GDC Floor To Double in Size for 2007

Yahoo! is reporting that, in the race to claim E3's crown, the Game Developer's Conference has announced there will be more than twice the space on the show floor next year. From the article: "When GDC was last in San Francisco in 2005, the show occupied the three floors of Moscone West. For GDC 07, the organizers reserved both Moscone West and Moscone North. With the Moscone West show floor virtually sold out, the organizers have now additionally secured the keynote hall in Moscone South in order to convert Moscone North into a second dedicated show floor. This will allow the GDC to accommodate the voluminous requests coming in for exhibition space and to include fresh exhibitor opportunities, such as the all-new Game Demo Theater." With PAX, GDC, GenCon, Leipzig, and others all lining up to be 'the next E3', is it too early to place bets? Will one event reign supreme, or is the E3 cake going to be shared by all these groups from now on?

Comments

Why?

[neonprimetime]

Is that to account for more vendors, or for the increase in physical size of the game players? Arrrrrr!

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Is that to account for more vendors, or for the increase in physical size of the game players?

Since they only mentioned doubling the floor space and not the ceiling space, I think it's safe to assume it's the former. The new structure will be nicknamed the "Food Pyramid."

Re:Why?

[drwiii]

It's to make room for all the Wii demo stations.

GDC is not E3

[GearType2]

If you've *ever* been to GDC, you'd know it's not taking E3's place. GDC is quite seriously a conference for the game developers. Much of the excitement last year was powerpoint presentations on the next gen consoles. Seriously, it is not meant for consumers at all, or to create buzz(well as much as E3).

Re:GDC is not E3

[RingDev]

But will that continue in the future? If they've over doubled the square footage from last year, their are either a lot more development studios getting together at this GDC, or they are increasing the scope of the event to include more flash, corporate, and consumer interest.

-Rick

Re:GDC is not E3

[seanmb15]

It seems to me that the various conference organizers themselves aren't in a race to replace E3, it's the media and fans that are looking for something to replace it. I wouldn't be surprised if they're expanding the space because other people are looking to them to replace E3 and will flock to them, not because the organizers actually intend to do that.

Re:GDC is not E3

[Anonymous Coward]

The same issues that plagues/plagued E3 will plague any other conference to some degree. Wherever the latest and greatest games are shown, if the show starts getting larger and more and more higher profile games are being shown, consumers will purchase tickets. The best parts of E3 for showing off games were behind the closed doors and those smaller separated environments. Only with that peace and quiet and with undivided attention, that environment gives the fairest view of games in development. GDC is geared more for developers (a lot more than E3) - but still, becomes more and more marketable each year for your general consumers.

Re:GDC is not E3

[Broken scope]

It should stay that way.

Re:GDC is not E3

[ObligatoryUserName]

it is not meant ... to create buzz

You just made the toolchain and middleware vendors cry. WTG.

Re:GDC is not E3

[abandonment]

it's a two-sided stick.

we are expo vendors and have been for a few years (very small booth) - the expo is pretty much the 'ugly duckling' of the entire GDC. The najority of GDC is about presentations & sessions, the expo component is a very minor sideshow, however large the conference floor is.

I think that CMP is trying to improve the visibility of the expo to try and drive more people there - the expo is very small, traffic-wise, compared to any of the other events. While the conference / sessions are pretty much packed throughout, the expo is pretty much empty friday.

Having said this, getting more eyeballs & traffic through the event would be nice, but are they really customers that we want to spend the time communicating with?

The majority of the booths at GDC are middleware developers - providing technology that is licensed for thousands of dollars (millions in some cases). All an influx of people with no ability to do anything but gawk will do is force more companies to go the 'private booth' type of setup like Epic did this year with Unreal 3 engine.

They had a good sized booth space, but it was all behind closed doors. If the general public wants to come into an expo full of private booths that they can't get into, then sure, turn GDC into the next E3.

---------

On the OTHER side of the stick, there are a number of smaller companies like my own that market specifically to Indie developers, so an influx of the general public for us would be a great thing.

dunno, either way, the expo is pretty expensive to exhibit at - I'm personally of the opinion that the more people the better. But as I mentioned above, I'm a little biased ;}

Re:GDC is not E3

[tygerstripes]

Absolutely true, apart from the bit about Buzz. I don't think many people except for hard-core Edge readers were too aware of Spore until that video was released on t'interweb. Sure, some people were aware of it (mainly because of the lead developer), but nobody knew enough to get genuinely excited until that release.

Incidentally, showcasing Spore at GDC rather than E3 or anywhere else was a stroke of PR genius. It got all the right people worked up about the game's core dynamics so all the other people got to hear about how good it was from industry professionals and developer press way before the consumer press-machine was gearing up. Personally, I feel sick with excitement whenever I think about it.

corinthian cake

[captain_cthulhu]

"is the E3 cake going to be shared by all these groups from now on?" awww, there's *always* room for cake!

Re:corinthian cake

[Valharick]

Cake? It's Jello. Jeez, kids these days. Bill Cosby is rolling in his grave....

E3 1990s

[ACAx1985]

The market has shifted. There will never be anything like E3 of the 1990s. With instant communication now a huge force in gaming, these giant events that cost companies so much money are never going to be as large as they once were.

It used to be a big thing.. it's not anymore, and won't ever be.

Re:E3 1990s

[Rob T Firefly]

Not only that, but the collapse of E3 has reminded the industry (and the media who cover it) the dangers of putting all your eggs in one basket. It's the same reason no one event has sprung up to fill the void left by COMDEX.

Re:E3 1990s

[twistedsymphony]

...giant events that cost companies so much money...

Isn't that part of why they got rid of E3? ..it was costing these developers and publishers too much time and money in preparation. So now that E3 is gone we have 5 more gaming conferences that are increasing their size to try and fill the void. So instead of wasting time and money on just E3 you're wasting time and money on 5 events now... yeah that's MUCH better.

None of them

[warmgun]

I would think none of them would try to claim E3's crown. My understanding was that game companies were seeing increasing costs and diminishing returns in putting on such shows, which is why most of them decided to back out of E3 2007, leading to it's demise. So why would another show be allowed to be just as wasteful and distracting?

Re:None of them

[NekoXP]

GDC isn't E3 though; E3 is for journalists first and foremost. Big COME LOOK AT OUR SHIT demo show where everyone spends 25% of the game development time and budget making a demo for 3 days, wasting resources.

GDC is for GAME DEVELOPERS. There are as many lectures and talks and so on which serve the purposes of mapping out the course of game development as there are silly little demos on games. Journalists come in because they would throw a fit if it was totally closed, but also because they offer some good input on games - and how to get good review scores of course.. I think Matt Cassamasinansansaisanas from IGN made a good blog post on this subject;

http://blogs.ign.com/Matt-IGN/2006/08/25/29138/

Re:None of them

[Joe The Dragon]

A new show may have lower fee to get into?

It's only a matter of time.

[Anonymous Coward]

Honestly, I truly believe that while the next few game conferences will be somewhat subdued, it really is only a matter of time before E3 (or one of its 'competitors') returns in the full blown extravaganza that we've come to know.

It'll only take one company putting on a big showing at some conference to start it up again. Then it's only a matter of time before company B decides to increase their hoopla so they're not eclipsed by company A. Pretty soon it'll be back to the full fledged circus yet again.

Flexibility

[MeanderingMind]

If all of these conferences thrive it will only help developers. Instead of dreading May each year and going crazy trying to come up with some deliverable to have gamers "Ooh" and "Aah" over, they can pick and choose approximately the month they want to let info get out. It doesn't even have to be the same each year.

One year, Rockstar announces "Rockstar Games Presents: Pinball" during PAX, another year they release more details at GDC. It'll make their schedules more flexible.

Re:Flexibility

[Anonymous Coward]

Close...the problem more had to do with the fact that a very impressive showing at E3 had become vital, and the competition for attention meant that the resources required to make the impressive showing that would get the attention had become astronomical.

E3 is in May, and your company decided long ago that your product would be shown at E3. That means you have to have a publicly playable demo. Sounds easy, because you're already making the game, right? The publicly playable demo is like an entire additional game release: You have to define the parameters of the demo, make sure that all code and art is for the demo is completed, conduct an entire alpha-beta-RC-final testing sequence, and the deadline is 100% immobile (as in, there is no "if you aren't done". That option doesn't exist. If you try to say that you won't be done on time, there's no response, because that set of words does not exist in this universe). At the same time, your marketing/comm/pr group is planning and obtaining the display setup, and the press releases and hype that will make your game anticipated, and the press kit with pictures and movies and datasheets and some little gimmicky toy (oh, and the press kit requires media from your demo, passing a little more pressure back to the dev group). People need to work the booth, and they need to know what they can say, what they can't say...they need a uniform and maybe some more freebies to hand out...they need to know how to play the game well enough to show it off and to hold their own at multiplayer.

And everything listed must strive to be better than all the competitors, since there are a shitload of companies with a shitload of games and even though a few game-news sites will strive to publish information on -everything-, nobody does, and even if they did, readers will get bored after reading about their big name titles and a few of the show's "gems".

And all of this work is for a one-weekend show. If you succeed, lure everyone into your booth, have a fun demo, get every journalist to write amazing reviews, it has no guaranteed effect on sales (see Eternal Darkness, maybe? I seem to recall lots and lots and lots of hype and press and very average sales, if even that). And if you don't succeed?

Your demo code was a branch, so there's not much, if any, benefit to the actual game code. Your press materials don't negate the fact that you'll need a box, a manual, and entirely new ads when the game is released.

So game companies went to the E3 organizers and said, "look, this is killing us...it's gotten too big, we don't want to buy so much floorspace and we can't afford the ridiculous cost of filling that floorspace." E3 organizers said "ok, if we tighten the event down, reduce the attendee list appropriately, reduce the amount of available floorspace and maybe charge a little more per foot (but offer smaller booths so companies will pay the same or less), we can totally maximize our profits."

Although the conventions will stay around, the solution doesn't include conventions at all:

Ideally, game companies show their games to smaller groups of journalists behind closed doors, and strictly protect the images, videos, and information that the journalists can report. It would allow game companies to show current builds and ban/limit discussion of crashes and glitches (and these more experienced/professional journalists wouldn't be as much like "omgz it crashx0red it sux"). Basically, imagine every game having an extra month of development time per year. Other savings from pulling out of conventions will probably just give more profit to the company, although we could hope that they'll translate to better game packaging, slightly earlier price drops, more money for development, etc...things that will benefit consumers. (Keep in mind that E3 versus smaller presentations really has little effect on how much news we as consumers will get, and don't pretend like you should practicaly be given a check for the savings from dropping conventions, and it

The Orange Shirt Guys

[Databass]

I've been one of those guys with the orange shirts and the headsets who helps people out and find where they need to be and all that. We're all volunteers who work in exchange for a ticket to the show when we're not on duty. Our numbers have been increasing every year, up to 220 in 2006. I think it's safe to say CMP considers the ticket-for-work trade a good investment for the orange shirts.

With this increase in show floor and conference rooms, I think it's safe to say the amount of orange shirts is going to increase again this year. It's funny that I'm seeing one of my side moonlighting jobs get harder on slashdot first. "Hey guys, you've got three times as many rooms to cover in 2007." /jawdrop

booth babes

[Sirfrummel]

Most Importantly, will there be a replacement for the E3 booth babes?

Cos-players?

[PhoenixOne]

I'm at the GDC to learn. If I see a cos-player in any of my sessions, I'm asking for my money back.