The eleventh edition of Paris Games Week, the largest French exhibition dedicated to video games, which was to take place from October 23 to 27, is canceled due to the health crisis linked to the coronavirus, warned its organizers on Thursday.
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The fair was to celebrate its tenth anniversary in 2020
"The current context and the necessary anticipation of technical and logistical complexities (...) force us to cancel this edition", explains the press release from the Syndicate of Leisure Software Publishers (Sell) which gives players an appointment the year next. The show was to celebrate its 10th anniversary in 2020, in a rich context marked by the expected release of a new generation of consoles and an increased interest in video games during the confinement period.
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An important fair, close to the end of year celebrations
If Paris Games Week is not usually the place of big video game announcements, already widely unveiled at E3 in Los Angeles or at the Tokyo Game Show, the show remains important for French "gamers" who have the opportunity to test the main titles expected in preview. For publishers, the stakes are high, at the dawn of the lucrative end-of-year holiday period, during which a large part of annual turnover is generated.
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317,000 visitors in 2019
The 2020 edition of E3 (Electronic Entertainment Expo), which was to take place in June, was also canceled on March 11. Gamescom, which was to take place in August in Cologne (Germany), will be organized "digitally", announced its organizers in mid-April. Paris Games Week welcomed 317,000 visitors in 2019 for five days in the aisles of the Parc des Expositions.