It’s your favorite reporter Ash Parrish soon to be coming to you LIVE from Summer Game Fest. As this is my first year covering the event as a member of the IC crew I’d like to open up the floor to ask you, yes you! what kind of stuff you’d like to see from me regarding the show?
I, of course, already have some plans in motion but I’m reporter of service. My job is to give the readers what they want so…what do you want? Summer Game Fest, unlike GDC which is mostly a hunger games style fight for game funding disguised as an inside baseball conference for developers, is tailored for the average video game consumer i.e. you fine folk. There will of course be round ups of the games that are showcased and coverage of the showcase’s events (Xbox presentation/Day of the Devs etc etc)
But what else interests you about these events that you don’t often see covered? What burning questions do you have? I’ll do my best to update live from the event with a thread here to post pictures, thoughts, and whatever might be too niche (or unhinged) for The Verge in general.
Regardless of your suggestions, thanks for being the best and coolest ass bunch of listeners a humble video games journo could ask for.
See you in LA
Ash
Food and drink options. Especially where they are paired with games for marketing reasons. I have a vague memory of Planet Coaster 2 giving out cotton candy when it was at Summer Games Fest, I also remember hearing about a game (I don’t remember the title, sorry!) letting you design your own smoothie to promo their game. I’d love a these are the foods of SGF type thing.
Swag! What kinds of things are they giving away to promote new titles - specifically the worst and/or tackiest things you can come across. Or something unrelated to a game but for some reason someone thought would be a good idea.
alex garland on stage awkwardly delivering scripted “banter” with geoff while molyneuxing about what the elden ring film will be all in no more than 45 seconds.
i do truly hope garland and kojima hang out. they seem made for each other. garland and sakaguchi too seeing as the latter famously put the former in final fantasy (1987, famicom)
I’m curious who Sega considers their #2 mascot for Summer Game Fest. Ignoring all the sonic stuff, the games they’re releasing this year lack familiar faces for broad American audiences and are from franchises that have been quiet the last 20 years. Do they prioritize Akira from Virtua Fighter? The devil summoner Raidou Kuzunoha? The Shinobi from Shinobi? A puyo puyo? Or maybe someone new from the fabled “Super Game”
my honest answer is the real stuff like what people are eating/drinking, are there goodie bags, are they having a good time? is it a cool party or a dreadful work event for the people there?
I tend to overlook new games, indie and AAA alike in the deluge of trailers. I’d be interested in an article highlighting games and devs that get lost in the noise that you thought showed promise.
The booth babes of this event are content creators who cannot be there in person, covering the event via semi autonomous segways with cameras mounted on them.
They wheel around the showfloor with human minders.
I’d be interested in hearing about any counter-programming or anything that feels subversive in its presence at the events, although I could see those being somewhere between very rare and non-existent.
I’m also curious if anyone else will be riding the wave of focusing on location-based, meaningful connection that seemed to be a focus for the recent press event for Death Stranding 2. Or ways that real-life presentations are built to echo themes within the game, if that makes sense.
Food and drink is a good one. Also just general ethnography/sociology. Are there any quirks or unwritten rules around the events? Things to do or not do with demos that you’ve seen? That may be basic stuff for the people here in the industry, but I’d learn something.
More fannishly, I’m most interested in what Sega has cooking and if any of it involves Skies of Arcadia (probably not) or new Like a Dragon (possibly).
For the show floor its jeans+tshirt fare. I and most other femmes in attendance will do something nicer. I wore this to the xbox showcase last year (and thought i looked pretty cool)
