E3 2017 will have public access!!
GameSpot announced today that the biggest trade show in the gaming industry would finally be opening to the general public. The Entertainment Software Association (ESA) have announced that there are 15,000 tickets available for the general public.
General public tickets will cost a whopping $250 while purchasing an early bird ticket will cost $150. Anyone looking for an early bird ticket will need to purchase them as quickly as possible on February 13th to make the most of the discounted price. The tickets have been confirmed to provide access to the show floor, panel discussions and more.
GameSpot had an interview with the ESA’s senior VP of communication and talked in detail about why the company has made this decision. This comes after the experiment last year where gamers could attend an off-site area for free and play test games from the E3 event. According to the interview with Rich Taylor, the response from gamers was clearly positive and they wanted to have more access to the show. This inspired their decision to allow some of the public on to the show floor.
What does this mean for gamers though?
It means that E3 is finally starting to open up to the public. While some of the events at E3 2017 will be open to the public, there will be some which aren’t. It’s not entirely clear yet what will be off-limits to the public and it’s uncertain if any of the public will be able to see the main conferences.
The public will be able to purchase a daily ticket for the Tuesday – Thursday times that the show is open. The exact details on how the tickets work should be revealed later this month when the early bird tickets go on sale on the 13th. The E3 website has very limited information right now but it should be updated very soon.
Opening E3 2017 to the public is good news for excited gamers as they’ll finally be able to walk around the show floor. It will allow public access gamers to test game demos of recent and upcoming games while also being able to see different booths. Game developers will also be able to interact with their fans at the event which provides them with another line of communication.
While there are plenty of positives with this decision, there are a few negatives and reasons to be concerned about this decision. The biggest concern is that fans may not get their money’s worth. The already busy event will get even busier and as a result, fans may not be able to see everything or spend enough time viewing things on the show floor.
According to KnowTechie not all booths have game demos. Some booths have videos that explain what a game is and there can be NDA’s attached to them also. This could raise some security concerns for game developers also and could mean that some companies won’t be showing any exclusive footage or videos this year. While many game developers do attend the E3 event, not all of them do so some fans may be disappointed when their favorite developer isn’t attending.
There may be some negatives and concerns about opening E3 to the public but overall this is a good thing. It’s making the gaming industry more open with their fans and will give gamers an amazing experience. More details about E3 2017 will be released later this month and ahead of the event in June.
Sources
1. GameSpot Interview
2. E3 website
3. KnowTechie
Please, keep your comments family friendly and respectful of each other and the author.