This has been , so far an amazing start to an already hectic weekend. We are talking about Gamescom 2023, the first two days are open to the members of the media and professionals of the trade. When I arrived at the venue I was greeted by a long line of people as far as the eye can see. But the brightside to this was that I was told to go through another side that saw my press pass and breezed me through. Within 10 mins I was already inside the venue looking at what Gamescom had to offer.
First thing when you get onto the show floor that you notice is that all of the booths have a smaller footprint than previous years. Xbox had the biggest booth but according to sources it was the smallest they have had at the convention in the past years. They still had a plethora of games, both indie and AAA titles.
When you walked around their booth you noticed the focus was on the big starfield theater they had built. On top of that the other focus was Forza Motorsports and S.T.A.L.K.E.R 2 Heart of Chornobyl, each with their own interactive booths. Further more Xbox dos show off a lot of games at their booth, I will be including some in this article. Xbox had the biggest booth but there was alot of open space in between their booths, granted I realized it was for traffic flow!
This year Gamescom turned out to be sold out. When I’m telling you that it was a sea of people that not even rush hour in NYC can compare! Just trying to get from one hall to the other was a quest in itself. And this includes on the last day of media access , for some reason it seemed that there were more people who weren’t just press (Could’ve been my imagination though) lol. Once it was open to the public it became line-con.
You also had many booths with live performances, which in itself was awesome because the talent were amazing and pleasant to hear. Not like other shows were they get novice and set up is poor quality. This on the other hand was amazing ! I enjoyed listening to anime music at the convention. It wasn’t just one band they had a different band every hour! Which was awesome ! I think they capped how many bands were per day though, even if that’s true it was still a nice change of pace.
Performances are usually an anime convention thing , to bring it to a gaming event is genius. What’s more impressive is that having it through out the day saves money on venue renting for the exhibitor! Again top grade thinking! If they keep this up and bring top grad quality to Gamescom, I can see this bringing in more people who wouldn’t normally go to these types of events. One thing I didn’t like was how quick they ran out of on-site merch i was able to grab a tshirt but that’s it lol! I was directed to look online at their website and have it shipped.
If you know you’re sold out request more items be overnighted to the venue, wouldnt that make more sense logistically? Many people weren’t happy when they couldn’t get merch that same day. I would be upset , but I do understand the venue as well as the convention organizers. They need to make sure that they don’t bring too much or too little merch. Because there’s a cost to sending everything back if it doesn’t sell, they rather bring a limited amount sell out and direct people to the website.
They also had an outdoor area where Red Bull had their creator lounge. Big Red Bull tent and 2 story building where their content creators can go have food, drinks and relax. It was great to see so many content creators in one spot, I got to meet a ton of awesome people! When it came down to it the creators were down to earth and awesome to talk to. Many of them were welcoming even though I didn’t speak German!
They switched to English while I was there and said we can’t be rude to the one person who speaks English. I was shocked and grateful. This was an amazing gesture that they didn’t have to do but I’m truly grateful to them and also they were explaining what was going on in the convos in German was really cool. I got to learn more about Germany and the language, even though it was a little bit. I am happy that I met the creators I met this past week.
In closing Gamescom event was amazing , tons of games to see, alot of people to interact with and many side options within the convention itself ! Not including the city wide parties that lights up the night sky with lights and music. Gamescom has city wide parties from day zero to the last day and they are scattered through the city giving everyone to attend an event no matter where you are staying. On my train rise back to my Airbnb I had past 2 parties. They were awesome! I stayed for a bit to hear some of the music and then went in my way.
All in all this was a great Gamescom and I can’t wait to see what they do,in Asia in a few months. I am trying to see if I can go to that one, but it’s in Singapore. I will try to go but this year might be way to short notice to plan a whole trip. This might be a thing for next year. But either way going to Singapore would be an amazing experience as well as to meet people you wouldn’t normally meet!
Please keep an eye on here as i post Gamescom content during the next few weeks ! Thanks again and hope to see you soon!
