The Average Gamer
Home / Posts / News / London Games Festival announced!

London Games Festival announced!

It’s been announced by ELSPA and TIGA and created in partnership with LDA and BAFTA. Whew, acronymphomania! (okay, I blatantly stole that word from alt.fan.pratchett. ‘Tis a good ‘un though, yes?)

It will be in the week of 2nd October 2006 and will encompass the London Games Summit, Content Market and other business and consumer-facing events which are yet to be announced. The British Academy Video Games Awards (who nominated Super Yum Yum by our very own Tikipod for Mobile Game of the Year in 2003) will also be moving to October to “climax the London Games Festival”

It seems they haven’t decided what consumer events will be available yet but with that gaping hole in my gaming heart following the lack of PlayStation Experience (moved to Alton Towers) and GameStarsLive (held in 2004, good fun, convinced me to buy Lego Star Wars, disappeared completely) I shall be following this closely.

What consumer events would you like see at a games festival?

Many quotes follow from the press release:

Fred Hasson, CEO of TIGA added: “The festival has the potential to become the ‘Cannes’ of the games industry, fittingly so since the UK is the most important centre for the games sector in Europe in both consumer and business terms. London Games Festival 2006 will be predominantly trade focused, but it is foreseen that cultural, artistic, educational and consumer elements will evolve as part of the activities in the future.”

Evolve? I’m guessing that means they would like them, but need to drum up the interest first.

Ian Baverstock, chairman of TIGA and business development director of Kuju, said: “This festival offers the games development sector a perfect vehicle through which to showcase what a vibrant and dynamic creative talent base the games industry has in the UK.”

Paul Jackson, VP and managing director Northern Europe, Electronic Arts, said: “We’re incredibly excited by London Games Festival. It is something that is grabbing the industry’s imagination. The hope is that it captures for games what an event like Cannes captures for film. We’ll be looking to see how we can be involved in the London Games Festival in ways that best reflect the EA brand and our games.”

Let’s hope so!