Going to E3

Every year that they've had a real E3, I've been there. I think most of you know that the last two years have been fake E3. They were press only events, invite only, and small. Although a few notable companies, Disney and Activision, had some really bad press events for the most part it was pretty boring and didn't create any buzz... which is the entire point of the show!

I have a large collection of autographs of famous people, and all from E3. I was so junior at SEGA that I couldn't secure a conference room to meet with developers. And standing in the booth was never a good situation... so I hit on the idea of standing in line to get an autograph and have our meeting. I would say to a developer: "Larry Bird is going to be at the Acclaim booth Saturday from 1-3, lets get in line at 12:30 and have out meeting". Without fail, they showed up and we had a great meeting.

I repeated this over and over and never once did a developer fail to show up, or even be late!

So I'm going again, for a single day. I'm sure I'll see old friends, and someone will ask me if I'm going to some big party... which I will say no because I have a flight back at 8. But it will be great to see the booths and how the companies struggle with the sound level and the women not wearing much.

(They could always do what Ripcord Games did, hire a beautiful woman and then put her in baggy clothes. I said: "Lets put a bag on her head and complete the picture". I insisted we find clothes her size and suddenly she had a crowd around her and was doing the job she was hired to do.)

I have a million convention stories, from both E3 and CES. I loved CES because it was twice a year, in Chicago and Las Vegas, two great cities. I miss going to that show...

I'll report back all of the vents of what will be a very busy day. But until then, I'll leave you with one of my favorite William Shatner quotes from the first E3.

This has been great, see you all next year at E4!

Mac