E3 is the busiest time of the year for video game publishers, as they scramble to set up booths, demos and arrange press conferences, all to create hype for their upcoming lineup of games. While EA will still have a press conference this year, the rest of EA's E3 2016 plans are going to be quite different from years past.
For starters, the publisher's press conference will start on the Sunday before E3 starts, much like Bethesda handled its news last year. But EA won't have a booth at the E3 show. Rather, it will be putting on its own event called EA Play in Los Angeles from June 12-14 and also in London on June 12, where press and the public can get hands-on time with some of the publisher's upcoming titles.
EA Chief Marketing Officer Chris Bruzzo tells IGN the press conference will be "similar [to last year's press conference] in that it's very much about the games.... It's also going to include competitions, special guest appearances, musical performances, and other cool stuff that makes it an event."
Come Monday, June 13, EA will allow members of the public to attend the event for free. EA will be streaming coverage of the event for the full three days, and plans to feature developer panels, daily game streams and more.
E3 then formally begins on June 14. That means there will be less news in the middle of the week and more toward the beginning, as EA is sure to blow the lid off upcoming games like Mass Effect: Andromeda and more during its press conference. Last year EA's big gun was Star Wars: Battlefront. With it now released, it will be interesting to see if any more Star Wars announcements surface during the press event. We'll know more in June.
