Is E3 Obsolete?

Well, we all know that the gathering known as E3 this year is a far cry from what E3 used to be. Now, with Sony, Ubisoft, and others holding their own press events, I think the time has come to ask the question: Is E3 obsolete?

No one who attended E3 in the past can deny that it was …well… overly expensive. But, it exposed developers, publishers, and their games to the media and some of the public with great fanfare. It also made for some great footage for games, devices, and everything else gaming related. I mourn its passing.

However, I think the writing on the wall was visible last year when Microsoft announced that they would be posting trailers from their E3 events in HD on XBox Live. For the first time, gamers were brought right into E3 without traveling or hitting the net for news.

Now, everyone in the industry is hosting their own major press events. Sony has GamersDay, Ubisoft has UbiDays. I’m sure we’ll see more as the year goes on. So, does this mean that E3 is not needed? Or is E3 the platform for the indie developer to get his wares in front of the mainstream gaming press?

Personally, I’m going to reserve judgment on this one until I get to E3. If the smaller developers (the ones the changes to E3 were supposedly meant to help) are well represented at E3, and they are able to compete with the larger developers, I’ll be impressed. However it comes out, I’ll let you know here in this space.

Anyone want to make any predictions?