A former PlayStation executive weighed in on why Sony chose to stop going to E3 after supporting the gaming trade event for more than two decades. Sony didn't attend E3 2019 and confirmed that it would also not be attending E3 2020, only for that event to be canceled because of COVID-19.

Speaking to Push Square, Adam Boyes, the former vice president of third-party relations at PlayStation, suggested that Sony's decision not to go to E3 is a sign of the times. Boyes brought up Nintendo Directs, Inside Xbox events, and the PlayStation events like the Ghost of Tsushima gameplay stream as proof that "we're migrating more towards that compilation-based approach."

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Boyes said he thinks that "we're in a faster 'give it to me now' TikTok era, people just want to see new stuff" and that E3 events from 2015 and before seem "a bit dated." The former PlayStation VP, who can now be found making decisions as the CEO of Iron Galaxy Studios, said that this style of showing more trailers is "more of what the fans want."

sony may skip e3 2020

 

Not everyone will agree with Boyes, but as he is someone who has hosted PlayStation E3 events and has been a big part of PlayStation announcements, it's difficult not to consider his comments. At E3 2015, Boyes announced that Shenmue 3 and the Final Fantasy 7 Remake would be coming to PS4 and he was also featured in the famous PS4 game sharing video, which he joked about on Twitter back in February.

Boyes also isn't the only one who has called for E3 to change and to do more with the new style of direct presentations. This is one of the reasons why Geoff Keighley, who has been part of the E3 organizing team, decided to create the Summer Game Fest. This event, said Keighley, would also allow developers and publishers to make announcements on their own time without having to pack everything into a 90-minute press conference, which is how E3 works.

It's unclear what E3's organizers are planning for next year, but COVID-19 may force it to change how it does things. With so many developers and publishers being part of other announcement events or hosting their own events, like Ubisoft Forward in July, there may a moment where they see that they don't want to be part of E3 as it looks now.

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Source: Push Square

Image source: Wikimedia Commons - EMR - Creative Commons license