We love it. You love it. Everyone who games loves it. It's called E3, the annual event held in the Los Angeles Convention Center that brings together everyone who's anyone in the world of video games and traps them in a three-day-long orgy of game announcements and product demos. Companies spend millions to take part in it, and others spend millions more covering it. So what exactly is it about E3 that makes it so important? We hit the show floor this year to find out straight from the source.
The Game Makers
The first people we asked about E3 are those who make the games. It's the publishers and developers that make the video game world go round. If it weren't for these guys, there would be no game industry. "E3 is a good event because it shows everyone in the industry what's out there," says Brian Decker, Production Coordinator for Electronic Arts. Brian isn't alone; most industry insiders have the exact same opinion. Tim Hernandez, Associate Producer for EA Mobile, believes E3 is a chance for people to "see where the game industry is headed and where we are."
A showing at E3 can have a huge effect on a game, according to Joe Floyd from Sega of America: "It's very critical. Every year is depending on the year before. If you have a bad year, it affects the following year." Developers scramble to get E3 builds ready, and sometimes this preparation takes time away from a game's regular production cycle. "It's very strenuous," says Floyd. Brandon Sanders from Vivendi Games goes into more detail. "We create specific builds for E3. It's like taking a section of a game, slapping on a new front end and back end, and making it a whole new game. It's a whole different piece of software." According to Sanders, it's all worthwhile. "It's worth it for people to see it. It's absolutely necessary."
The Businessmen
It doesn't take a genius to figure out that E3 is the perfect place to get keyed in to the pulse of the industry. This benefits more than just developers and publishers. Adam Carpenter from Vivendi Games says, "It's a good place for merchants. You can see what's being sold and what's needed for the future of gaming."
From Hollywood
Right after our talk with Adam we ran into Adrian Askarieh, the producer of the upcoming Hitman movie from 20th Century Fox and Spyhunter from Universal Pictures. Askarieh tells us, "As far as I'm concerned, it's the number one place to be if you wanna find out where gaming is going. Since we're turning a lot of videogames into movies, that's a big part of our business, so we want to make sure we're in the middle of it and know what's going on." Daniel Altar, Askarieh's production partner, tells us that E3 is also a great place to "scour new properties."
The Media
As gaming expands, the kind of people who attend and cover the show becomes more diverse. It was next to the Buena Vista booth where we ran into George Pennacchio, entertainment reporter for Southern California's KABC-TV. Pennacchio was doing a story on games based on movie licenses and was very impressed with what he saw. "This is nuts, I had no idea. It's fascinating to me that this got so big so fast," says Pennacchio, adding, "There was a time when they used to beg us to come cover this."
What It All Means
So, the true meaning of E3 is that it's better to give than to receive. Wait a minute, wrong event. All kidding aside, it doesn't matter whether you're at E3 to find business opportunities, to make deals, to write a story about it, or just to see all the games. It's about bringing the game industry together to show the world what we're all about. There's something for everyone here, and we look forward to many more E3s to come.