Curtain Falls on E3

The largest and most popular gathering of video games and other video game-adjacent activities, Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3), is officially gone.

On Tuesday, 12 December, E3’s official website, along with its related social media accounts, reflected a simple statement: “After more than two decades of E3, each one bigger than the last, the time has come to say goodbye. Thanks for the memories.”

Stanley Pierre-Louis, the president and CEO of Entertainment Software Association, the company which organised and presented E3, said: “We know it’s difficult to say goodbye to such a beloved event, but it’s the right thing to do given the new opportunities our industry has to reach fans and partners.”

Since 1995, the gaming convention was hailed as the biggest date on the industry’s calendar for consumers, companies and developers, generating buzz with major announcements while new games and technology drove trends.

However, recent years saw partners withdrawing, new competitors entering the scene, shifting audience preferences and plummeting attendance numbers. The final nail blow came as the coronavirus pandemic saw E3 cancelled in 2020; the lingering pandemic resulted in an online-only event the following year, and a total cancellation for 2022.

Image Credit: Source