After initially indicating it would happen the last week of August, IDG World Expo on Tuesday revealed plans to hold this year’s E for All game show in early October instead. The event will happen October 3 – 5, 2008 at the Los Angeles Convention Center.
E for All is a consumer-based video and computer game event coordinated by the same company that puts on Macworld Conference & Expo in San Francisco. The event was created in the wake of the demise of the Electronic Entertainment Expo, or E3, a giant annual gathering of computer and video game companies held each May. It kicked off its inaugural gathering at the Los Angeles Convention Center in October, 2007.
E3 was squarely focused at the business of computer games, gathering media, buyers and distributors, but ostensibly not open to the general public. E for All is consumer-oriented, meanwhile, on a smaller scale but offering a much lower cost of entry for video game enthusiasts who want to get their hands on new games. Another smaller event — the E3 Media and Business Summit — was offered earlier in 2007 as a way for press and game companies to gather.
E for All was originally set to happen on August 28 – 30, 2008. That timing would have overlapped with Penny Arcade Expo, or PAX, an annual game gathering put on by the publishers of the popular Penny Arcade webcomic.
IDG World Expo didn’t address that overlap in announcing the new date; instead, they indicated that the new date “reflects the great success of last year’s event,” along with positive feedback garnered by exhibitors and attendees of the timing. The company also cited “efficiencies” for some attendees and exhibitors of another IDG World Expo event, GreenXchange, which is set to happen on Oct. 1 – 3, 2008 at the L.A. Convention Center.
E for All counted 18,000 attendees for its inaugural show.
IDG World Expo and Macworld publisher Mac Publishing LLC are both business units of International Data Group (IDG).