E3 2007, the much anticipated, never duplicated, and largely restructured event from years’ past is now in the books, leaving many attendees looking back as they evaluate the proverbial good, bad, and ugly. For me at least, there was a lot to like about the show, which moved from the chaotic stomping grounds of Los Angeles to the more serene Santa Monica, this year taking up residence in a handful of hotels rather than the LA Convention Center. In many ways this proved to be a positive move for the event, as developers and marketing reps were able to spread their wings and speak to much smaller groups of people for longer periods of time, making Q&A sessions more viable and altogether resulting in a much more relaxing experience.
That’s the good part.
The flip side to this is that while on the map these hotels, six in all, look to the casual observer to be well within walking distance, in practice many are anything but, meaning that scheduling suffered, and many such as myself who had planned appointments based on previous years’ experience found that there simply was not enough time to account for the walk. And while shuttles and taxi cabs presented another option for journalists, many times the wait and traffic, especially in the evenings, presented another hurdle altogether.
So, as said, there were things to like about this year, but as I overheard while waiting in line for the Activision press conference, one person said it best by referring to the event as A
