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Blizzard freezing out E3

By Tor Thorsen, GameSpotPosted Feb 5, 2009 3:20 pm PT

Reps say World of Warcraft publisher skipping June event entirely, dashing hopes of playable Diablo III and Starcraft II on show floor.

To all those fantasizing about being able to play Diablo III and/or Starcraft II deep in the heart of a resurgent Electronic Entertainment Expo: Stop. Today, reps confirmed to GameSpot that, despite the presence of its parent corporation, Activision Blizzard, Blizzard Entertainment will not be present when the Los Angeles Convention Center opens its doors June 2-4.

"Sorry, E3, I got plans that week..."

"A lot of people saw Activision Blizzard listed on E3 and just assumed we were going, but that's not the case," a rep said, before confirming Activision Publishing would be there. Activision reps said it would indeed have a game-packed booth at the Expo, which will be greatly expanded from last year's stripped-down 5,000-person convention. The company did not say which games would be on display at said booth.

Blizzard's boycotting of E3 isn't that surprising, given that it skipped the confab for the past two years. However, it does underline the fact that, while bigger than the previous two year's gatherings, E3 2009 still won't be as huge as the 65,000-attendee-strong E3 2006, which the World of Warcraft publisher did participate in. On Monday, the ESA made much of the fact that "Activision Blizzard" would be on hand after boycotting the proceedings last year. Another 2008 no-show, LucasArts, will also be in attendance.

As for Blizzard's next public event, reps declined to say when, where, or if any gathering featuring the $100 million-per-month company will take place.

175 Comments

  • Overneathe

    Posted May 26, 2009 5:14 am PT

    @keith21uk

    Sorry, but they have seperate teams for all projects. There's no "back burner" there.

    The reason why Blizz are not going to E3 is because... there's no point in it. Blizzcon is later this year and they won't have anything to show to their biggest fans if they go ahead and display everything that is done lately on some convention where there will be fans of all sorts of crap and mostly media.
    Blizz likes to keep their stuff for their fans. So when Blizzcon hits (and I think it'll be rather bigger then E3) a company will give its fans what they deserve.
    Just a note. The first batch of Blizzcon tickets sold out in about 15 minutes. And there's just one more batch of the getting old. A few seconds after the tickets were released for sale there was a queue of about 12,000 people.

  • keith21uk

    Posted Apr 25, 2009 12:21 pm PT

    I think they are delaying the release of Diablo III because they are working hard on the new World of Warcraft content. They have only recently released the tier 8 dungeon. They still have tier 9 and 10 to go. This year In March was an estimated date but think they are putting it on the back burner for a while. Rather work on the game that's making them millions every month. Admittedly im sucked into wow myself. Diablo III defintely sounds exciting though as used to play Diablo and Diablo II a lot.

  • itachi100

    Posted Mar 24, 2009 10:19 pm PT

    fantasy? sure its not reality, but its FAR from original.

    also, SC2 and diablo 3 are obviously cancelled games

  • Jegudiel

    Posted Feb 17, 2009 3:06 am PT

    blizzard rules if u dont like their job dont wait for it but u cant ignore the truth that they do best in fantasy universe and i d like to say something to i'v been waiting 8 years for diablo 3 ican wait for little more because i know they are trying to do their best

  • downloadthefile

    Posted Feb 11, 2009 2:26 pm PT

    I foresee a 2010 release for whichever they intend to work on the most, and 2011 release for the other. Knowing Blizz, a playable version of either could definitely be released this year and even very soon, but it wouldn't have the amount of polish they are known for.

  • wayanbros

    Posted Feb 10, 2009 9:45 pm PT

    but but the models need jobs. we need boothbabes! think of the models!

  • DO646260

    Posted Feb 10, 2009 8:33 pm PT

    nothing wrong with booth babes and handouts, We can take them and still enjoy the little ones... Like Spore Wars and whatnot... Both can thrive in a no restrictions E3... The crappy part is no news about D3 in 5 months... And no demo at E3 either...

  • mastriania

    Posted Feb 10, 2009 6:47 pm PT

    Yuck Too: what's wrong with booth babes and handouts? They have really never bothered me (well at least at anime cons).

  • Yuck_Too

    Posted Feb 10, 2009 9:07 am PT

    E3 was always meant to be for the little guys to help them get exposure...not so see how much money the big boys could waste on booth babes and handouts.

  • BlackKnightOfH8

    Posted Feb 9, 2009 5:41 pm PT

    The amount of E3 fanboys here is just astounding.

  • motorxd posted Feb 8, 2009 3:07 pm PT (does not meet display criteria. sign in to show)

    motorxd

    Posted Feb 8, 2009 3:07 pm PT (hide)

    I'm guessing they don't want to show their faces because of how angry everyone is at them for the sc2 spltting BS, turning diablo into a big cartoon, and the impending charges that will be coming with bnet2 theyve been hinting at.

  • Thyranel

    Posted Feb 8, 2009 8:04 am PT

    Its only a big hype like Paladin_basic say all games need now days have carp edge graffic so u need a monster computer to play it. Have just played through starcraft campain again and dame how i had missed the game. I think the developer need to go back and think what a makes a good game.

  • Paladin_basic

    Posted Feb 7, 2009 7:42 pm PT

    Can't say I blame them, it's not like E3 does anything more than keep the multitude of gaming mags / websites and associated journalists in work anyhow, and what they write is usually 75% biased (10/10 for GTA4! Hahahaha!) I'd rather publishers and devs didn't go and spent the cash on making sure games get released on time and with a minimum of bugs

  • gbrading Site moderator

    Posted Feb 7, 2009 5:12 pm PT

    I fully expect that they will hold their own press junket down the road, conveniently at exactly the same time that E3 is happening.

  • crowskull-666

    Posted Feb 7, 2009 5:04 pm PT

    as long as it doesn't slow down Diablo 3 or Starcraft 2 to come out then I frankly don't care.

  • khariss

    Posted Feb 7, 2009 3:59 pm PT

    e3 isn't worth the money sure you get previews but id rather they spent the money keeping developers alive

  • TheClown24

    Posted Feb 7, 2009 11:15 am PT

    i cant wait for diablo 3, but i really dont care about this as im not too concerned about missing out on a preview and a few gameplay movies

  • DamianW

    Posted Feb 7, 2009 11:00 am PT

    Maybe they are really busy creating... Games?

  • BenBenBen93

    Posted Feb 7, 2009 10:46 am PT

    no they have plenty of money with 11.5 mil people spending £5 a month not including any other forms of money including the cost of buying the game alone and there other games. they have enough money to throw away

  • brosim1104

    Posted Feb 7, 2009 4:22 am PT

    I bet they don't have any money to be at E3...... :O:O:O

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