E3 is partnering with PAX organizers for 2023 return in LA

Mere weeks after the ESA announced that, no, seriously this time, E3 will make an in-person return in 2023, it’s ready to share some more details. In a press release, the ESA announced that it’s partnering with ReedPop, the production company known for running the Penny Arcade Expo and New York Comic Con, to facilitate the industry event.

“We are thrilled to bring back E3 as an in-person event with ReedPop, a global leader in producing pop culture events,” said ESA CEO Stanley Pierre-Louis.

According to the press release, E3 2023 will return to its home at the Los Angeles Convention Center. It’s the same convention center that was so inundated with attendees at last week’s Anime Expo that it produced some truly horrifying pictures (that don’t look appealing even if there wasn’t a pandemic still raging) and required the Los Angeles fire marshal to prevent even more attendees from entering the building.

ReedPop’s E3 team seems confident that something like that won’t happen during next year’s expo. “E3 2023 will be recognizably epic,” said Kyle Marsden-Kish, ReedPop’s global VP of gaming. “A return to form that honors what’s always worked — while reshaping what didn’t, and setting a new benchmark for video game expos in 2023 and beyond.” Hopefully “reshaping what didn’t” means we’ll no longer have to worry about the organization doxxing its attendees.

E3 won’t be alone in its 2023 return. Yesterday, Blizzard announced that BlizzCon will also be returning to in-person events after BlizzConline in 2021 and a pause of the event in 2022 due to the company’s considerable legal issues.

The ESA did not share which publishers would be at the event, indicating that information would be shared in the coming months. In a world where Microsoft, Sony, Nintendo, and more have been content to host their own showcases on their own timeline, it’s unclear which, if any, of the Big 3 publishers show up. Geoff Keighley, who recently wrapped up his Summer Game Fest — an event that stepped in to provide an alternative E3 when the pandemic shut down the big convention — has said he’s not sure what E3 even is anymore. Seems like we’ll see the first week of June 2023.