E3 could also be useless however the Summer time Recreation Fest is alive and effectively, and can return to motion for 2024 on June 7 with one other live-and-livestreamed present taking place on the YouTube Theater in Los Angeles.
Summer time Recreation Fest 2024 will likely be a “cross-platform reside showcase of sport bulletins, trailers and extra.” Particulars on who will likely be there and what they will be displaying off have not been revealed—need to have some surprises, in any case—however the present will run for 2 hours and, as occasion founder and host Geoff Keighley put it, serve up a “showcase of what is subsequent for videogames.”
The rise of Summer time Recreation Fest has been fairly a factor to see. For almost 30 years, E3—the Digital Leisure Expo—was the preeminent videogame showcase in North America, the one everybody needed to see. However its dominance started to wane within the mid-2010s resulting from a mixture of rising prices, the rising reputation of livestreaming, and the appearance of extra consumer-focused occasions like PAX and, in fact, Summer time Recreation Fest.
A transfer to open the present to the general public failed to show its fortunes round; main publishers started to fall away, and the Covid-19 pandemic pressured the cancellation of the 2020 occasion totally. A web based E3 came about in 2021 however 2022 was one other miss, and whereas organizers promised a comeback for 2023, that too was finally dropped. Lastly, on the finish of 2023, E3 was put to relaxation for good.
Summer time Recreation Fest lands at across the similar time E3 used to, however it’s a really completely different type of occasion, envisioned from the start as a concentrated, consumer-oriented show meant to be blasted immediately into the eyeballs of avid gamers. As somebody who remembers the joy of the early days of E3—I used to be by no means in a position to attend, however I examine it voraciously in magazines and boards—there’s a component of unhappiness to its demise, however there is no query that Summer time Recreation Fest is a much better match for the very on-line world that avid gamers now reside in.
Happening instantly after Summer time Recreation Fest will likely be Day of the Devs: SGF Version, a showcase of “greater than a dozen unimaginable video games from sport builders of all completely different backgrounds.” Hope you’ve got cleared your calendar for the day.
If you are going to be in LA on the massive day and wish to attend reside, tickets will likely be accessible for buy from Ticketmaster on Might 7. If not, you may watch it livestreamed on the platform of your alternative—we’ll have particulars on how and the place to look at on-line as the massive occasion will get nearer.
