After this year's E3 event, it feels more and more obvious the format is in very serious decline. Even if we take out the corona effect on live shows, the fact that companies can use digital presentations and social media to show their titles whenever they want without having to deal with the serious expenses of live shows is something clearly eroding E3's usefulness. This year, Sony decided to just not bother showing up in favour of their own presentation sometime down the line, and some of the companies who did show up frankly had no reason to (I still don't get why T2 even bother with a presentation with zero games). This makes me think that, once companies become more comfortable with their Direct style presentations, they just won't bother with E3. So how long until E3 becomes unsustainable and just dissapears completely?

E3 is not only for gaming, right? How are the other companies that attend it and what is the buzz they generate with their presence?

Dont know, but it will be sad when it happens.

You do realise there is technology on the show floor for journalists to try out and report on? E3 will never die.

I don't see how that changes things. Video game companies need no live show anymore (at least not one they don't fully control in their own terms), and being overshadowed by bigger games after all of the expenses of going there is not really an attractive prospect. Once videogame publishers and devs stop going there, will E3 be even profitable to organize? If I recall, they are the main show, most people who go there pay to see the games, not the hardware. And even if it stays profitable somehow, would E3 even be relevant for most people?

I think it could get replaced with something like Summer Game Fest which gives publishers a more flexible schedule. But tbh I don't see E3 going away, worst case scenario it just becomes a watered-down version like the PAX conventions.

Journalists and the media are at probably an all-time low in regards to the public trusting them due to mis-reportings, agendas, politics, staged things (like CNN faking a rescue of people from flood waters by hiring actors), etc. Journalism itself is dying as everything is becoming increasingly caught on camera and hot mics. You don't need to hire people to dig up dirt on something when that something is publically on display more and more as the years go by. Regarding gaming specifically, if a company can stream directly to you to deliver information on the products/services they have, then what use is the media? To make predictions? To tell you how you should feel about something? Those were useful when companies didn't directly communicate to consumers regularly or in convenient ways. But now all Phil Spencer has to do is get the programmers at MS to deliver push notifications to the billions of users on PC to let them know about a presentation they have in store. We'd all be better off without journalists since so very often they have an agenda in the modern era.

Probably wont dissapear, but likely in due time its just gonna shift the focus from videogames to a more general tech convention. Its already heading in that direction.
Which is fine I guess, when it comes to videogames I like it as its been these past years, with each company having its own direct whenever it is competent.

E3 is but a shadow of what it once was. I wouldn't mourn if the last straw breaks and it dies off completely.

I'd say it's got about six to ten years left. So it should survive most of the ninth generation, and will probably go into the tenth generation as well.

I haven't cared much about E3 in years. Sony doesn't care anymore and Nintendo hasn't had a physical conference since 2012, though they still bring games to the expo.