The show isn't going on.
Well, dear play chums, around this time of year I'm usually looking forward to E3 and bemoaning the state of the UK trade show ECTS. I'm also usually trying to predict how crap-like ECTS can possibly get. But no longer. No more moaning because ECTS has finally died the death we've all been expecting for the past three years.
The age of the London trade show is pretty much dead and buried. You may remember that last year ELSPA, the European industry body, launched its own show, EGN. This rang the death knell for ECTS even more loudly than ever before. Alongside EGN, was consumer show Gamestars Live, which put another nail in the coffin of ECTS. All death analogies have been exhausted when it comes to ECTS, so I'll try to desist.
At the end of March it was announced that GameZone Live (flash new name for Gamestars) has been cancelled. Well, this wasn't the news we were expecting. However, Roger Bennett, Director General of ELSPA, kindly sent me (and a few other industry bods no doubt) an email assuring me that EGN was still going ahead.
With news of GameZone Live (GZL) being canned, it's no surprise that the industry was jumping to all sorts of conclusions. Apparently, GZL just wasn't getting the support from publishers to make it financially viable. Everybody wants to do their own thing, leaving GZL out in the cold.
So we were all recovering from that shocker when another blow hit the UK industry. This week it was announced that ECTS, GDCE and retail show SCoRE have all been cancelled. They're dropping like flies and heading to the big games trade show in the sky.
We all knew ECTS had to go sometime, but a small part of us hoped it would rise like a phoenix from the ashes. It's all very well ELSPA reassuring us that EGN is still going ahead. But the fact is, that's not very reassuring because EGN was the most soulless event I've ever had the misfortune to attend.
GZL was the only thing that kept EGN from dying a death if you ask me. The industry skipped through EGN and went straight across the corridor to enter GZL because that's where the games were and we work in the GAMES INDUSTRY. If we wanted to talk business models with men in suits we'd have joined the finance industry.
EGN was a dry, corporate affair that focussed on pre-arranged meetings. This is all well and good for the professional face of the industry, but we're not used to being professional. ELSPA's trying to drag the industry out of trainers, trendy jeans and t-shirts with amusing yet stylish logos and we're just not ready for that. We don't want proper jobs, that's why we're in the games industry.
ELSPA's trying it's best to give us a show that ‘reflects the needs of our business', but I think the death of ECTS reflects those needs far more eloquently. The industry obviously doesn't want a London show and is happy to hot foot it over to LA once a year.
The consumer show in Leipzig, Germany is being touted as the big show to replace ECTS, EGN or whatever. And if that is the case, it begs the question why can't London or the UK support a show for the third largest territory in the world? So this week the UK industry is left feeling a little bit impotent.
I'm not convinced by EGN at all. If it's anything last year it'll mean not even one stand with games to play. I know games are a serious business and now involve huge amounts of cash, but dag nabbit we still wanna have fun. E3 manages to combine the two, so why ELSPA thinks they have to be mutually exclusive I'll never know.
Well it seems the UK industry has spoken and seeing as I don't think EGN counts unless it has a serious rethink, E3 is our last hope. Or, like Star Wars, will there be another?
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