Tales of E3 presently passed

This year was the return of the "old" E3. The past two years have had depressingly small shows designed to focus on the games and cut costs. Really it was an attempt by some of the larger companies to try and take better control of the media by focusing on their own events. An understandable proposition but ultimately the wrong path. The way I see it games NEED a big show like E3 still - partly it's for the developers and publishers to get to show off their work to the outside world. It's much like a gallery showing or even something like the Academy awards - these things are events that showcase products in different ways. Sure we've got a few public shows like PAX and Blizzcon but E3 was always the crowning "night of nights" as it were.

So how did this year's version fare? Actually I thought it was pretty sweet. Yes it did have some faults but generally I had a great time at it.

What was good?

• Size - not too big, not too small. Plenty of room to walk around and enough to see. I was pleased that by Thursday's I had felt that I had seen everything I had wanted to see and them some. Usually there's always the feeling of "I missed a lot of stuff"
• Body count - Just the right amount of people. You could move around easily and play most games without a huge wait. Of course there were lines for games like Halo: ODST (I don't get why - It's Halo with a new hat. If you liked Halo 1-3 chances are you going to like this right?). I think the higher admission requirements helped a lot.
• Sitting space - as flow on from the above there were actually plenty of places to sit and take a break with some food or drink which just made the whole thing that much more enjoyable

And the Bad?

• Not enough pods/games - It felt like there wasn't enough games on show. There were plenty of stretches of open carpet and booths didn't seem to have a lot of pods or variety of games on show. That said this was a really minor complaint.
• TV crew and junior staff - These are two wildly different things but I'm lumping them together because of my solution. With all the online blogs and sites there was an abundance of people walking around with cameras blocking the the thoroughfares. The other group spend the show running around hunting down freebie crap to hoard or sell on ebay and filling up the lines. It's understandable for the first few shows when it's all cool and fun to see this stuff. Really to solve the above issues E3 needs to be longer and have public days like TGS. Have two days for business and two days for the general public. That way people can go do work there then every gets a chance to see the games. (sorry if you are one of those folks mentioned above but in a few years you'll understand what I mean - I did the same crap at my first few shows)
• So far away :)Ok maybe I'd rather have it in San Diego because it's a nicer town for conventions.
  
  
  

I think my most favorite thing at the show was the Bayonetta model. There were a lot of booth babe types but this one really stole the show and I'm not even a fan of the game character - I don't get the whole Sarah Palin witch with guns thing. But the chick they had had a real presence. If I was just a fraction sadder than I am I probably would have sat around starting for a while but in the end I was there to see games. Wait... that might actually make me sadder :)

Sega was kind enough to post some info about the show and included a link to an interview with the model which is kind of cool to get her take on the whole thing. http://blogs.sega.com/usa/2009/06/05/bayonetta-e3/