There will not be an E3 in 2023 after all — in person, online, or otherwise. The Expo was just canceled for the year.
It had been scheduled to start online on June 11, and then run from June 13-16 in-person in downtown Los Angeles. Now none of that is happening.
Citing two anonymous sources inside E3’s parent organization, the Entertainment Software Association, IGN reported the cancelation on Thursday afternoon. IGN’s report was then confirmed when the ESA released a public statement credited to Kyle Marsden-Kish, global vice president of gaming at ReedPop:
“This was a difficult decision because of all the effort we and our partners put toward making this event happen, but we had to do what’s right for the industry and what’s right for E3. We appreciate and understand that interested companies wouldn’t have playable demos ready and that resourcing challenges made being at E3 this summer an obstacle they couldn’t overcome. For those who did commit to E3 2023, we’re sorry we can’t put on the showcase you deserve and that you’ve come to expect from ReedPop’s event experiences.”
For those keeping score, E3 was canceled in 2020 due to COVID. The 2021 expo, like so many things in 2021, was online-only. Then last year, E3 was cancelled entirely once again. 2023 was supposed to be E3’s big comeback. The ESA’s president and CEO, Stan Pierre-Louis, told the Washington Post last June, “We’re excited about coming back in 2023 with both a digital and an in-person event.”
Currently, there’s still a “Buy Tickets” page, but thankfully it appears the page is incapable of taking anyone’s money.
