The organizers of The excessive E3 Games conference voiced the event in 2023. Attendance at the bombastic, news-packed trade show was declining in 2019, and after the Covid-19 closure, the organizers at the Entertainment Software Association held one more virtual in 2021 before reaching the plug.
Now the ESA is ready to go on with a new, vaguely described event called the Interactive Innovation Conference, called “Iicon.” Developers of major games such as Microsoft, Nintendo, Sony Interactive Entertainment, Electronic Arts, Ubisoft and more are already confirmed for the show.
But ESA President and CEO Stanley Pierre-Louis wants to make one thing clear: “It’s not the new E3,” he tells Wired.
Pierre-Louis, who will take place in Las Vegas in April 2026, will not be a trade exhibition, says Pierre-Louis. It will also not be a consumer show with demos or a forum to talk about game development. He says there are already events “that do all the things very well.”
Instead, with Iicon, the ESA hopes to bridge the gap between the many industries formed by progress in video games, from film and music to healthcare and education.
“We are proud of the history we had to offer E3 and what it did to bring our industry together,” says Pierre-Louis. “But it’s a completely clear event with another purpose and another audience.”
The inclusion of Hollywood studios makes sense. Games and Hollywood enjoy a successful marriage of the Super Mario Bros. Movie and its achievement as one of the animated films of all time, to the award-winning HBO adjustment of The last of us. The transition with the music industry also feels natural, because musicians like Travis Scott and Ariana Grande held virtual concerts Fortnite.
More opaque is the link between video games and an industry such as healthcare. However, according to Pierre-Louis, they are more connected than you think. “Surgeons learn their trade through mixed reality to understand how to improve their skills,” he says. “ADHD and Alzheimer’s are now being treated by video games, sometimes by prescriptions.”
Organizers have not yet disclosed details about speakers or panels that will appear, but according to Pierre-Louis, the schedule will not look like that of the shows that E3’s place has taken. “If you look at how interactive entertainment has been used in a number of other fields,” he says, “you can see that it has a big impact, even if four people don’t admit it as much.”
The new event is’ only ‘invitation’, so that interested participants must register to attend. This will make room for big names in various industries. “What is missing since the sunset of E3 is the ability to bring everyone together to invest while bringing in the broader business community,” says Pierre-Louis.