The Industry Pandemic of 2020.
The significance of overcoming adversity, comes in the shape of knowing when to accept defeat.
The Coronavirus poses a looming threat to many of us. Whether that means you are hoarding rice and canned beans, focusing on buying all the toilet paper left on Earth, or just trying not to touch your face, the possible pandemic of COVID-19 is affecting just about everyone’s lives in one way or another. As a consequences, many of the live events and releases of media have either been postponed or cancelled. Today I would like to dwell into advert situations, specifically in the gaming industry, with those examples being E3 2020 and the rising population of active gaming online users.
However, before starting the true analysis, I would like to describe the relevance of it all. Coronavirus, will continue to be a transnational problem for the foreseeable future that knows no preferences. The best way to solve an issue, of such specific nature, in my opinion, is for all parties to recognize the value of “taking an L”. As individuals and instutions, it’s important to understand that somethings are out of our control and being capable to cope with a loss in profit, image or numbers is what will dictate the power shifts in the particular areas of an industry.
That said, let’s take the premier trade event of the video game industry, E3. This global event has been in decline for a few years now. Sony affirmed it will not attend the 2020 show, stating that the vision for E3 2020 doesn't meet their goals, and instead will showcase their games at other events throughout the year. Other companies such as Nintendo left the event long along and approach a completely different strategy to the live demo approach. Known nowadays famously for their Nintendo Direct. A ‘direct’ is a livestream in which Nintendo showcase their latest releases and provide production updates for their fanbase.
“It is your reaction to adversity, not the adversity itself, that determines how your life’s story will develop."
— Dieter F. Uchtdorf
It could be this impose decision, due to corona that could potentially accelerate the invention of new marketing strategies, such the aforedmentioned livestreams. Furthermore, the idea having people witnessing the event in an online format does in fact grant the media company great benefits. The main example of this is, the potential audience can be bigger and widder. Reaching further to people that did not met originally the underlying means to attend an event like this, as well as allowing for more interactivity between the audience members themselves through an always concurrent live chat.
To that end, leading spokepersons in the industry expect that the coronavirus will put an end to the steady decline of E3. In other words, the closure of the event will force big media companies to seek new ways of communicating the same information as they used to before.
