Sony, No 2019 E3 Showing

The rest of the industry already feels like an afterthought when it comes to coverage. Journalists make sure they cover conferences like Activation, Bethesda, EA, Microsoft, Sony, Square and Ubisoft and the small devs/publishers and indies scarcely get a look-in. Outside the main conferences you have others like CD Projekt Red showing Cyberpunk 2077 behind closed doors. How can smaller companies and indies possibly compete without a massive publisher pushing their wares? There's needs to be more events like PAX and E3 could become that.

Well, first and most obviously, they can be granted a place in one of the platform holder press conferences. The Sony press conference that had the large indy showcase in the middle was good for Sony, good for those specific developers and likely stimulated interest in smaller titles in general. MS has been pretty good since in featuring ID@Xbox titles as part of their presser. Yes, this can be done at the platform holder's independent events as well, but I think those events draw a different audience with more specific interests.

Secondly, E3 causes more people to pay more attention to gaming in general. Someone who may not follow gaming news on a daily or even weekly basis may be more willing to have their eyes on gaming news for a few days in June. As a smaller developer or publisher it may be enough for a larger to audience to be exposed to a small news blurb on a gaming news site to build a greater awareness of your upcoming title.

If each major company has their own events, at various times of the year and those companies become the primary source of coverage of those events, things that happen around and in between those events will get less notice than they would if everything were happening at the same time and coverage is being provided by "independent" sources.
 
So presumably they'll come back to E3 for 2020 to tout the launch of the PS5 later that year?
Rumours are:
mid 2019 announcement. Full reveal at PSX 2019.
Launch 2020. though not sure when, rumours don't specify

Most plans seem to follow:
If they wanted to launch 2019, it would have been early 2019 announcement, E3 full reveal. Launch fall of 2019.
 
Big February PlayStation meeting thing like they did with ps4. PS5 2019
my theory, the difference being that it makes no sense to show it that soon, but post-E3, so I guess it could be around the summer.

Curious about the PS5 aesthetics, the PS4 is one of the ugliest consoles I've ever seen imho
 
So presumably they'll come back to E3 for 2020 to tout the launch of the PS5 later that year?
E3 is a big global consumer and retail advertising platform with a lot of press in one place. If Sony plans to release PS5 within months of E3, they will definitely be there to hype it even if they had other shows.
Rumours are:
mid 2019 announcement. Full reveal at PSX 2019.
Launch 2020. though not sure when, rumours don't specify

Most plans seem to follow:
If they wanted to launch 2019, it would have been early 2019 announcement, E3 full reveal. Launch fall of 2019.
This seems reasonable but what is the source of the rumor?
 
Well, first and most obviously, they can be granted a place in one of the platform holder press conferences. The Sony press conference that had the large indy showcase in the middle was good for Sony, good for those specific developers and likely stimulated interest in smaller titles in general. MS has been pretty good since in featuring ID@Xbox titles as part of their presser.

Both companies have shown a fair amount of indie content at E3 but often very short and sandwiched between bigger titles. When you look at E3 coverage there is detailed coverage on the big trailers and everything else often amounts to "and a bunch of indie games".

If each major company has their own events, at various times of the year and those companies become the primary source of coverage of those events, things that happen around and in between those events will get less notice than they would if everything were happening at the same time and coverage is being provided by "independent" sources.

Or, if you take industry giants out of E3, journalists can focus on everything else. The industry giants only control the content at their events, which are generally outside of E3 anyway. The industry giant conferences are mostly before E3 begins on the Monday or Tuesday morning. Imagine how many more companies could attend if 40% of the floor space taken by industry giants was freed up.
 
I’m gonna bet for a March 2020 release, with a PS Event similar to PS4 unveil with tech demos and 2-3 teasers in September 2019, followed by a PSX in December with 3-4 major AAA titles. That would give 3rd party devs almost 2 years to prepare their games and have a lot of content ready for the launch.

IMO, it wouldn't make sense to miss this E3 if they plan to release the console in fall of 2020, what are they going to do? Not attend any major gaming show for 1,5 years?
 
This is really sad.

Imo these may be the reasons between this choice:

1) Most of their studios are already starting their work on PS5
2) They have released a lot of AAA games in 2018 and early 2019
3) TLOU2 may be going through a rough time and maybe Death Stranding too or Kojima is planning to show it somewhere else.
4) Wild, FF7 and Shenmue 3 are absolutely going through bad times.
5) Dreams is having a public beta in 2019 that is going to spoil it.

This only leaves Ghost of Tsushima and it has already been shown twice.

I think they should plan better, having too many events and showing games too early is not a good idea if then you have to go through a year without announcements.
Plus they need to have a couple of studios more, in particular a racing studio.

Driveclub was a launch disaster, but it was a good game and many people in the studio were clearly well talented. They should have replaced only who was responsible of that mess.
On the other side, Polyphony digital is a mess that has been going on for years.
Replace the management, they cannot release half a GT in a generation or release a full GT when a new console launches. Ridicolous.
 
@lefantome

1) Most of their studios are already starting their work on PS5
But isn't that better then what happened with PS3>PS4 transition? A lot of 1st party games were released in 2013 for PS3, leaving PS4 without strong exclusives support for years.

2) They have released a lot of AAA games in 2018 and early 2019
And they still have a lot to release. And even more, PS4 games TLOU2,GoT and DS are some of the most hotly anticipated games known to mankind [same as is C2077]. PS4 will continue to sell great in 2019 with such software support.

3) TLOU2 may be going through a rough time and maybe Death Stranding too or Kojima is planning to show it somewhere else.
Or, they may be doing just great. You are speculating.

4) Wild, FF7 and Shenmue 3 are absolutely going through bad times.
Wild is a small indie in a sea of indies, FF7R development is Square's mess not Sony's, and Shenmue 3 is doing just fine. It will be released in August 2019.

5) Dreams is having a public beta in 2019 that is going to spoil it.
Spoil what? And there is only one beta announced, and it is for 2018 [yes, devs still claim it will be out this year]. The amount of participating players is not set, it will most likely NOT be a fully open beta.


As for hardware unveil, PlayStation boss has openly talked about E3 hint of Scarlett as the unexpected and premature. He said that Sony aims to shorten the time before announcement and release.

IMO, them not coming to E3 does not mean they will not have prominent promotion during 2019.
 
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.th...ny-playstation-skipping-e3-2019-keynote-booth

From the link:

According to Shawn Layden, the chairman of worldwide studios for Sony Interactive Entertainment, the issue is that the company just wouldn’t have enough new material to justify the event.
“We don’t want to set expectations really high and then not deliver on it. It was a hard decision,”

Makes sense as with 2/3 potentional titles we only seen demos off probally wont suffice.
 
@lefantome

1) Most of their studios are already starting their work on PS5
But isn't that better then what happened with PS3>PS4 transition? A lot of 1st party games were released in 2013 for PS3, leaving PS4 without strong exclusives support for years.

2) They have released a lot of AAA games in 2018 and early 2019
And they still have a lot to release. And even more, PS4 games TLOU2,GoT and DS are some of the most hotly anticipated games known to mankind [same as is C2077]. PS4 will continue to sell great in 2019 with such software support.

3) TLOU2 may be going through a rough time and maybe Death Stranding too or Kojima is planning to show it somewhere else.
Or, they may be doing just great. You are speculating.

4) Wild, FF7 and Shenmue 3 are absolutely going through bad times.
Wild is a small indie in a sea of indies, FF7R development is Square's mess not Sony's, and Shenmue 3 is doing just fine. It will be released in August 2019.

5) Dreams is having a public beta in 2019 that is going to spoil it.
Spoil what? And there is only one beta announced, and it is for 2018 [yes, devs still claim it will be out this year]. The amount of participating players is not set, it will most likely NOT be a fully open beta.


As for hardware unveil, PlayStation boss has openly talked about E3 hint of Scarlett as the unexpected and premature. He said that Sony aims to shorten the time before announcement and release.

IMO, them not coming to E3 does not mean they will not have prominent promotion during 2019.

1) Yes it's better but still not optimal, a year without E3 is awful. Plus there is no need to play all the cards at launch, I don't want big franchises to be released all together when nobody has the chance to show what the new hardware can really do.

2) What are GoT and DS? Multiplatform game do not matter.

3) yeah, that's the whole point of my post

4) Wild is not a small indie, it's a AA+ project that disappeared. FFVII is an exlcusive doesn't matter if it's not Sony's fault. Shenmue 3 looked awful, it's going to make backers mad.

5) There is nothing coming from Dreams that can be shown at conferences, they didn't even show it this year.


They are premature because MS doesn't have much to talk about other than gamepass, buying studios and new console.
I am sure that they can afford to skip E3 because MS is not doing much on its side.
 
Both companies have shown a fair amount of indie content at E3 but often very short and sandwiched between bigger titles. When you look at E3 coverage there is detailed coverage on the big trailers and everything else often amounts to "and a bunch of indie games".

I can say that watching the press conferences has made me aware of and created interest for games I would not otherwise have been aware of. Surely I am not the only one for which this is the case.


Or, if you take industry giants out of E3, journalists can focus on everything else. The industry giants only control the content at their events, which are generally outside of E3 anyway. The industry giant conferences are mostly before E3 begins on the Monday or Tuesday morning. Imagine how many more companies could attend if 40% of the floor space taken by industry giants was freed up.

If you take the industry giants out of E3, E3 dies. They are like the anchor stores in a strip mall. Not enough people will come to visit the smaller businesses for the entire concern to be viable. You need a big draw to get a volume of people to come to the location and then, while they are there, they visit the other stores.

Industry people from all over the world aren't going to travel to E3 to visit the booths of minor publishers and indie developers.
 
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.th...ny-playstation-skipping-e3-2019-keynote-booth

From the link:

According to Shawn Layden, the chairman of worldwide studios for Sony Interactive Entertainment, the issue is that the company just wouldn’t have enough new material to justify the event.
“We don’t want to set expectations really high and then not deliver on it. It was a hard decision,”

Makes sense as with 2/3 potentional titles we only seen demos off probally wont suffice.

Based on the placement in the article, I think that quote may actually be referring to them cancelling this year's PSX.

It wouldn't surprise me if the statement did also apply to next year, though. Their last E3 presser wan't one of their best from a volume of game content perspective (I still can't believe parts of it were watching talking heads comment while the audience was physically moved between locations) and if this one was likely to be as bad or even worse, they may not want to open themselves up to the inevitable criticism. It makes sense that they would want to hit the ground running with PS5 titles to a greater degree than they had with the PS4. While I thought the Indie Showcase was great, one of the reasons it happened was to they needed to fill time and didn't have enough big titles to show at that time. They have the luxury of coasting for the rest of this gen and maybe they are taking advantage of it to devote the majority of their development resources towards PS5 to improve its 1st and 2nd year lineup.
 
Last edited:
Based on the placement in the article, I think that quote may actually be referring to them cancelling this year's PSX.

It wouldn't surprise me if the statement did also apply to next year, though. Their last E3 presser wan't one of their best from a volume of game content perspective (I still can't believe parts of it were watching talking heads comment while the audience was physically moved between locations) and if this one is likely to be as bad or even worse, they may not want to open themselves up to the inevitable criticism. It makes sense that they would want to hit the ground running with PS5 titles to a greater degree than they had with the PS4. While I thought the Indie Showcase was great, one of the reasons it happened was to they needed to fill time and didn't have enough big titles to show at that time. They have the luxury of coasting for the rest of this gen and maybe they are taking advantage of it to devote the majority of their development resources towards PS5 to improve its 1st and 2nd year lineup.
This is kind of odd to me. The PS4 is probably their second most successful console. You would think they could at least secure some very important 2nd/3rd party exclusives since their console should have full support. The PS3 was their worst performing console and every year they could have enough announcements to keep rolling even though many titles came years later or saw their way to PS4.
I don't they they over announced titles. I think the new content has become much less compared to previous generations.
 
This is kind of odd to me. The PS4 is probably their second most successful console. You would think they could at least secure some very important 2nd/3rd party exclusives since their console should have full support. The PS3 was their worst performing console and every year they could have enough announcements to keep rolling even though many titles came years later or saw their way to PS4.
I don't they they over announced titles. I think the new content has become much less compared to previous generations.

Maybe those are thin, too. Especially since they have to "fight" MS for them.
 
Back
Top