaker 1: the convention and you are miserable or angry, or you
Speaker 1: feel like you you wasted your money. That isn't doing
Speaker 1: the developers any favors. It's not doing the gamers any favors.
Speaker 1: So if it is to continue to exist, assuming we
Speaker 1: get to a world where such a thing can happen,
Speaker 1: I think it does need to have a major overaul. Anyway,
Speaker 1: I hope you guys enjoyed that classic episode. I promised
Speaker 1: the new episode will go live on Wednesday. It will
Speaker 1: be how hard drives and solid state drives work, or
Speaker 1: something similar along those lines, and hopefully by that point
Speaker 1: I will have sussed out all of the issues with
Speaker 1: my computer system and my internet because I do not
Speaker 1: want that to happen again. You might have felt a
Speaker 1: disturbance in the force when that happened, as if a
Speaker 1: podcaster cried out in pain and anguish and then was
Speaker 1: suddenly silenced because his internet cut out. Anyway, if you
Speaker 1: guys have any suggestions for future episodes of Tech Stuff,
Speaker 1: please get in touch with me. Let me know what
Speaker 1: those are, whether it's a technology, a company, a personality
Speaker 1: in tech, maybe just a trend in tech. Let me know.
Speaker 1: You can each out on Twitter. The handle for the
Speaker 1: show is tech Stuff h s W and I'll talk
Speaker 1: to you again really soon. Y text Stuff is an
Speaker 1: I heart Radio production. For more podcasts from I heart Radio,
Speaker 1: visit the i heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
Speaker 1: you listen to your favorite shows.