This is how games industry events looked like in 2023
Game Conference Guide Insights - November 2023
Every year I am trying to predict how events will look like during the next season. It is an exercise back by data, countless conversations with conference organizers and by attending events. Not all the predictions are correct though.
The year 2023 is not without its challenges. Geopolitical situation is affecting everyone; war in Ukraine continues, while the Israel – Hamas conflict took the world by storm. We are still seeing high interest rates, the investment is dropping below pre-Covid times, the games industry is on one side celebrated by the number of hits, on the other more than 7,000 jobs have been cut throughout the whole year. These are out of control events affecting the attendance, pricing, and availability of events.
Many events are back to normal and operating as usual, not without changes though. Local initiatives welcomed back their efforts and they are successfully catering to smaller audiences, while some were cancelled, and their future existence is questioned. I will be zooming in on events during the traditional Year in Review in January 2024 with more details and comments.
Now let’s look at my predictions from last November and see how wrong I was.
Disclaimer: Predictions are highlighted with bold text.
PARTNER OF THE MONTH
Have you ever considered playtesting your game before launch?
Playtesting presents a myriad of advantages to developers such as uncovering issues that may affect the game's performance, identifying key bugs/glitches, and understanding what gamers really want from your game.
Why playtest your game?
Playtesting provides in-depth useful feedback to every aspect of your game — from the game mechanics to controls and even difficulty. Developers can watch how players interact with the game and use this feedback to make necessary changes and improvements.
It can provide useful information about what gamers want in a game. Developers can learn what features and mechanics are important to gamers by collecting feedback from actual players.
Playtesting is crucial for the success of a game in the market. It helps identify bugs and glitches, provides feedback on the game's mechanics, controls, and difficulty, and offers valuable insights into what gamers want in a game.
If you’re interested in playtesting, consider signing up your game for G.Round.G.Round is the leader in global public playtesting, providing feedback directly from quality gamers. Games that playtest on G.Round have a 25% better Steam score on launch.
While attending events in 2023 we will have to follow health guidelines. GDC on their Health & Safety page informs visitors to have proof of vaccination or results from a negative test to successfully register and pick their badge. Masking is going to be voluntary but highly recommended.
On all events I attended this year (12 of them so far) masking was voluntary. The safety protocols weren’t strict. While I was having majority of the meetings outdoors, many attendees were wearing mask inside even during conversations. I call this a draw. Events dropped informing about health and guidance, some are following it to the letter.
When the venue is out of the budget scope, the search for a new one starts resulting in changing the dates or switching the event into virtual offering with in-person party at the end with networking component attached to it.
I have seen small events struggling to book a venue, or they just plainly cancelled their edition or planning to host the next one only in virtual setting. The prices increased across the board, supplier are asking more for the same amount of services as before, plus the rent has increased.
I will be talking about this below, the local events are in jeopardy.
In general, the events in 2023 will attract more attendees than in 2022, but their numbers will be affected by pickier audience choosing where to travel and even limiting the number of international trips.
This is true. Many are back, and the landmark events are bringing more attendees as everyone understood it is safe to attend them and wide company travel bans were lifted. GDC, gamescom and many others welcomed higher number of attendees, yet the latter couldn’t attract more than pre-Covid.
This plays into the cards of virtual event which are here to stay. They will continue to decline and loose the audience preferring the in-person events. The struggle is to attract more attendees and not to serve only to companies trying to sell / offer services or hunt down talent.
This is true. Like them or not, they are here to stay. Some organizations are offering tickets for ridiculous amounts to join with a message that you are being offered access to network you can’t see unless you buy in. Some are sticking to free access or for a fraction of a fee from an on-site participation (these are usually run by local initiatives backed by government funds). Virtual events is always an option for many who are unable to travel due to budget restraints (monetary or time).
Yes, you will be able to attend for free but only passively, interacting with attendees, posting on boards, or just looking at the attending companies will be hidden behind a paywall.
This is not true, there are still very good events to my surprise you could attend for free and interact with everyone hanging out at Discord. Sending ❤️ to Helsinki.
Even with the wide availability of conferences, summits and events covering every nook and cranny you need for your business, the prices are not going to go down.
True again. And it is not surprising. The energy crisis, higher interest rates, increased rents, drove the prices for living sky high. GDC, gamescom again increased their prices and many others as well as a response to a higher demand and to cover the costs of running the event. Renting the venue, AV equipment and paying the staff is not cheap. Running events is even harder these days and will continue to be a challenge next year, as the companies are tightening their belts.
The combination of in-person events with added online component (meeting app / showcase) is stabilized and they co-exist in harmony. Attendees are preferring offline meetings and in-person events rather than virtual ones.
I fall into this group. There are many events offering meeting systems, and whenever there is a request to meet me online, I am politely declining it offering to chat after the event concludes. When I am on-site, I want to focus on what the event has to offer while hanging out with those who made the effort to travel.
On the B2B side, we will see increase again in the attendance, but nowhere near the records from pre-pandemic era. On the B2C side, we will see new local initiatives pop up and we will see an increase in attendance. Gamescom will be very close to the record from 2019 in attendance.
This prediction is partially true. There are events attracting more than before (GDC, Digital Dragons, Game Days), and the organizing teams deserve all the praise.
When it comes to gamescom it is a draw, they managed to attract 320,000 in-person visitors this year compared to 373,000 in 2019, which is still a lot.
E3 will deliver, yet not fully realized and fleshed out new vision. Attendees will be praising new format and strong foundations for the future editions. Geoff Keighley will still alienate on the E3 week with his Summer Game Fest / Judging Week (happening a week earlier).
Sadly, this is not true. E3 was cancelled and no one knows if it will ever return in the form, we all remember. Sumer Game Fest will continue in 2024 as a virtual showcase with “judging week” attached to it, media only event where selected publishers are showcasing new games to the journalists and influencers.
Some would like to see E3 back, some are saying it has seen its better days and shouldn’t return. I honestly think the E3 as a concept should survive as it was condensed week with barrage of announcements, dozens of meetings, and parties attached to a single location. And it worked as a celebration and demonstration of what games industry is and was a major attraction to many players outside of the industry. I do hope it will return, even though it will be super tough.
TGS will bring international visitors after a long time, the visitor numbers will be higher, but we won’t be seeing smashing record from 2018.
This is true and it was expected. They put a lot of effort into attracting international audience and exhibitors resulting in 243,238 compared to 262,076 in 2022. When it comes to number of business visitors, this year topped 2019.
Established brands and groups of organizers will create spin-offs – more curated and highly focused to target different audience and serve them more frequently during the year.
I must admit, this was wild guess, but it came true. There are many initiatives doing amazing job. See below for more.
These kinds of events were happening on local level already, but I do believe this trend will be more visible and has potential for growth in the coming future.
I was surprised to see Hungary coming back very strong with Game Dev Gathering, Serbians pulling a separate Unreal day, Data Spels Branschen doing their own Summit in Stockholm, Games Ground looks like delivered a very strong first edition in Berlin, DevGAMM found its new homes after a very challenging previous year, and Rami Ismail is bring back his highly ambitious and massively important GameDevWorld!
In 2023 the importance of local events is bigger than ever.
This ties up this piece very nicely. Local events sparked my interest to know more about how game development works. When I was a journalist, they helped me to maintain connections while developing network I would need later as a business developer. And as the list above confirms, there are more new initiatives and events aimed at networking, knowledge exchange and to showcase your creations.
And here we are, not all my predictions are 100% spot on, but that is the beauty of this exercise. I will be making predictions how events in 2024 will look like next month. Stay tuned.
[Game Conference Guide is tracking games industry & game developers events, trade shows, festivals, conferences and events around the world.]
Thank you for reading and supporting Game Conference Guide. Consider sharing it with your peers, colleagues, and community.
Pavol Buday, curator @ GCG