Sony Comments On E3 2019 Absence

The Entertainment Software Association announced today that E3 2019 would not play host to Sony for the first time since inception. The gaming convention started 24 years ago, and Sony appeared at every single one of the yearly expos. Earlier this year Sony announced that they would not hold their "PlayStation Experience" for the first time since inception – though that event was only four years old at the time.

While it's not clear the intent of Sony's absence from E3, they did lend a comment to the gaming press on their thought process. "As the industry evolves, Sony Interactive Entertainment continues to look for inventive opportunities to engage the community," said the Sony representative in a statement. "PlayStation fans mean the world to us and we always want to innovate, think differently and experiment with new ways to delight gamers. As a result, we have decided not to participate in E3 in 2019. We are exploring new and familiar ways to engage our community in 2019 and can't wait to share our plans with you."

It's a bit of a lull time for Sony as they're not super close to releasing any headliner games and their most recent mega-hit Spider-man is still riding high on good reviews. Titles like The Last Of Us 2 and Death Stranding aren't likely ready to show anything extraordinarily new since they last appeared. According to their most recent public commentary, neither game will likely be released until later on in the year anyway.

Microsoft didn't really appear at E3 proper last year – they held an event outside the convention center. Electronic Arts has their own event and also doesn't make a big appearance at E3. Nintendo hasn't had an event at E3 for the past half-decade.

I feel like it's more surprising that Sony stayed at major part of E3 as long as it has. Much like the major players in gadgets over the past decade, we're going from full-on one-host event of all to everyone for themselves. If you're a big company and want to be seen as a big company, you hold your own events, and don't rely on a convention to bring in the fans.