PAX East 2023 and the Future of Fan Gaming Events
Are gaming conventions back?
It’s been a few weeks since I returned from my trip to Boston to attend PAX East, and I feel like this is a perfect time to come out of writing retirement. With PAX East and the recent news about the death of E3, I’ve thought a lot about the future of video game conventions and expos, and I have mixed feelings. In the words of modern poet Meek Mill, “There’s level to this sh*t”. It brings me joy to say that I believe the fan-focused events like the PAXes of the world are slowly rising from the ashes, but it is still to be seen if they can reach the highs of the pre-COVID events.
This was my first time in Boston, and although most of my time was spent doing things completely unrelated to the city, it was a great time nonetheless. For those that don’t know what a PAX is like, it’s a 4-day event where mostly independent and AA publishers and developers all set up hundreds of TVs, monitors, and gaming hardware to show off their latest projects. Lines are typically long (Avoid going on Saturday if you can), but if you manage your time right, you can end up playing dozens of fantastic unreleased titles of various quality. There are also panels all weekend long hosted by gaming personalities about insight or entertaining topics.
For the past couple of years, PAX has been a shell of its former self. Obviously, COVID took a huge toll on the industry, and as a result many teams just haven’t had a game worth showing. Not to mention that we’re in somewhat of a financial crisis in the U.S., so spending loads of cash to erect this fanciful booth for your games isn’t exactly the wisest decision. As a result, the show floor was essentially a ghost town the past couple of years, but it seems things are slowly coming back to life. I went to PAX West 2022, and it’s really refreshing to see that not even half a year later, a new slate of companies has cropped up to show their new projects.
Even with the recovery we’re seeing now, we’re nowhere near pre-COVID PAX experiences of the past. In the before times, PlayStation would regularly have a huge showing, with exclusive merch and early builds of premier titles like Spiderman. Epic Games literally transformed the entire floor of a convention center building into Fortnite mini-golf. On any given day, you could run into industry heavyweights like Reggie Fils Aime, Cory Balrog, or Shuhei Yoshida. Those times were legendary, and I really hope they return, because they really made things feel larger than lif,e and it felt like something almost anyone could enjoy, regardless of how big a gamer you were.
Now it is more of an event for the video game enthusiast. There wasn’t much pomp and circumstance, but my time at PAX East this year was extremely fulfilling. I was able to connect with creators and developers that I really appreciate and respect. I was able to put new games on my radar and add a few dev teams to my list of people to cheer for. To me, it was a fantastic opportunity to immerse myself in the roots of the industry I love so much. That being said, I do hope PAX returns to a state where ALL developers and publishers can use it to connect with fans, not just the smaller ones. Understandably, with COVID, we lost that connection with the Xbox, PlayStation, and Nintendo of the industry.
It’s hard to read the pulse of things. If you’d ask me, PlayStation, just like its stance on E3, has abandoned the idea of having to connect with its fans in a physical space. It seems like they are focusing on Apple-like, polished presentations of their games, hardware, and services. They show things when they’re ready; they don’t need to hype people up with early hands-on. People will play it when they purchase the game in the comfort of their own homes. Now I could be totally wrong, and I hope I am, because I’ve always wanted to attend a PSX, but they have had a very sterile physical brand come from the success of the PS4 and PS5, and there’s no indication they’re reversing on that anytime soon.
Xbox actually seems like one big publisher that eagerly wants to connect with fans, and yet, they, too, have been awfully quiet on the prospect of true fan events. They’ve done some in-person screenings of their pre-recorded June showcases, but let’s be honest, that’s lame as hell compared to what they could be doing. Problem is, and I promise I’m not saying this in a console fanboy way because I love Xbox, but what is there to celebrate and gather about? We’re still waiting on several projects, and this new age for the green giant is still approaching. Now granted, it seems like by the end of this year things could finally be in motion, but it seems like their specialty is graceful delays ,so we’ll see.
To Nintendo’s credit, they still have had a presence at PAX. They had a Tears of the Kingdom statue front and center at PAX East, and they regularly have playable demos (of games that released years ag,o like Mario Kart 8?). To be honest, Nintendo can keep doing Nintendo, but I just need some info about what the next few years are looking like from them because my Switch is on its last legs.
In the end, I just want there to be events that serve as a reminder for everyone as to why they fell in love with video games. I could go to PAX as is for the next several years and have a great time, but I would be lying if I said it didn’t feel like something was missing. There’s a magic about seeing the brands you’ve grown up with set up incredible homages to franchises you love; there’s an excitement about running into your favorite voice actor or game director. I hope we can figure out how to capture that magic again. If we must, I’m down for the return of specialized fan events like PSX or XO, but ideally, I would like everyone to come under one roof and serve as a place people from all around can gather and celebrate gaming as a whole.
Until we get there, let’s celebrate those that already participating in those events. I made a video highlighting a few of my favorite games I saw at PAX East. Check it out below.
P.S. - E3 is a whole other can of worms that I was planning to talk about, but this post started getting long. Stay tuned.