If you’ve been following gaming news this week, I wouldn’t be surprised if you’re a bit confused about when exactly E3 starts. We expect a few leaks here and there during the week before E3, like the listing for a Skyrim remaster, but it’s much more than just leaks showing up this year. Game companies themselves have decided to start the party early, tossing out announcements like E3’s up in the air and they just don’t care.
Just look at everything that’s come out this week. Square Enix has decided to go ahead and pre-announce everything that isn’t Final Fantasy XV related – a Final Fantasy XII remaster, the Western release of World of Final Fantasy , and all the latest Deus Ex news. Watch Dogs 2 has been confirmed and received multiple videos. Injustice 2 has been officially announced. Persona 5 ‘s Western release date has been announced. Even Sony, which has its very own stinkin’ press conference at E3, released the newest Horizon: Zero Dawn trailer a week early – and that’s one of the most anticipated PlayStation 4 exclusives!
Why are so many game companies spoiling the big E3 party early? Some of them probably want to stand out from the crowd, getting their big news out early when there’s less news to drown it out. Of course, now that everybody is announcing early at the same time, that strategy isn’t quite so effective, is it? Other companies, and I suspect Square Enix is one of them, are getting smaller announcements out of the way so they can focus their E3 attention on their biggest kahunas. And I’m just not sure what some others are doing. Ubisoft has three hours booked for a press conference on Tuesday. It couldn’t have waited until then to give us the deets on Watch Dogs 2 ? Is it just going to repeat the same information in their presser? I don’t get it.
Although some of these early reveals might be good for companies, I wonder how much they can backfire? If you reveal too much before E3, your announcements can get forgotten by gamers wowed by the actual conference reveals and by press outlets that focus on new information during the big week. If you repeat the information you’ve already revealed during E3, people might tune it out and press outlets might not cover it, because they already did so the week before. E3 is crazy and stressful for journalists – don’t give us an excuse to ignore you, game companies!
I don’t think E3 is dying, but I do think it’s transforming. It’s definitely becoming more of a digital event than a strictly physical one, and that’s good news for gamers. What might not be as good for us is that it seems to be turning more into a general, “announce stuff in early June” time period instead of strictly one big conference during which everything comes out. I think it’s more fun when companies wait and really wow us during the show. What about you?