E3 broke our hearts last year when it had no choice but to cancel its highly anticipated annual gaming event due to the pandemic. Now, the Electronic Entertainment Expo is coming back this summer with a new plans that will rock your world (via Digital Trends).
Video Games Chronicle got its hands on documents Entertainment Software Association sent to video-game publishers, which revealed that E3 2021 will be a three-day digital event scheduled to take place on June 15 to June 17.
E3 2021: Game demos, keynotes and a pre-show
E3 2021 will reportedly kick off with a 30-minute preview show on June 14. The pre-show will be hosted by a media partner. After the pre-show, there will be an exclusive, two-hour press conference held by a console platform holder. This will precede a Q&A and panel reaction.
The rest of E3's pre-show will involve third-party publisher exhibitions that will differ in length. The day will conclude with a teaser to get folks pumped up for E3. There may also be an "after-party stream" to promote a charity.
E3 2021 plans to run a live broadcast from 10am to 10pm EST for three days. There will be regional replays scheduled for viewers in Europe, China and the Middle East. ESA hopes to schedule several two-hour keynote sessions from games partners, and most interestingly, offer free game demos to the media.
"The ESA [...] says it will allow partner companies to remotely stream playable game demos to the media across 'thousands' of scheduled meetings, with one-to-one assistance from developers," Video Games Chronicle said.
The ESA confirmed with Digital Trends that it is transforming and reimagining the E3 experience for 2021, but it did not confirm whether it would be a three-day, digital-only event. “We are having great conversations with publishers, developers, and companies across the board, and we look forward to sharing details about their involvement soon," an ESA rep said.
It's worth nothing that the document obtained by Video Games Chronicle are pitches that require approval from ESA's members, so the aforementioned proposed plans are not yet set in stone.
