With the enthusiasm of a youngster showing off a new toy, Rein led me to a computer that was set up in the corner of the conference room. He launched a version of Fortnite still under development. He told me, “We’re pretty enthusiastic about this,” before giving me a preview of what would become the world’s most popular entertainment venue.
Physical events like Gamescom and Tokyo Game Show provide attendees with opportunities like this. While I didn’t have any serendipitous contacts at the German show (I couldn’t make it to TGS this week) on par with finding the decade’s largest game, it was a great antidote to the digital monotony of the past two years. This is especially true now that covid vaccination adoption has made it safer.
You probably aren’t shocked that I’m happy to see the return of weeks spent in foreign expo halls, what with me being a 36-year-old father of two small children who enjoy watching YouTube at maximum volume, and running a news website that benefits from the access shows like E3 afford.
A further caveat: ReedPop, organiser of PAX, EGX, and eventually E3, is a business partner of VGC. Although the first disclaimer was a factor in my decision to work with them, VGC is a separate entity.
But as a gamer, I don’t think I’m alone in noticing a slow but steady decline in enthusiasm for video games since the outbreak.
Yes, business is booming, and there have been some fantastic releases in 2022: Elden Ring, Pokémon Legends, and Horizon: Forbidden West are all excellent games that could easily be nominated for Game of the Year in any calendar year. It may seem like an exciting period for the games industry, but the market is stagnating, major releases are less frequent, and there have been no public showcases like E3 in over three years.
Considering that 2023 will bring us even more monsters like Zelda, Starfield, and Final Fantasy 16, 2022 will be an exciting year for gamers, as it should be.
The lack of excitement about recent digital happenings is exemplified by two such occasions that occurred this week. The tired formula of Nintendo Direct and PlayStation’s State of Play doesn’t help. Neither show has any real character anymore (if the latter ever had any in the first place).
We all recall plenty of disappointing E3 press conferences, so we know that doing an event in person is no guarantee of success just because it’s not streamed online (most of them feature a car underwhelmingly appearing from the ceiling). From what we’ve seen in the past two years, though, it appears that they provide gaming industry heavyweights more reason to put on a show.
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The digital events this week seemed content to treat their shows like a list of marketing obligations, rather than actual showcases curated to build excitement around their platforms, perhaps because they know there is no risk of a collective groan from a live audience or because the attendance of hundreds of industry partners and pundits doesn’t need to be justified.
While Geoff Keighley’s annual events have been rightly criticised for the lower quality of content in what has been a sluggish year for AAA games, they still manage to produce a programme that is fun and worth watching.
But this week, Nintendo and Sony couldn’t hide behind a lack of content: The introduction of Pikmin 4 was like hearing music to my ears, Yakuza Ishin is a game I’m eager to try, and the gameplay reveal for God of War: Ragnarök was among the most impressive I’ve ever seen. If the film had been shown to an audience at TGS, E3, or a PlayStation Experience-style event, I can only imagine the uproar it would have caused.
There Needs to Be More of These Kinds of Events in The Gaming Business
Consumers have seen the other benefits of the Nintendo Direct and State of Play shows being planned ahead of the Japanese gaming expo, which is certainly no coincidence, in the days following the digital events, as attendees have shared their hands-on impressions and developer interviews for games revealed during the digital events.
The developers of popular fighting games like Yakuza (or Like a Dragon, as it is currently known), Tekken 8, Wo Long, and Street Fighter 6 have made extra efforts to ensure their fans understand the games and have few questions left unanswered.
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Companies would have slouched back into their complacency and left us waiting for the next teeny-tiny video broadcast for more marketing department-approved content if there had been no need to justify participation at a physical show.
Many of the games and developers I learned about at Gamescom and TGS now excite me more than they did before, which can only be good news for those who were able to attend.
There will always be a need for digital events in the promotion and debate of video games, as society will never again be the same as it was before the pandemic. However, in-person gatherings are superior to both for uniting and generating excitement among gamers. It’s for this reason that many attendees and exhibitors at TGS are probably overjoyed to be home again this week.It’s possible that one of them will unearth the decade’s biggest surprise smash.
