E3’s 2021 live event has been cancelled, LA city documents claim

E3’s physical event for 2021 has been cancelled, according to Los Angeles city documents published this week.

In a new report published by the Board of Los Angeles Convention and Tourism Development Commission, a sales update lists E3 2021 as a “cancelled live event”.

The document states that the Convention board is working with E3 organiser The the second year in a row the E3 event has been called off due to the coronavirus pandemic.

As exclusively revealed by VGC this month, The ESA has been pushing forward with plans for a digital E3 event this summer, but it still requires the backing of major games companies.

According to E3 2021 pitch documents sent to games publishers and seen by VGC, the ESA has outlined its proposals for this year’s event, which would see three days of live-streamed coverage held during the previously announced dates of June 15-17.

The broadcast event would be supplemented by media previews the week before, as well as demos released on consumer platforms, according to the ESA’s proposal.

However, the E3 2021 plans still require the approval of ESA’s membership, which is made up of the industry’s biggest games companies and who have significant influence over the direction of the show.

The ESA was already facing significant pressure to reinvent E3, with several major publishers including abandoned the event in recent years – and that was before 2020’s cancellation, after which many companies such as EA and Ubisoft enjoyed success running their own digital events.

Multiple games publishing sources had told VGC they were working under the assumption that the physical event would not take place this year.

In a statement issued to VGC, the ESA said it would soon share exact details on this year’s E3 show and claimed it was having “great conversations” with developers and publishers, but would not confirm who had signed up for the event.

“We can confirm that we are transforming the E3 experience for 2021 and will soon share exact details on how we’re bringing the global video game community together,” an ESA spokesperson said. “We are having great conversations with publishers, developers and companies across the board, and we look forward to sharing details about their involvement soon.”

Commenting on VGC’s report, former E3’s 2021 live event has been cancelled, LA city documents claim