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E3

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The E3 Media and Business Summit, formerly known as the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3), and commonly known as E3, is an annual trade show for the computer and video games industry presented by the Entertainment Software Association. It is only open to game industry professionals, journalists, and guests of exhibitors, such as celebrities. As of 2007, E3 is invitation-only, meaning that instead of around 60,000 attendees at E3 there were only around 3,000-5,000. The reason for this change is to allow for a more intimate atmosphere where business can be emphasized. A separate conference called Entertainment for All Expo has been created to accommodate the public demand for a major, annual video game event.

E3 was previously held in the third week of May of each year at the Los Angeles Convention Center (LACC) in Los Angeles. In 2007, the show was held in Santa Monica, California from July 11 to July 13. The ESA said that over 70,000 people attended the show in 2005. Many video game developers show off their upcoming games and game-related hardware at the event, The independent "Game Critics Awards" have been given to "Best of E3" games in various categories since 1998.

The Game Developers Conference is another yearly milestone for developers held in the spring each year in San Jose or San Francisco, California, and generally billed as an educational conference for game developers, while E3 is primarily a showcase, aimed at the press and retailers.

On July 31, 2006, it was announced that the expo would be downsized and restructured and on October 13, 2006 the new format of the show was detailed. Essentially, the E3 "Trade Show" was replaced with a much lower-key and invite-only event or series of events known as the E3 Media and Business Summit. It will focus on press events and small meetings with media, retail, development, and other key sectors. While there will be opportunities for game demonstrations, E3 2007 did not feature the large trade show environment of previous years.

History

Prior to E3, most game developers went to other trade shows to display new products, including the Consumer Electronics Show and the European Computer Trade Show.

The first E3 was put on by the Interactive Digital Software Association (now the Entertainment Software Association). It coincided with the start of a new generation of consoles, with the release of the Sega Saturn, and the announcements of upcoming releases of the PlayStation, Virtual Boy and SNK's Neo*Geo CD. Specifications for the Nintendo Ultra 64 (later renamed Nintendo 64) were released, but there was no hardware shown.

The event ran from May 11 through May 13 1995 in Los Angeles, California. Keynote speakers included Sega of America, Inc. president and CEO Thomas Kalinske; Sony Electronic Publishing Company president Olaf Olafsson; and Nintendo chairman Howard Lincoln.

Layout

The 2007 show was housed in suites and meeting rooms in numerous hotels in the Santa Monica area, within walking distance of each other. The Barker Hangar was used for showcasing software.

Show floor

When held in Los Angeles, the show was exhibited over five halls: Kentia, Petree, South Hall, Concourse Hall, and the West Hall. Booth space was purchased ahead of time by publishers. Some publishers, in turn, spent millions of dollars creating elaborate displays and structures to accommodate the promotion of their bigger titles.

While E3 was noted as being noisy and busy, sound levels are not what they once were; in recent years (2005, 2006), publishers like EA have kept their sound down compared to years directly before. At one point, sound levels would fluctuate as exhibitors raised the volume to compete with near by stands. Shouting was common at some stands. Meanwhile, in 2006, when attendance was down to 10,000, according to the organizers, it was a planned move as industry accreditation was stringently checked. VGEXPO had nearly ten times the number of attendees.

Different booths would also invite celebrities over for signings for their specific games. For 2004, Activision brought in Stan Lee and Tony Hawk to promote X-Men Legends and Tony Hawk's Underground 2 respectively while Vivendi Universal brought in Vin Diesel to promote his new game The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay, a prequel to the summer 2004 film. Celebrities were generally only available for a few hours, so line-waiting was a general practice at E3.

Concourse Hall and lobbies

The external apparatus that connects the bigger halls is the Concourse Hall and subsequently, the West Hall and South Hall lobbies. The lobbies were used for registration, picking up badges and badge holders, and other general information. Bag stands and the daily magazine were available in the lobbies. The lobbies were also the signature glass structures of the LACC and were massive structures.

The Concourse Hall generally featured four booths and a few media outlets as well as the Into the Pixel game art exhibition started at E3 2004. The Concourse Hall was generally used as a link between both lobbies and featured a window display with a beautiful view of downtown Los Angeles.

South Hall

The largest ship of the LACC and the largest exhibition space by default. Microsoft and many of the largest Western developers from North America and Europe generally found their homes here.

Kentia and Petree Halls

The second smallest and smallest ship respectively. The RMN Petree was the indefinite home to Atari and Midway's massive booths. The RMN Kentia was generally used by smaller developers who could not afford the hefty fees of having a booth 'planetside'. As a result, the look of the RMN Kentia at E3 was similar to that of a bazaar.

West Hall

The RMN "West Hall" was used by the biggest publishers from Asia. Nintendo and Sony's booths are normally located here. The RMN "West Hall" was also normally temporally home to private press rooms, and sometimes TV studios, of large gaming media outlets such as IGN, 1UP.com, GameSpy, and GameSpot.

Online scheduling system

In addition to the physical event, E3 supports or is otherwise associated with a number of online sites. One site introduced in 2006 was E365, an online community which attendees use to pre-network and schedule meetings with one another.

Media coverage

On behalf of the organizers, Future Publishing now publishes the free official daily magazine, named in 2006 as ‘The 2006 Official Show Daily’. Previously published by Ziff Davis under "SHOWDAILY", the magazine provides news, and maps of the show floor.

On site, the event is covered by accredited journalists from around the world. Credentials are verified before the event or on-site. Once nearly completely dominated by print games journalist, the mixture now includes general and specialist TV crews, newspaper journalists, website journalists, and ‘fansite’ journalists. Many were armed with consumer-level digital video and photograph cameras.

G4 aired live coverage of E3 2005, 2006 and 2007 (E3 '05 Live, E3 '06 Live, and E3 '07 Live) three hours a day for 4 days in one week each year.

IGN, 1UP.com, GameSpot, Gametrailers, Advanced Media Network, VGCore.com as well as many other sites provided video coverage, and copies of official game trailers.

An episode of The Showbiz Show featured Andrew Daly getting live coverage from E3.

2007 restructure

On July 31, 2006, the ESA announced sweeping changes would take place prior to the 2007 E3. No longer a massive gaming expo, the event was downsized at the behest of industry giants such as Microsoft, Sony, Electronic Arts and THQ.

Although E3 was originally envisioned as an expo open only to game industry professionals, it has grown in recent years to include greater numbers of bloggers and attendees who were not industry professionals. Most of these bloggers were excluded from the revised event, as the ESA has announced that the new E3 will be by invitation only.

This is seen as a severe blow to smaller gaming publishers and developers, as they relied on E3's mass-market buzz and may have to leave the event and advertise independently if the new format becomes too exclusive, although some people argue this is beneficial. Also harmed is the city of Los Angeles, which experienced a huge economic boom from the influx of gamers and industry employees during the event.

Spiritual successor

On August 8, 2006, Gen Con, LLC announced that it would be expanding its gaming exhibits to include video games. The company also stated that it would increase venue space at its Indianapolis convention and relocate its Anaheim convention to the Los Angeles Convention Center. However, on January 26, 2007, Gen Con announced that it would be canceling its Anaheim show, Gen Con So Cal. The company cited a lack of growth in attendance and an increase in competing shows.

On January 5, 2007, IDG World Expo announced that the ESA had endorsed a consumer-oriented successor to E3 called Entertainment for All or E for All (which replaces the GamePro Expo name). The expo took place from October 18 through October 20, 2007 at the Los Angeles Convention Center to allow participating companies to sell their holiday releases to the attendees. The expo charged an entrance fee of USD $50 to $110, but attendance was no longer limited to video game developers, retailers, and media.

In many countries other than the US, several smaller expositions have arisen showcasing local talent and games production companies as well as many international companies.

References

See also

External links



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