There's something to be said for watching videos/trailers with a live audience though. I know people say "oh they can toss it up on YouTube and be done with it" but stuff like in this video just gets you extra hyped:
Perhaps this will be an unexpected benefit to the boom of VR gaming. Not that you'd want to allow hundreds or thousands of VR participants to add audio (so many racial slurs), but some kind of cheering option to simulate the roar of the crowd (with limits so people weren't assholes about it) might be interesting.
Not the same, but it might be better than 'this entire experience is now dead'.
They better hope so. Because it's pretty much the expected death of VR demonstrations in any commercial setting. Demoing a VR headset in front of an audience actually worth the trouble was already a uphill battle when people were just leery of swapping sweat and possibly pinkeye.
There's something to be said for watching videos/trailers with a live audience though. I know people say "oh they can toss it up on YouTube and be done with it" but stuff like in this video just gets you extra hyped:
Perhaps this will be an unexpected benefit to the boom of VR gaming. Not that you'd want to allow hundreds or thousands of VR participants to add audio (so many racial slurs), but some kind of cheering option to simulate the roar of the crowd (with limits so people weren't assholes about it) might be interesting.
Not the same, but it might be better than 'this entire experience is now dead'.
I would be 100% down for something like this. I have always wanted to try that and the VR Concert thing that some venues have.
You know what would be great? If something like this actually helped bring back the demo level. With digital distribution as large as it is, why not start showcasing a curated slice of the experience to anyone that wants it? I know the demo isn't entirely dead, though sometimes hidden away as a pre-order bonus. But if you can't put it into people's hands physically, maybe start doing so digitally again in a more common manner.
My impression, though don't quote me on this, is that the issue with Demos is they actually suck up a ton of resources, especially in this modern age of games. Consider the bug fixing and technical issues (arguably a demo with good data reporting might be helpful here, but it could also do damage to the brand)
It's not just producing the curated slice, you have to sanitise it to of you want to protect leaks (because it will be data mined)
Beyond that there's further issues of research indicating that demos actually reduce sales. Which probably indicates that demos were a good thing for a consumer, but well. What's consumer friendly is not always business friendly. (Which is rather depressing, but I think we're a long way from something like legally mandated demos, as fascinating as the knock on effects from that would be)
And finally, you have issue of when do you make and release the demo? On release so it's as close to the experience as possible? Months ahead to increase hype? What if the structure of the game changes in the mean time, or similar? And how do you even define a demo? It's easier for an fps, but what about a roguelike? Etc.
All that said, I'd certainly like to see more chance to try before you by
I absolutely would love to see the return of demos as part of the promotional cycle for a game, but I doubt this is going to cause it.
If anything, it might just lead to even more close control over all relevant media in the pre-release promotion cycle, since they don't have to deal with annoying press and consumers at E3 wanting to try out ten minutes of a game.
For example, Capcom pretty much releases a demo for every game they make. Resident Evil 7? Check. Mega Man 11? Check. Devil May Cry 5? Check. RE2 Remake? Check. And also, Capcom demos are usually kickass and I've wanted to play more of and/or buy every game of theirs (in recent years) that has had a demo. Capcom has got successful demos on lock as far as I'm concerned.
On the other hand, there are other demos that do end up un-selling me on a game. Sometimes it's gameplay. Like with Vanquish. I played that demo. The game looked neat. It's pretty. And it's a novel idea. But the gameplay wasn't for me. The demo saved me $60 bucks. That's not really even a knock on the game itself. I know there are a lot of people out there who really enjoyed Vanquish. But for me it just wasn't my thing.
And as an anecdote from the way back... when I was a kid, my first exposure to the Warcraft universe was the WC2 demo. I played that one level so many times. Probably at least 20 times. And I've been a Warcraft/Blizzard fan ever since. All because of one demo.
The limited-area demo for Little Big Adventure 2 and the demo/shareware releases of Tyrian, Warcraft II and Transport Tycoon will never leave my heart, back when that model was commercially viable.
The limited-area demo for Little Big Adventure 2 and the demo/shareware releases of Tyrian, Warcraft II and Transport Tycoon will never leave my heart, back when that model was commercially viable.
Capcom's Dead Rising demo for the 360 got played sooooooo many time by myself and friends. Hot damn.
"God help us, this font is tiny."
That and "holy crap, look at how many zombies are on screen at the same time, this is crazy! And look at all these stores with different weapons and stuff in them!"
The first title was honestly too rough-around-the-edges for my tastes. I didn't get into the franchise until DR2. Which, somewhat relevantly, had a demo of sorts in a short-running minigame release prior to its launch.
The first title was honestly too rough-around-the-edges for my tastes. I didn't get into the franchise until DR2. Which, somewhat relevantly, had a demo of sorts in a short-running minigame release prior to its launch.
It was rough but also such a cool, impressive, new thing that it made up for all the jank.
I prefer some aspects of Dead Rising 1 to the other two three. I loved the psycho survival mode even though it literally killed one of my many Xbox 360s via RROD.
edit: Lol, I actually forgot the terrible fourth one exists. The only one I still haven't beaten. So boring.
The first title was honestly too rough-around-the-edges for my tastes. I didn't get into the franchise until DR2. Which, somewhat relevantly, had a demo of sorts in a short-running minigame release prior to its launch.
It was rough but also such a cool, impressive, new thing that it made up for all the jank.
I really didn't think so. It was too much jank by half, to the point where the game was always more tedium than fun. But I'm glad it worked out for other people.
I've never really been a fan of the franchise as a whole.
DR1 is a classic in many regards. It was easily one of the first "holy shit" games for the 360. The achievements were memorable but not too bullshit. At first you have no idea where anything is, by the end I was hardcore parkouring over everything to grab ninja swords and hidden items. Plus the photo system was like the closest we will ever get to a Pokemon Snap sequel.
It's just a perfect Capcom game, it's satire of both American excess and their own zombie focused franchise (I'm like pretty sure the Carlito character is based off the guy from RE4). The vehicles, the bosses, the way the female zombies always went straight for Frank's genitals (yeah 2006 was a different time for sure).
It was also one of the first games I realized I could sequence break, because once I realized the gun shop was accessible before you're supposed to wander over there all bets were off. Idk it's one of those games that really clicked with me and none of the other sequels really did it justice. The co-op and weapon crafting of 2 was ok, but I disliked the protagonist. It's a shame Frank has been basically turned into a joke himself after the abysmal DR4.
DR1 is a classic in many regards. It was easily one of the first "holy shit" games for the 360. The achievements were memorable but not too bullshit. At first you have no idea where anything is, by the end I was hardcore parkouring over everything to grab ninja swords and hidden items. Plus the photo system was like the closest we will ever get to a Pokemon Snap sequel.
It's just a perfect Capcom game, it's satire of both American excess and their own zombie focused franchise (I'm like pretty sure the Carlito character is based off the guy from RE4). The vehicles, the bosses, the way the female zombies always went straight for Frank's genitals (yeah 2006 was a different time for sure).
It was also one of the first games I realized I could sequence break, because once I realized the gun shop was accessible before you're supposed to wander over there all bets were off. Idk it's one of those games that really clicked with me and none of the other sequels really did it justice. The co-op and weapon crafting of 2 was ok, but I disliked the protagonist. It's a shame Frank has been basically turned into a joke himself after the abysmal DR4.
That's why you just play the hugely superior Dead Rising 2: Off the Record. Not only is it packed with Frank, it turns the original protagonist into a psychopath to be defeated, adds a sweet scifi zone, and has a considerably more entertaining twist villain.
I never did play that one, should go back and try it
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Ninja Snarl PMy helmet is my burden.Ninja Snarl: Gone, but not forgotten.Registered Userregular
I found it to be an enormous improvement over the original DR2, which was taking itself and it's hero way too seriously. You still have to get Zombrex but now it's for Frank himself, and the photograph system is back. Lots of other stuff is the same, but there are story changes plus an additional (quite large) scifi zone area.
Basically, it's the direction the series should've gone instead of turning into the dull-as-dishwater grimmed-up DR3 and DR4.
I get the feeling this may limit E3's death throes and send it straight to the grave.
That wouldn't be great for the game industry, unless something else came forward to take it's place. As been mentioned before, the main benefit of E3 was allowing smaller devs to mingle with bigger publishers and maybe work out deals.
I get the feeling this may limit E3's death throes and send it straight to the grave.
That wouldn't be great for the game industry, unless something else came forward to take it's place. As been mentioned before, the main benefit of E3 was allowing smaller devs to mingle with bigger publishers and maybe work out deals.
I get the feeling this may limit E3's death throes and send it straight to the grave.
That wouldn't be great for the game industry, unless something else came forward to take it's place. As been mentioned before, the main benefit of E3 was allowing smaller devs to mingle with bigger publishers and maybe work out deals.
Could maybe do some of that at GDC.
that's pretty much already how it goes. there's an ex-community manager i watch on Twitch and the way he puts is that the deals are done at GDC and the contracts are signed at E3. that's not to say that deals aren't made at E3 but i think GDC has strongly positioned itself as the place for devs to pitch to publishers and for publishers to shop around for titles to fill out their calendar. and with E3 being more public facing than GDC it makes sense to want to have the details hashed out ahead of time and have games ready to be shown off.
And as an anecdote from the way back... when I was a kid, my first exposure to the Warcraft universe was the WC2 demo. I played that one level so many times. Probably at least 20 times. And I've been a Warcraft/Blizzard fan ever since. All because of one demo.
I played pretty much exclusively on my SNES. The WarCraft 2 demo turned me into a PC gamer.
I skipped WarCraft 3 because I didn't really like the "regular units and hero units" design, but then I started playing WoW because I remembered the mission briefing narrator in WC2 saying all the place names in an epic voice, and I wanted to see those places for myself.
I get the feeling this may limit E3's death throes and send it straight to the grave.
That wouldn't be great for the game industry, unless something else came forward to take it's place. As been mentioned before, the main benefit of E3 was allowing smaller devs to mingle with bigger publishers and maybe work out deals.
Could maybe do some of that at GDC.
PAX Dev, too.
Not that losing E3 wouldn't be a big blow for dev networking, but hopefully something would rise in its place to replace it. Maybe something more dev-focused and less explosion of chaos.
I get the feeling this may limit E3's death throes and send it straight to the grave.
That wouldn't be great for the game industry, unless something else came forward to take it's place. As been mentioned before, the main benefit of E3 was allowing smaller devs to mingle with bigger publishers and maybe work out deals.
Could maybe do some of that at GDC.
Didn't that go from "postponed" to just "canceled?" If so, not this year they won't.
there have been rumours of MS having a showcase for Series X hardware and games in May, followed by a games only showcase in June.
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MaddocI'm Bobbin Threadbare, are you my mother?Registered Userregular
Once the major publishers realize that they can get their announcements out just as effectively, not share that time with every other major dev, and spend a lot less money doing it, nobody is going to even consider a potential E3 2021
The companies at the top of the heap, the platform holders and giant multi-national publishers, will be fine without E3. The people who won't be fine are the lower tier companies and the indies who relied on it to give them the means to interact with publishers, developers, and platform holders. For them, E3 was a way to potentially get their actual foot in the door, especially if trying to get their metaphorical digital foot in the door wasn't working.
A less important thing but still a benefit of E3 was that it was a big enough event for national local news to comment on it. Even if it was a simple and generic "video games' big annual event, the Electronic Entertainment Expo--or E3 as they call it--is happening right now in LA. Here's Bob with his report" segment, it still pierced the mainstream veil. I think it's likely that when each company is releasing info days and weeks apart across a span of months, almost none of it will get mentioned by local newscasters (especially since the new consoles are known quantities at this point, so "Microsoft announced their next generation console today" level news stories aren't going to happen).
I'd like them to get rid of the commercialism side of E3 and go back to focusing on their business needs, but do a better job of that contraction than E3 2007's attempt. I don't think that trying to become a public PAX-like expo is going to work out well for them in the long run.
The limited-area demo for Little Big Adventure 2 and the demo/shareware releases of Tyrian, Warcraft II and Transport Tycoon will never leave my heart, back when that model was commercially viable.
The companies at the top of the heap, the platform holders and giant multi-national publishers, will be fine without E3. The people who won't be fine are the lower tier companies and the indies who relied on it to give them the means to interact with publishers, developers, and platform holders. For them, E3 was a way to potentially get their actual foot in the door, especially if trying to get their metaphorical digital foot in the door wasn't working.
A less important thing but still a benefit of E3 was that it was a big enough event for national local news to comment on it. Even if it was a simple and generic "video games' big annual event, the Electronic Entertainment Expo--or E3 as they call it--is happening right now in LA. Here's Bob with his report" segment, it still pierced the mainstream veil. I think it's likely that when each company is releasing info days and weeks apart across a span of months, almost none of it will get mentioned by local newscasters (especially since the new consoles are known quantities at this point, so "Microsoft announced their next generation console today" level news stories aren't going to happen).
I'd like them to get rid of the commercialism side of E3 and go back to focusing on their business needs, but do a better job of that contraction than E3 2007's attempt. I don't think that trying to become a public PAX-like expo is going to work out well for them in the long run.
I think this gets to the crux of it. No-one needs the entity of E3 as we know it now, but the industry still does need a singular event where developers and publishers of all shapes and sizes can confer, a conference if you will, along with retailers and produce enough noise to reach the broader public at the same time.
The potential to connect the biggest with the smallest is something that plenty of other events like GDC, Gamescom, PAX, TGS, etc. all manage to do, but none of them quite reach the scale and scope as E3 does
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FencingsaxIt is difficult to get a man to understand, when his salary depends upon his not understandingGNU Terry PratchettRegistered Userregular
edited April 2020
Then just make it an actual industry conference, and leave all the hubristic advertising stupidity at home, because that stuff actually gets in the way of making a good product. Have your marketing strategy based on targets you've achieved, rather than the date of E3, so you actually have the opportunity to make a thing.
Those conferences already exist. GDC being the most notable of them but there are literally dozens of such conventions over the course of the year that don't even hit the consumer's radar.
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AxenMy avatar is Excalibur.Yes, the sword.Registered Userregular
While there certainly are other conferences many an Indie dev and smaller studios have said that for them E3 is/was certainly the most important for rubbing elbows and making deals.
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BRIAN BLESSEDMaybe you aren't SPEAKING LOUDLY ENOUGHHHRegistered Userregular
Then just make it an actual industry conference, and leave all the hubristic advertising stupidity at home, because that stuff actually gets in the way of making a good product. Have your marketing strategy based on targets you've achieved, rather than the date of E3, so you actually have the opportunity to make a thing.
From what I hear tell, both things still exist within E3 - obviously anyone who cares will know about the show floor, the exhibits, etc, but there's still a significant space in that event carved out where people discuss straight business and formal demonstrations behind closed doors
No Direct from Nintendo in June, due to problems with working from home during the pandemic. There might possibly be some announcements or such, but no Direct.
The details for the delay are pretty interesting.
The issue is that while many people outside of Japan view the country as on the cutting edge of technology, this isn’t the case will all aspects of its business culture. In a story in The Washington Post, reporter Simon Denyer explains that many IT departments and corporate strategies haven’t changed in Japan since the 1990s. Companies still regularly use fax to send documents, and they have “little awareness of cloud computing or video conferencing tools.”
But that tech aversion extends beyond the workplace and into people’s homes. As Yuri Kageyama writes for the AP, “many Japanese lack the basic tools needed to work from home.” This includes personal computers, but often people don’t even have Wi-Fi.
The slow embrace of the cloud and other tools, however, is likely less about a fear of technology. Japan places supreme importance on conducting business with face-to-face meetings. Decision-makers throughout the Japanese economy believe that they cannot show proper respect without appearing in-person.
Which means other Japanese developers might be slow to do their announcements too. Or maybe they'll get their acts together faster. Who the hell knows.
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They better hope so. Because it's pretty much the expected death of VR demonstrations in any commercial setting. Demoing a VR headset in front of an audience actually worth the trouble was already a uphill battle when people were just leery of swapping sweat and possibly pinkeye.
I would be 100% down for something like this. I have always wanted to try that and the VR Concert thing that some venues have.
My impression, though don't quote me on this, is that the issue with Demos is they actually suck up a ton of resources, especially in this modern age of games. Consider the bug fixing and technical issues (arguably a demo with good data reporting might be helpful here, but it could also do damage to the brand)
It's not just producing the curated slice, you have to sanitise it to of you want to protect leaks (because it will be data mined)
Beyond that there's further issues of research indicating that demos actually reduce sales. Which probably indicates that demos were a good thing for a consumer, but well. What's consumer friendly is not always business friendly. (Which is rather depressing, but I think we're a long way from something like legally mandated demos, as fascinating as the knock on effects from that would be)
And finally, you have issue of when do you make and release the demo? On release so it's as close to the experience as possible? Months ahead to increase hype? What if the structure of the game changes in the mean time, or similar? And how do you even define a demo? It's easier for an fps, but what about a roguelike? Etc.
All that said, I'd certainly like to see more chance to try before you by
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If anything, it might just lead to even more close control over all relevant media in the pre-release promotion cycle, since they don't have to deal with annoying press and consumers at E3 wanting to try out ten minutes of a game.
For example, Capcom pretty much releases a demo for every game they make. Resident Evil 7? Check. Mega Man 11? Check. Devil May Cry 5? Check. RE2 Remake? Check. And also, Capcom demos are usually kickass and I've wanted to play more of and/or buy every game of theirs (in recent years) that has had a demo. Capcom has got successful demos on lock as far as I'm concerned.
On the other hand, there are other demos that do end up un-selling me on a game. Sometimes it's gameplay. Like with Vanquish. I played that demo. The game looked neat. It's pretty. And it's a novel idea. But the gameplay wasn't for me. The demo saved me $60 bucks. That's not really even a knock on the game itself. I know there are a lot of people out there who really enjoyed Vanquish. But for me it just wasn't my thing.
And as an anecdote from the way back... when I was a kid, my first exposure to the Warcraft universe was the WC2 demo. I played that one level so many times. Probably at least 20 times. And I've been a Warcraft/Blizzard fan ever since. All because of one demo.
"God help us, this font is tiny."
That and "holy crap, look at how many zombies are on screen at the same time, this is crazy! And look at all these stores with different weapons and stuff in them!"
You say "Dead Rising" three times and Frank West will show up behind you and beat you up with a nail bat.
WATCH OUT BEHIND YOU @urahonky !
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It was rough but also such a cool, impressive, new thing that it made up for all the jank.
edit: Lol, I actually forgot the terrible fourth one exists. The only one I still haven't beaten. So boring.
I really didn't think so. It was too much jank by half, to the point where the game was always more tedium than fun. But I'm glad it worked out for other people.
I've never really been a fan of the franchise as a whole.
It's just a perfect Capcom game, it's satire of both American excess and their own zombie focused franchise (I'm like pretty sure the Carlito character is based off the guy from RE4). The vehicles, the bosses, the way the female zombies always went straight for Frank's genitals (yeah 2006 was a different time for sure).
It was also one of the first games I realized I could sequence break, because once I realized the gun shop was accessible before you're supposed to wander over there all bets were off. Idk it's one of those games that really clicked with me and none of the other sequels really did it justice. The co-op and weapon crafting of 2 was ok, but I disliked the protagonist. It's a shame Frank has been basically turned into a joke himself after the abysmal DR4.
From an actual story/narrative perspective, I thought DR1 was perfect.
It was also tonally “crazy” but in a still-somehow-grounded way which I thought was awesome.
That's why you just play the hugely superior Dead Rising 2: Off the Record. Not only is it packed with Frank, it turns the original protagonist into a psychopath to be defeated, adds a sweet scifi zone, and has a considerably more entertaining twist villain.
Basically, it's the direction the series should've gone instead of turning into the dull-as-dishwater grimmed-up DR3 and DR4.
That wouldn't be great for the game industry, unless something else came forward to take it's place. As been mentioned before, the main benefit of E3 was allowing smaller devs to mingle with bigger publishers and maybe work out deals.
Could maybe do some of that at GDC.
that's pretty much already how it goes. there's an ex-community manager i watch on Twitch and the way he puts is that the deals are done at GDC and the contracts are signed at E3. that's not to say that deals aren't made at E3 but i think GDC has strongly positioned itself as the place for devs to pitch to publishers and for publishers to shop around for titles to fill out their calendar. and with E3 being more public facing than GDC it makes sense to want to have the details hashed out ahead of time and have games ready to be shown off.
I skipped WarCraft 3 because I didn't really like the "regular units and hero units" design, but then I started playing WoW because I remembered the mission briefing narrator in WC2 saying all the place names in an epic voice, and I wanted to see those places for myself.
PAX Dev, too.
Not that losing E3 wouldn't be a big blow for dev networking, but hopefully something would rise in its place to replace it. Maybe something more dev-focused and less explosion of chaos.
So, we'll get news, just probably not all in the same time period.
IGN is running some kind of large scale digital event in June. That might help out a lot of the devs who wanted to showcase at E3.
Didn't that go from "postponed" to just "canceled?" If so, not this year they won't.
Hopefully -- the whole event created kind of a halo effect that made every announcement a bit more exciting.
But I'm guessing the random reveal of the PS5 controller is a sign that the big boys won't be beholden to a specific time.
A less important thing but still a benefit of E3 was that it was a big enough event for national local news to comment on it. Even if it was a simple and generic "video games' big annual event, the Electronic Entertainment Expo--or E3 as they call it--is happening right now in LA. Here's Bob with his report" segment, it still pierced the mainstream veil. I think it's likely that when each company is releasing info days and weeks apart across a span of months, almost none of it will get mentioned by local newscasters (especially since the new consoles are known quantities at this point, so "Microsoft announced their next generation console today" level news stories aren't going to happen).
I'd like them to get rid of the commercialism side of E3 and go back to focusing on their business needs, but do a better job of that contraction than E3 2007's attempt. I don't think that trying to become a public PAX-like expo is going to work out well for them in the long run.
The shareware episode of Doom is ostensibly the best one.
I think this gets to the crux of it. No-one needs the entity of E3 as we know it now, but the industry still does need a singular event where developers and publishers of all shapes and sizes can confer, a conference if you will, along with retailers and produce enough noise to reach the broader public at the same time.
The potential to connect the biggest with the smallest is something that plenty of other events like GDC, Gamescom, PAX, TGS, etc. all manage to do, but none of them quite reach the scale and scope as E3 does
The details for the delay are pretty interesting.
Which means other Japanese developers might be slow to do their announcements too. Or maybe they'll get their acts together faster. Who the hell knows.