Speaker 1: Get in touch with technology with tech Stuff from how
Speaker 1: stuff works dot com. Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff.
Speaker 1: I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer at
Speaker 1: I Heart Radio and how Stuff Works and I love
Speaker 1: all things tech and In mid November, Sony, the company
Speaker 1: that makes the PlayStation four game console, announced it would
Speaker 1: not be taking part in the two thousand nineteen E
Speaker 1: three Conference E three, which essentially stands for the Electronic
Speaker 1: Entertainment Expo, although I think they just call themselves E
Speaker 1: three these days anyway. It's a big annual industry event
Speaker 1: that takes place in Los Angeles, California. It's not the
Speaker 1: largest video game industry conference in the world. There's one
Speaker 1: called Games Common Germany that has about three hundred thousand
Speaker 1: more people attending it than E three, but E three
Speaker 1: is usually viewed as one of the most important video
Speaker 1: game conferences of the year. It puts a spotlight on
Speaker 1: video game companies and titles, as well as hardware manufacturers.
Speaker 1: So let's take a step back to talk about the
Speaker 1: brief history of E three before we explore the whole
Speaker 1: Sony story here. So, before there was an E three,
Speaker 1: most video game manufacturers would showcase upcoming consoles and titles
Speaker 1: at c e S. C e S is another one
Speaker 1: of those conferences that used to be known by its
Speaker 1: name Consumer Electronics Show, but again they kind of shy
Speaker 1: away from that and just called themselves c e S
Speaker 1: these days. There was no dedicated conference for video games
Speaker 1: at that time, and after the video game crash of
Speaker 1: nine three, it was kind of a question as to
Speaker 1: whether the home video game market would even be a
Speaker 1: thing ever again. But then Nintendo came along with the
Speaker 1: Famicon also known as the Nintendo Entertainment System, and the
Speaker 1: industry would claud its way back to stable ground. But
Speaker 1: for about a decade, c e S was the one
Speaker 1: big trade show where companies could show off their stuff,
Speaker 1: and this was actually pretty tough because there's a lot
Speaker 1: that's going on during c e S, so standing out
Speaker 1: from all the other things that are happening at that
Speaker 1: same time as a really big challenge. Then we flash
Speaker 1: forward by more than a decade really in there was
Speaker 1: an organization coming together. Originally it was called the Interactive
Speaker 1: Digital Software Association, but it would change its name eventually
Speaker 1: to the Entertainment Software Association or e s A. The
Speaker 1: e s A as the organization that created E three.
Speaker 1: It organized a brand new trade show dedicated solely to
Speaker 1: the video game industry. At the time, video games were
Speaker 1: not nearly as prominent in culture as they are today,
Speaker 1: so the goal was multifold. It was to give video
Speaker 1: game studios and console manufacturers a dedicated event where they
Speaker 1: didn't have to buy against microprocessors and TVs and refrigerators
Speaker 1: for attention. They would be able to hold meetings with
Speaker 1: each other and do business. They would be able to
Speaker 1: promote things to the media, and they would be able
Speaker 1: to bring some attention to an industry that otherwise was
Speaker 1: fairly obscure. Apart from the you know, legions of dedicated
Speaker 1: gamers out there, no one was really aware of it.
Speaker 1: So that first event in uh in N had approximately
Speaker 1: fifty thousand attendees. I've seen estimates between forty and fifty thousand, really,
Speaker 1: and it was an industry and press event, which meant
Speaker 1: the general public was not allowed to attend. If you
Speaker 1: were not media and you weren't connected to the video
Speaker 1: game industry, you were not allowed to go. This gave
Speaker 1: game developers the chance to promote their work direct to
Speaker 1: the media as well as the corporate representatives of some
Speaker 1: of the larger retail organizations. They got a chance to
Speaker 1: talk to these video game developers, and so you had
Speaker 1: these conversations where you could actually make deals where the
Speaker 1: retail representative would agree to carry those video game titles
Speaker 1: and put them on store shelves. Because in those days,
Speaker 1: physical copy was really the only option. You didn't have
Speaker 1: digital distribution networks. So this conference it filled a very
Speaker 1: important role. It gave these video game companies the outlet
Speaker 1: not just to the media, but also to the stores
Speaker 1: that would ultimately carry the titles. So E three was
Speaker 1: all about marketing and sales essentially. That first year saw
Speaker 1: Sony reveal the original PlayStation price and release date in
Speaker 1: the United States, and Nintendo would show off the Virtual Boy,
Speaker 1: which would go on to become one of the most
Speaker 1: hand flops in video game tech history. Sega also announced
Speaker 1: that it would start shipping the Sega Saturn console to
Speaker 1: retailers during the event itself was meant to be a
Speaker 1: big sort of press reveal, and there were big video
Speaker 1: game companies like e A, Capcom, Acclaim and more that
Speaker 1: were at that first E three. It was considered a
Speaker 1: big success when it was all over and the e
Speaker 1: s A would continue to hold E three and the
Speaker 1: next two events were in Los Angeles, but then negotiations
Speaker 1: with venues did not go so well for the next
Speaker 1: couple of years. So typically, if you're gonna throw a
Speaker 1: big event, you have to make arrangements years in advance
Speaker 1: to guarantee the space, and the s A was unable
Speaker 1: to do that in Los Angeles, so instead E three
Speaker 1: for those two years took place in my hometown of Atlanta, Georgia.
Speaker 1: It would return to Los Angeles after and no, I
Speaker 1: never got to go to E three while it was
Speaker 1: next door to me. I was not working in the
Speaker 1: field of tech at that time. In Sega would show
Speaker 1: off the Dreamcast, Sony gave some previews of the PlayStation two,
Speaker 1: and in two thousand, Microsoft appeared at E three for
Speaker 1: the first time to promote the upcoming premiere of the
Speaker 1: Xbox Console. In two thousand one, Sego would make its
Speaker 1: final appearance as a console maker, though it would continue
Speaker 1: to show up as a game developer, it just was
Speaker 1: getting out of the hardware business. Nintendo would show off
Speaker 1: the GameCube that same year, and the event grew year
Speaker 1: over year until two thousand seven. That year, several exhibitors
Speaker 1: had approached the e s A with concerns about how
Speaker 1: E three was just growing too big and it was
Speaker 1: too flashy and too focused on the media. The exhibitors
Speaker 1: felt they were seeing diminishing returns, that the large number
Speaker 1: of attendees made it difficult to have any meaningful interactions
Speaker 1: with any one person because you just you were flood
Speaker 1: with people all the time. And the spectrum of media
Speaker 1: media had grown significantly. You know, in the in the
Speaker 1: old days when it first started, it was pretty much
Speaker 1: mostly print publications, so you had gaming and computer magazines
Speaker 1: that were in some newspaper reporters that were largely the
Speaker 1: press at this event. But by the mid two thousand's,
Speaker 1: the Web had really taken over. You know, the print
Speaker 1: medium was dying compared to the web. I hate saying that,
Speaker 1: and of course print media is still around, it's not
Speaker 1: like it's gone, but the Web was definitely taking the
Speaker 1: lead over print, and now bloggers were making up a
Speaker 1: larger percentage of the press passes. So the E s
Speaker 1: A took a look at these complaints from the exhibitors
Speaker 1: and responded by purposefully scaling back E three. So then
Speaker 1: the organization announced in two thousand seven E three would
Speaker 1: become an invitation only event, and they also it would
Speaker 1: be limited in size. Only ten thousand attendees would be
Speaker 1: allowed to go there, including a select you from the media,
Speaker 1: and it would not take place at a centralized location
Speaker 1: like the l A Convention Center. Instead, it was spread
Speaker 1: across multiple smaller venues across Santa Monica. The response was
Speaker 1: not what the exhibitors or the e s A had
Speaker 1: hoped for. The reduced media coverage meant that the game
Speaker 1: companies received far less attention and therefore very much less
Speaker 1: free publicity, which unfortunately was something that they had been
Speaker 1: enjoying without any fear up to that point. So they
Speaker 1: found out late in the game that the real audience
Speaker 1: for E three happened to be all those bloggers and
Speaker 1: the media professionals after all. So after the two thousand
Speaker 1: eight conference, which was also a stripped down, more modest affair,
Speaker 1: the s A chose to return to the bigger, Boulder
Speaker 1: brassier approach. The two thousand nine conference had forty one
Speaker 1: thousand attendees, and the two thousand ten show saw game
Speaker 1: developers like Ubisoft, Konami, and e A hold their own
Speaker 1: press conferences, which expanded the media events beyond just the
Speaker 1: console manufacturers. They had frequently been holding live conferences, but
Speaker 1: now the game developers themselves were starting to hold their
Speaker 1: live press events. So those companies set the precedent for
Speaker 1: what we've seen over the years since, when company representatives
Speaker 1: take the stage to show off footage from previously announced games,
Speaker 1: all the way up to unveiling exclusive announcements of game
Speaker 1: titles that had previously been top secret in Nintendo chose
Speaker 1: to skip E three and it held its own presentation
Speaker 1: called Nintendo Direct with a prerecorded presentation. This marked the
Speaker 1: beginning of Nintendo sort of backing away a bit from
Speaker 1: E three. They would come back in to have some
Speaker 1: space on the exhibition floor, but they would continue to
Speaker 1: do their prerecorded UH Direct events rather than holding a
Speaker 1: live of event. So they do still show up to
Speaker 1: E three, but they don't hold a live press conference
Speaker 1: like Microsoft or until recently, Sony. This helps keep Nintendo
Speaker 1: games in gamers minds, and in fact, Nintendo is known
Speaker 1: for holding multiple digital events throughout the year so that
Speaker 1: it's not dependent on just one major event to impress gamers.
Speaker 1: This way, gamers tend to be aware of what's coming
Speaker 1: out throughout the year and it's not just one big moment. However,
Speaker 1: uh some people believe that this means that the company
Speaker 1: tends to have less of an impact at E three,
Speaker 1: and that means that they don't often feature into the
Speaker 1: main conversation you'll often hear from the more recent E
Speaker 1: three is the ones like sixteen who one E three,
Speaker 1: and it usually comes down to an argument between Microsoft
Speaker 1: and Sony, which is kind of infuriating for anyone who's
Speaker 1: a PC gamer and has no interest in console gaming.
Speaker 1: In the e s A made another big change to
Speaker 1: E three, one that was seen as either inconvenient or
Speaker 1: downright controversial. The organization opened up the conference for the
Speaker 1: first time to the general public. If you wanted to
Speaker 1: go to E three, you could purchase a ticket for
Speaker 1: between a hundred fifty and two fifty dollars a princely
Speaker 1: some and then you could attend. That would give you
Speaker 1: access to the exhibit floor space, which meant you could
Speaker 1: line up for hours in order to get a little
Speaker 1: hands on time with an upcoming video game title or
Speaker 1: watch and a non interactive demo. Now, I was there
Speaker 1: in and I saw a lot of people waiting around
Speaker 1: for half a day to play games like God of
Speaker 1: War for about ten minutes. I can't speak to their experience.
Speaker 1: It's possible they all loved it, but to me, it
Speaker 1: seemed like a recipe for disappointment. Would you walk away
Speaker 1: feeling that those hours in line were well spent? I
Speaker 1: guess if you were making friends in the line, that
Speaker 1: would help. As a member of the media, I could
Speaker 1: have jumped ahead of most lines if I had wanted to,
Speaker 1: but I spent most of my time observing, because honestly,
Speaker 1: it felt kind of scuzzy to jump ahead. Maybe if
Speaker 1: my job was to cover only video games, if that
Speaker 1: was all I did, I probably would have jumped ahead,
Speaker 1: because it's the only way I would have gotten enough
Speaker 1: work done. But I cover all of technology, so I
Speaker 1: felt like I should probably just sit back, let the
Speaker 1: other video game journalists actually get in to do their jobs,
Speaker 1: and let the people who paid to be there the
Speaker 1: chance to play these games, and I would just kind
Speaker 1: of observe. Now that brings us up to Sony's announcement
Speaker 1: that it would not be participating in the three and
Speaker 1: twenty nineteen The company will not have a space on
Speaker 1: the exhibition floor. There will still be game developers and
Speaker 1: the three showing off PlayStation games on PlayStation hardware, but
Speaker 1: there won't be a dedicated Sony space, nor will there
Speaker 1: be a live event filled with weird entertainment and video
Speaker 1: game announcements. That Sony Live event was really darn weird.
Speaker 1: I'll explain more about Sony's thoughts in just a moment,
Speaker 1: but first let's take a quick break to thank our sponsor.
Speaker 1: Sony released a statement about their decision to skip E three,
Speaker 1: and it said quote, as the industry evolves, Sony Interactive
Speaker 1: Entertainment continues to look for inventive opportunities to engage the community.
Speaker 1: PlayStation fans mean the world to us, and we always
Speaker 1: want to innovate, think differently, an experiment with new ways
Speaker 1: to delight gamers. As a result, we have decided not
Speaker 1: to participate in E three and twenty nineteen. We are
Speaker 1: exploring new and familiar ways to engage our community in
Speaker 1: twenty nineteen and can't wait to share our plans with you.
Speaker 1: End quote. Now, that's not that different from what Nintendo
Speaker 1: executives said when Nintendo decided to skip holding that live
Speaker 1: press event at E three. The big difference here is
Speaker 1: that Sony is skipping the whole thing, not just the
Speaker 1: live event, and E three is not the only event
Speaker 1: that Sony has backed out of. Sony launched at their
Speaker 1: own event called the PlayStation Experience back in At that time,
Speaker 1: it was celebrating the twentieth anniversary of the PS one,
Speaker 1: But earlier in Sony executives revealed that there would be
Speaker 1: no such event this year in December. So what's the
Speaker 1: reason for that. The executives were very candid. They said,
Speaker 1: there just wouldn't be enough new games that are far
Speaker 1: enough along in their development to create an experience that
Speaker 1: would satisfy fans. So rather than hold an event where
Speaker 1: they might have two or three new titles, many of
Speaker 1: which gamers are all are you familiar with? Because they've
Speaker 1: already seen promotional material for these games, that would they
Speaker 1: would walk away disappointed and Sony didn't want that, so
Speaker 1: they decided that for this year they're going to skip
Speaker 1: the PlayStation Experience. One of the discussions going around online
Speaker 1: is that Sony pulling out of E three is another
Speaker 1: sign that the conference overall doesn't really serve a useful
Speaker 1: purpose anymore. It's easier than ever for companies to reach
Speaker 1: out over various digital platforms to promote upcoming games and hardware,
Speaker 1: from company owned media outlets to twitch streamers, there's no
Speaker 1: shortage of points of contact with the general public. You
Speaker 1: could even bypass traditional media entirely and still reach an
Speaker 1: enormous audience. What's more, by leveraging some of those assets,
Speaker 1: like popular twitch streamers. Let's say that Sony reaches out
Speaker 1: to a very popular Twitch streamer and says, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: make a deal with you for X amount of money.
Speaker 1: I need you to stream and talk about these new games,
Speaker 1: and you can be totally upfront that it's sponsored content,
Speaker 1: but you will reach a much larger fan base, and
Speaker 1: that's a dedicated fan base. And the fan base is
Speaker 1: really dedicated and they they the twitch streamers really genuine
Speaker 1: and transparent. Then the company can piggyback off the popularity
Speaker 1: of the online personality and it's an incredibly valuable marketing tool.
Speaker 1: Over at Microsoft, Phil Spencer, who's the VP of Gaming there,
Speaker 1: had a different perspective. He said, quote E three is
Speaker 1: an incredible platform to showcase the vibrancy and creativity of
Speaker 1: the video game industry. The es A continues to expand
Speaker 1: the events reached the fans and the industry, both in
Speaker 1: attendance and online, and we look forward to what's ahead
Speaker 1: at E three nineteen end quote. Of course, right now,
Speaker 1: Microsoft is poised as the only aiming console manufacturer that
Speaker 1: will have a live press event during E three. The
Speaker 1: stage pretty much belongs to them at this point, which
Speaker 1: could be an incredibly valuable thing. If they don't drop
Speaker 1: the ball some crazy way, they kind of win E
Speaker 1: three twenty nineteen by default. The question some people have
Speaker 1: is is it's still worth winning because meanwhile, some game
Speaker 1: publishers have also tried to pull away from E three
Speaker 1: a little bit. Ubisoft has been known to hold off
Speaker 1: site events during E three. E A has launched a
Speaker 1: fan event that took place at the same time as
Speaker 1: E three, but a different location, so it was not
Speaker 1: connected to E three. It was their own thing. Then
Speaker 1: there's stuff like Blizzard Entertainment, which holds its own annual
Speaker 1: gaming convention called blizz Con, which started back in two
Speaker 1: thousand five. They can use that as a place to
Speaker 1: announce big developments in their various titles. On top of
Speaker 1: those events, there are some held by other organizations that
Speaker 1: offer video game developers a chance to connect directly with
Speaker 1: fan bases. So the Penny Arcade Expo, now known as
Speaker 1: PACKS launched in two thousand four. It's a gaming culture festival.
Speaker 1: It's meant for gamers to attend, and it connects to
Speaker 1: the online Penny Arcade comic. That's the origin for this.
Speaker 1: It was the creators of the Penny Arcade comic who said,
Speaker 1: we want an event specifically for gamers as a celebration
Speaker 1: of gaming. Today. Packs includes multiple shows throughout the year.
Speaker 1: What used to be called Packs Prime that was the
Speaker 1: original event, the one that takes place in Washington State.
Speaker 1: These days it's called Packs West, but there's also Packs South,
Speaker 1: Packs East, Packs Unplugged, which is for board games and
Speaker 1: card games, that kind of thing like physical games, and
Speaker 1: then there's Packs Australia. Several video game developers attend events
Speaker 1: this and they give fans a chance to play demos
Speaker 1: and early builds of various games, and they'll even use
Speaker 1: those as places to announce new titles. So it kind
Speaker 1: of takes a little bit of the luster away from
Speaker 1: E three. E three is not quite as special because
Speaker 1: there are these other events that the companies are using
Speaker 1: to make these big announcements. From a media coverage perspective,
Speaker 1: A three seems to be losing some value. There may
Speaker 1: be diminishing returns on the press coverage for E three
Speaker 1: moving forward. Now, that doesn't necessarily mean that the conference
Speaker 1: has lost all its value, because we are forgetting about
Speaker 1: all those meetings that take place at E three, Right
Speaker 1: like we tend as the media and as consumers, we
Speaker 1: tend to be very much focused on the presentations, on
Speaker 1: the video game titles, on the demos, on the booth design,
Speaker 1: that kind of stuff, the flashy, forward facing stuff. But
Speaker 1: the stuff behind the scenes is still really important. Over
Speaker 1: at Kotaku, Jason Schreier and Kirk Hamilton's responded to a
Speaker 1: listener question to the podcast split Screen. They they said,
Speaker 1: are the listener was asking about E three's relevance? Is
Speaker 1: E three still relevant? And their response was more about
Speaker 1: the stuff that's going on off the show floor, namely
Speaker 1: those meetings that game developers get with potential publishers, And
Speaker 1: it's at those meetings where a company might be able
Speaker 1: to land a deal so that the game they've been
Speaker 1: working so hard on gets distribution, and publishers in turn
Speaker 1: might meet with retailers to make sure the games they
Speaker 1: distribute are getting good promotion and placement in stores that
Speaker 1: helps boost sales. They also mentioned that for smaller developers,
Speaker 1: getting the chance to share the stage with big companies
Speaker 1: like Sony and Microsoft is a huge deal. So up
Speaker 1: until twenty nineteen, Sony has been known as giving a
Speaker 1: nice stage for smaller developers. They'll feature some of these
Speaker 1: independent games in their major press conference, and that gives
Speaker 1: what would otherwise be an obscure little title an enormous
Speaker 1: push in the larger gamer consciousness. He could turn something
Speaker 1: that would have just faded away into a cult success.
Speaker 1: Of course, this particular episode of split Screen was recorded
Speaker 1: in the summer of eighteen, before Sony had announced that
Speaker 1: it was not going to attend E three twenty nineteen,
Speaker 1: so that changes things a bit. And I also feel
Speaker 1: I should point out that the move toward digital distribution
Speaker 1: has made some of those retailed discussions less relevant as well.
Speaker 1: There's still a lot of people who will only buy
Speaker 1: physical copies of games, but online platforms like Steam and
Speaker 1: the various console online shops have become increasingly popular options
Speaker 1: for gamers. According to Statista, two thousand twelve was the
Speaker 1: last year when physical copies of games outsold digital copies,
Speaker 1: and that year of all games sold were physical were digital.
Speaker 1: The following year those figures flipped, and every year since
Speaker 1: digital copies of games have made up an increasingly larger
Speaker 1: percentage of sales compared to physical copies. So you're more
Speaker 1: likely to have discussions with Valve about the Steam platform
Speaker 1: than you are with Walmart about where they should put
Speaker 1: the Elder Scrolls online display. Kirk Hambleton's on that same
Speaker 1: episode i mentioned earlier, said he felt that E three
Speaker 1: was rapidly losing relevance as a media event. These days,
Speaker 1: companies are holding their own announcements and reaching large audiences
Speaker 1: through streaming. More and more companies are following in the
Speaker 1: footsteps of Apple, which kind of defined this sort of
Speaker 1: direct marketing back when Steve Jobs was presenting stuff like
Speaker 1: the iPhone in two thousand and seven. Since that time,
Speaker 1: we've seen other companies similarly pull out of big trade shows.
Speaker 1: Micro Soft, which once upon a time held a place
Speaker 1: of dominance at C E S for many years, Bill
Speaker 1: Gates would give the the top keynote at C E
Speaker 1: S and then uh Balmer would give the top keynote
Speaker 1: for a few more years, but the company announced in
Speaker 1: two thousand twelve that that was going to be the
Speaker 1: last year it would attend c S. It would no
Speaker 1: longer be part of this enormous trade show. And when
Speaker 1: you step back, you can kind of understand why. As
Speaker 1: these shows get bigger, it gets harder to stand out
Speaker 1: in the crowd. When everyone is holding a press event
Speaker 1: or begging for attention, then it becomes more challenging to
Speaker 1: get any focus for your own announcements. And not only that,
Speaker 1: if you hold a specific event at a specific time,
Speaker 1: like a big trade show, then all the companies that
Speaker 1: are going to be at that trade show have to
Speaker 1: work super hard to have something to show off on
Speaker 1: a date that wasn't their choice. You know, it's not
Speaker 1: air event. They're attending the event, so they have to
Speaker 1: work for someone else's timeline. And if you get big
Speaker 1: enough to say, you know what, we don't need to
Speaker 1: do this, you can step back, and then your company
Speaker 1: can hold its own events on your terms, on your schedule.
Speaker 1: That's a big deal. It means you can wait until
Speaker 1: you really have something cool to announce and show before
Speaker 1: you come forward. You don't have to risk having nothing
Speaker 1: of note to show off or that you might show
Speaker 1: off something that's so early in development that there's no
Speaker 1: guarantee it will make that the rest of the way through.
Speaker 1: I have a little more to say about this subject,
Speaker 1: but first let's take another quick break to thank our sponsor.
Speaker 1: A second ago, I was talking about CS and Microsoft.
Speaker 1: We'll ce S is still an enormous show and it
Speaker 1: can easily carry on without the presence of Microsoft, and
Speaker 1: it has. But can E three do the same without Sony?
Speaker 1: The PlayStation four has been the top selling video game
Speaker 1: console since two thousand fourteen. The PlayStation four debut toward
Speaker 1: the end of and so every full year it's been available,
Speaker 1: it's been the top selling video game console. It has
Speaker 1: sold more units every year than the Xbox One has.
Speaker 1: But this leaves not just Microsoft and then Nintendo's limited presence.
Speaker 1: There's also the enormous PC games market, so that's still
Speaker 1: going to be part of the three. According to New Zoo,
Speaker 1: and PC games accounted for thirty two point nine billion
Speaker 1: dollars in sales, with twenty eight point six billion of
Speaker 1: that being in digital and physical copies. The other uh
Speaker 1: for something billion dollars was from browser based games. Console
Speaker 1: games took up more of the market slightly. They sold
Speaker 1: for thirty four point six billion dollars worth, so a
Speaker 1: little bit more sales in console games than PC games,
Speaker 1: but PC games are still a big deal. However, both
Speaker 1: of those sectors were dwarfed by the mobile market that
Speaker 1: racked up an astounding seventy point three billion dollars in sales.
Speaker 1: Fifty six point four billion of that was for smartphone games.
Speaker 1: Mobile games typically don't get a ton of coverage at
Speaker 1: E three, that we might see that start to change.
Speaker 1: The e s A announced an attendee list not long
Speaker 1: after Sony's announcement that it wasn't going to be a
Speaker 1: E three nineteen, and in a press release, the organization said, quote,
Speaker 1: among the leading video game companies already committed to participating
Speaker 1: in E three twenty nineteen are Microsoft, Slash, Xbox, Nintendo
Speaker 1: of America, Activision, Bethesda Softworks, Capcom, Epic Games, Konami, Digital Entertainment,
Speaker 1: Square Enix, Take Two, Interactive Software, u be Soft, and
Speaker 1: Warner Brothers Interact to Entertainment end quote. That's definitely a
Speaker 1: list of heavy hitters, and while that doesn't necessarily indicate
Speaker 1: which subsidiaries will also be attending, it's good to remember that.
Speaker 1: You know, there are some other big names that are
Speaker 1: part of the umbrella that was mentioned. So for example,
Speaker 1: Take Two, which will be at E three nineteen, is
Speaker 1: the parent company for rock Star, and Activision is the
Speaker 1: parent company for Blizzard Entertainment. Also, people have predicted the
Speaker 1: death of E three several times in the past, and
Speaker 1: so far it's still alive. So back when the conference
Speaker 1: was scaled down in two thousand seven, there were people
Speaker 1: who were saying the writings on the wall, this conference
Speaker 1: is just going to fade away, and it didn't. It
Speaker 1: came back in when e A announced it was going
Speaker 1: to establish its own event during E three. It wasn't
Speaker 1: long before news broke that Activision was also planning to
Speaker 1: skip the event that year, and then another company called
Speaker 1: war Gaming, which is a smaller developer They make a
Speaker 1: game called World of Tanks, said it too was going
Speaker 1: to skip the event, and then Disney followed suit, although
Speaker 1: to be fair, that was likely because Disney was planning
Speaker 1: on shutting down its video game developer division, which was
Speaker 1: called Disney Interactive Studios, and instead they were switching to
Speaker 1: a model where the company will license out Disney properties
Speaker 1: to third party developers. But we didn't really know that
Speaker 1: at that time. From the outside looking in, seeing these
Speaker 1: various companies kind of pull out of the three, it
Speaker 1: looked like it was a cascade effect, like maybe this
Speaker 1: was going to be uh the end of E three
Speaker 1: with lots of companies bailing on this established trade show.
Speaker 1: And it may even have been what convinced the E
Speaker 1: s A to open the show up to the public
Speaker 1: in ten that by making the show accessible to the public,
Speaker 1: it would also bring pressure on video game companies to
Speaker 1: participate or risk being left out of all the excitement.
Speaker 1: So there's some who have said that that was probably
Speaker 1: why the E s A really chose. One they could
Speaker 1: sell tick it's and make money, and two this would
Speaker 1: force the companies to participate for fear of otherwise getting
Speaker 1: the ill will of the gaming community, and thus the
Speaker 1: trade show itself would remain relevant by force. And while
Speaker 1: Wired was musing on the possibility that E three might
Speaker 1: die after Polygone would call for E three to change
Speaker 1: or die, in Brian Crescente wrote an article saying it
Speaker 1: was clear that the reasons the E s A started
Speaker 1: E three were no longer relevant. Whereas in years past,
Speaker 1: game developers would use E three to land publication deals
Speaker 1: for the rest of the year. Polygone cited industry professionals
Speaker 1: like Sean Leyden of Sony, who said that these days
Speaker 1: those deals are done before the games are complete and
Speaker 1: well ahead of E three, so they're not happening at
Speaker 1: E three, they're happening before, and E three's mission to
Speaker 1: bring attention to games isn't relevant anymore either. People are
Speaker 1: pretty aware of video games, and the piece pointed out
Speaker 1: that the three opening up its doors meant it was
Speaker 1: trying to be the next Packs. But Packs is still
Speaker 1: Packs and manages to work pretty darn well, so it
Speaker 1: might mean that E three is just being kind of
Speaker 1: a watered down version of Packs. Many video game journalists
Speaker 1: are guessing that Sony's announcement really means that the company
Speaker 1: is just trying to get its ducks in a row
Speaker 1: for the successor to the PlayStation four. Sony executives already
Speaker 1: have confirmed that the company is working on the PS five,
Speaker 1: and most analysts guests it's going to come out either
Speaker 1: by the end of twenty nineteen or perhaps in and
Speaker 1: it's possible that Sony wants to make sure it can
Speaker 1: hold an event all its own to announce this next
Speaker 1: piece of hardware and not have to worry about winning
Speaker 1: a trade show. And because they're focusing on the PS five,
Speaker 1: it probably also means they're winding down development for the
Speaker 1: PS four, which means they don't have very much to
Speaker 1: show off for the console that they are getting ready
Speaker 1: to phase out. And again, just like the PlayStation experience,
Speaker 1: it may well be that one of the reasons Sony
Speaker 1: wants to pull out of the three is they just
Speaker 1: don't have a whole lot to show off, and so
Speaker 1: it doesn't make a lot of sense to maintain a
Speaker 1: presence there now. That could mean that in Sony would
Speaker 1: be right back at E three now with the PlayStation five,
Speaker 1: and that is just a blip in the radar. Or
Speaker 1: it might mean that more companies will follow suit and
Speaker 1: I'll like to have their own events instead of going
Speaker 1: all in together, and it could mean the E three
Speaker 1: is finally starting to unravel. Why do I think I
Speaker 1: I suspect Sony will be back in twenty unless the
Speaker 1: company just decides that it's much better to have your
Speaker 1: own stage rather than share it with others. Uh. The
Speaker 1: real value I think is that by having a concentrated event,
Speaker 1: you get a lot of excitement that it's all focused
Speaker 1: at the same time, and you can you can get
Speaker 1: a lot of leverage out of that. But holding your
Speaker 1: own event means you can really control the focus and
Speaker 1: control the narrative. And so I don't know. I think
Speaker 1: Sony will be back in, but if they announced that
Speaker 1: they're done, I think the three might be done too.
Speaker 1: Despite the fact that PC gaming continues on strong, it's
Speaker 1: getting stronger. Um, I just don't think that the the
Speaker 1: developers and the other companies will want to participate if
Speaker 1: there's a perception that the event is kind of falling apart.
Speaker 1: It might be one of those cases where people say
Speaker 1: the ship looks like it's sinking. I don't know if
Speaker 1: it's sinking, but let's go ahead and get in the
Speaker 1: lifeboat just in case. Well, that wraps up this episode.
Speaker 1: It was fun to kind of talk about this and
Speaker 1: to go over Sony's announcement. Uh. It surprised me when
Speaker 1: I heard about it, and then I had to learn
Speaker 1: more and it was all have fun to kind of
Speaker 1: go down this sort of guess this estimation about whether
Speaker 1: or not E three will stick around. What do you
Speaker 1: guys think. I'm curious to hear your thoughts on it.
Speaker 1: Maybe that I'm completely off base, and maybe E three
Speaker 1: is stronger than it ever has been and I'm just
Speaker 1: being silly. I totally accept that that's a possibility. If
Speaker 1: you want to get in touch with me, you can
Speaker 1: go over to tech stuff podcast dot com. There you're
Speaker 1: gonna find links to get in contact with me via
Speaker 1: Facebook or Twitter. You can also send me an email
Speaker 1: the addresses tech stuff at how stuff works dot com,
Speaker 1: and you can go over to our our store, our
Speaker 1: merchandise shop. Every purchase you make goes to help the
Speaker 1: show and can stop me from stuttering. To be fair,
Speaker 1: it's been a very long day. This is the third
Speaker 1: episode of recording today, and I'm starting to lose my voice.
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Speaker 1: help me out, I mean help the show out, go
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