ESA has officially released a statement canceling E3 2023.
In a surprising turn of events, the Electronic Entertainment Association (ESA) has officially released a statement confirming the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) cancellation this year. This comes after the past week Ubisoft and Tencent had already confirmed their withdrawal from the massive event, and in Ubisoft’s case, doing their own “Ubisoft Forward” event on June 12 in Los Angeles.
The last E3 event, which was the largest in-person gaming expo of its time, was celebrated in 2019, before it had to cancel in 2020 and beyond due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The future seems very uncertain for the ESA as bigger gaming related events such as Geoff Keighley’s Summer Games Fest and The Game Awards gain more traction with gamers and worldwide audiences.
Nintendo, Xbox and Sony also have for years made their own events with their Nintendo Direct and Xbox and PlayStation Showcases respectively, showing the lack of need of these events to talk directly to a consumer without an intermediary.
Many developers also argue for the need for an in-person event as networking and real connections cannot be made through just a live stream and meeting new gamers to show their products goes a long way with the community, with PAX East and Gamescom being a few examples of these ongoing events.
It has yet to be seen if the ESA plans to make a comeback next year or decide to stop making E3 and try a different kind of event in the future. This news was first confirmed by the ESA to IGN.
