E3 is officially gone forever and that’s okay. In fact, it’s probably a good thing. It was extra work for developers, who had to take time out of their busy schedules to make playable demos for their games. Summer Game Fest and The Game Awards have taken E3’s place to a certain extent with big game announcements, but developers and publishers have the ability to communicate directly with their fans now. Nintendo started it back in 2012 with their Nintendo Direct streams. Sony and Microsoft followed with their State of Play and Xbox Showcase online events. With the advent of Early Access, gamers can play unfinished games from home without having to travel to a big three-day expo.

The video game industry has evolved to a point where the only ones really benefiting from E3 anymore were the media, who used it to drive traffic to their sites. E3 was great for its time, but onward and upwards.