I don't care what they do to E3 next year. Just make sure Nintendo doesn't set one foot anywhere near it. Reggie Fils-Aime = misplaced corporate monkey; Shigeru Miyamoto = aging relic that's lost his usefulness in a modern age; Cammie Dunaway = WTF.

J3EBS

PLEASE, MAKE IT PUBLIC!!! Oh, and bring back the booth babes.

KM91

If it's anything like this year's show, would we even want to go?

TF2Soldier914

@LittleBigPlaneteer:
Agreed.

Gam3r

I really like that Leipzig idea. I mean, really, REALLY, like it. I mean after hearing about that being the format my brain cannot possibly comprehend running your game conference any other way!

art_zombie

Well if the picture above is any sort of indication of the "excitement" E3 is generating now...

Quilt

It wasn't open to the public before?
I went in... '04, I think? It was so big and confusing that I didn't really find much to write home about. I could live without the hubbub and certainly without the empty promises. (Webzen, I'm looking at you!)

Comatose Turtle

@wild homes loves you but chooses darkness!: Wait, that sentence should read But you have to admit the development process endures a lesser burden this way. I'm tired.

wild homes loves you but chooses darkness!

@ctaylor: Sure, and I agree. But you have to admit the impact on the development process endures a lesser burden this way. If you control when things get shown, you control to a great extent how much it's going to affect your production. These conventions are just examples of the publishers granting inexplicable power to the arbitrary, when they'd do a lot better keeping things close to the belt.

wild homes loves you but chooses darkness!

Hey Maniacmayhem! Tell me how crow taste!

Lixie

@Hulkamaniac: WOOT you know it or the Jacob Javits Center, thats how you 'll bring E3 back

JackDaniels19

E3 needs to be earlier in the year. I'm not sure that opening it to the public would be well received by everyone in the industry. Those trade shows are hard ass work. Whenever I worked E3 or CES, my feet and my talking voice were basically shot after a couple of days.

@wild homes loves you but chooses darkness!: Without E3, you'd still have interruptions in the natural development cycle as publishers move to private events. No matter what happens, you won't be able to take PR, and the need to support PR, out of the dev cycle. Media demos are here to stay. That means doing work and cutting corners for demo purposes that you know you're going to throw away.

ctaylor

Seeing how E3 is the biggest gaming expo of it's kind in the states this would be welcome news. I still regret not going to Atlanta in '96...97?

SAKY

Do we even need E3 anymore? Seriously, what big news came out of the show? Final Fantasy XIII coming to the 360? Big deal. Hold a press conference or send out a press release. We don't need it anymore. I think ESA has proven that they are going to just run the show into the ground, so why don't they just admit that their time has come and gone, and give up?

PissedPS3Fan

They should move the show to Las Vegas. We've got a big enough convention center that the CES is hosted in.

DazeOfWar

so who's ready for pax?

s7arbuck

Would have been nice if they did this when E3 didn't suck.

Solertia

@parad0x360: I like that idea actually.

I would contemplate driving/ flying to wherever they are going to hold it next year if it were open to the public. A lot of money could be made if opened to the public. And we all know how much everyone likes money....

Satis24

Move it to Boston Expo and Convention Center so I don't have to fly to the west coast! D:

[www.advantageboston.com]

Of course that'll never happen...

DanoruX

OMG, pls move E3 to Mexico City !!

It would be awesome !!1

Hellicus

the ESA needs to go back to the almost perverse spectacle that was pre-'06 E3, but open to the public (no huge amounts of tickets going to retailers either) and a few months earlier for more megaton face ownage.

SpishackCola

@Atheist Jew: You can't really think the scale was the cause of the problems at this year's E3...

Arttemis

???

E3 didnt suck because it wasnt open to the public. It sucked because they didnt announce anything exciting. Opening the ho-hum show up to fanboys would only make things worse.

Thrillhaus

As much as the old E3 was a spectical and as much money as it sucked from companies, the ESA needed it. Without it they've lost a huge chunk of their fund raising, and have had to raise their dues. E3 needs to be open to the public or everyone loses.

EmeraldDragon

Shut it down.

badasscat

But what of the booth babes?

Trowble (XBL/PSN)

@kagai: I don't know, some of the companies liked it. I know for a fact that Akira Yamaoka liked it when I had an interview with him like 4 years ago. I think it's a split decision...but if it's public, it also gets them more attention too than just press only event. I can understand the too big part though. Like the post I mentioned earlier, it took like 30 minutes to get a damn hot dog.

djricekcn

well, with the amount of negative feedback that this new E3 has been getting, it's no wonder why they'd go back.

now kotaku, how about a contest to fly out there with you guys next year? ;)

justinbox360

It'd be smart to consolidate E3 and E4 into a single week long (or 2 week long) event.

KingBroly

I agree with Paradox and Viper; the press should have a few days without the public to get in and get some hands on time with the games.

ThisIsSick

honestly, i dont care what they do with E3, as long as they keep the big game announcements that make me crap my pants... granted this year sorta disappointed...

canceric09

Pretty please 3 2009. free to $30 bucks a day.

zkotaku

Please make this happen ESA, this is what every gamer has wanted since the beginning of E3. It will fully revive the show and make it better then ever, especially if they take the suggestion that Brian just made also.

WPack911

@Atheist Jew: I was just going to post this same comment. I remember E3 2006, because I was going to Gamespot a lot to watch their daily live coverage. Most of their people were complaining about E3's excess, and the execs were complaining about it, and the publishers, and, well just about everybody.

E3 2007 rolls around and it's a totally boring ass event, everyone starts grumbling amongst themselves and then E3 2008 passes us by and everyone is saying the exact opposite of what they were saying in 2006. Be careful what you wish for.

I always dreamed of going to the E3 of 2006 and before. I hope they pimp it back up and let the public in. That would be awesome. Now, if I can just get someone to fly me to California and put me up someplace nice, I'll be all set.

kagai

Personally, I still vote for shut it down. E3 creates artificial procedures in the development cycle. Teams put too much time into doing demos and content-- and testing it for bugs-- to make E3. Time that would be better spent simply developing the game. It's an unnecessary expense, and the benefit is really fairly small relative to the effort put in. Publishers can just as easily continue to become increasingly proficient at using technology to serve more of the community as the opportunities present themselves naturally during the development cycle, without having to bend the natural development process.

wild homes loves you but chooses darkness!

@djricekcn: It also use to take practically every hall that was available from LAC too, which is big...I remember standing in line for a hot dog...that took 30 min....a lot of people, but the enviornment itself was sure a lot more fun.

djricekcn

"You also have a hall or two dedicated solely to the press where writers and reporters can have quiet meetings and interviews with developers, producers and businesses types."

That was exactly how the old E3 was...sure miss those days (even though I no longer work for a gaming company)

djricekcn

E3 Washington, DC would also be acceptable . . . :D

Tubatic

[www.columbia.edu]

this one /\ is what i mean, good staging.

Hulkamaniac

It's so easy though. Have two days for press only. And have 3 days for everyone else. Simple. Get it together guys.

Adisah

I thought the problem was that E3 was pushed back. By the time E308 hit, everything was pretty much out of the bag. If they keep the format the same and just push the date up to what it used to be, wouldn't that fix the complaints? From what I've read and heard, most people's complaints centered around a lack of big announcements. Moving the date would fix that at least somewhat.

Another problem I think lies with the those giving the conferences. I only saw MS's and Nintendo's presentations and it seemed to me that the style was dictated to take advantage of an old-E3 mentality. E3 has now become something more business-like, but the presentations haven't followed suits. As such I found a lot of awkwardness all around (Cammie's laid back attitude was the most obvious).

Silent Predator

@parad0x360:
I agree press should have first dibs and then the public.

ViciousViper

[www.columbia.edu]

this is the perfect place for E3 09 really, Pontiac Silverdome, it has staging, easily modified, large... easy parking...

Hulkamaniac

E3 downtown New York City, Time Square. The first outdoor E3.

Hulkamaniac

@y2julio: @y2julio:

Both are too small I think, but I would love that being a new yorker and all.

LittleBigPlaneteer

Maybe they should open it to the public but sell tickets at "premium" prices. That should hopefully weed out the shit people and would make a good transition between the old E3 and the current one.

LittleBigPlaneteer

@y2julio: or MSG too.

y2julio

Why dont they do a 4 day show, 2 days for just the press and 2 days for everyone? That way fans can get hyped up about it again and the press can still get some of their work done.

parad0x360

Move it to NYC to the Javitz Center!!!

y2julio

E3 should go to... Pontiac Silver Dome! It can fit over 93,000 people! They could separate each section of the dome for specific booths, with one massive 360-degree center stage that can be seen from all seats.

Hulkamaniac

I really hope that I am out there during that time, travel ALOT!!!

ghnvt

Will they sell those Garden Gnome this year?

Shachihoko

Well, they can't go on down the road they are currently going. I don't think they are pulling a full u-turn, but they definately need to turn this bitch in a new direction.

Monsignor

And again they realize the stupid mistakes they made.

Do you know how many bloody MILLIONS they paid to get out of the contract for the LACC just for one year?

Oi vei... ESA is flipflopping worse than a dying company trying to save itself from swirling the drain.

Ignatius

We are their friggen' consumers. Of COURSE we should have access to events like this.

cZEAL

Post E3 06 - Developers, publishers, journalists, industry reps, etc all complained that E3 was too large, too loud, too expensive, and too open to the public.

Post E3 08 - Those exact same people now complain about the exact opposite. It's not grand enough.

E3 09 - Who the fuck knows what's going to happen? If they had any common sense they'd move the show up to San Francisco, make it an industry event with access to the public for a nominal fee (free for students), and actually bring some dignity back to the Expo.

But of course, they won't do that.

Atheist Jew

@Hopanoe: And you saw how the last 2 E3's fared due to 'cutting back'...

But jeez, will they really have enough space for a public E3?
PAX is always packed to the brim... and it's far from the biggest convention out there.

Revolutionary

Better yet, WILL they have bacon-wrapped foods?

oh grammar...

icegoat

Groundhog Day^100.

PsycheE

So back to old E3 days then? I'm for it. There's no where to go but up right? I hope...

LittleBigPlaneteer

But do they have bacon-wrapped foods?

icegoat

Wait...didn't they spend the last two years cutting back E3 to select members of the press?

Hopanoe

Bring it back to Atlanta! I remember the glorious 16-bit E3 days where the placards had better graphics than the games!

And no, I'm not saying that because I will be living there by the time E3 09 hits...

>.>

<.<

OK, I lied.

tlozwarlock

What if...

E3 09 was a 6-day event: First two days are more of a business summit, sorta like this year. Next three days, open to the public. Last day, mostly open to the public, but with each company unleashing their biggest stuff of the year for a crowd of journalists with tv's everywhere so the public can watch too.

My360broked

Then they seriously need to get off their asses, and just move it to Las Vegas. Every year since I started going (2000) there's been talk of that E3 is too expensive, and that Vegas would be a much better place. And no I didn't sneak in. I was legitimately there. E3 will never move somewhere that isn't on, or very near the West Coast. The big players are mainly in that surrounding area. At the rate thing are going, transportation is playing a bigger role.

kermit007

so they realized that E3 sucked and that they need to improve on it.

Para

what they should do is completely scrap E3 in California, and bring it to New York. That would be much better for me, and make it open to the public and dirt cheap. You could limit the ammount of people though, I don't mind that as long as I get a tic.

v12qborony

@y2julio: As much as I would love that being a fellow New Yorker the Javitz Center just isn't bit enough to house E3 I mean we have NY comic con and thats only a fraction of the west cost event.

Random_Ant

Good point.

felx2542

I guess it can only get better. Lord knows it can't be any worse...

luigiman0

Anything will be better then this years e3...I fell asleep half way through.

Your-Face-Has-To-Be-A-Lie

They could generate revenue of some sort if they would make it open to the public. I say they should relocate it to Florida, but then again there isn't much down here...

gr8asianman

@djricekcn:
Umm, no. It wasn't. There was no seperate press hall. We had to dodge the masses standing in line to get a picture taken with nameless model 273 and clogging the aisles jumping up and down for t-shirts. I can very well live without that. Make it like the Games Convention and all is good.

robur

@Atheist Jew:
+1

robur