Why are some of gaming’s biggest publishers abandoning E3?

Those were the days...

The annual orgy of game marketing and hype that is the Electronic Entertainment Expo will be a little less hype-filled this year, as some of gaming's biggest publishers have decided not to buy space on the Los Angeles Convention Center show floor.

VentureBeat reports today that Disney Interactive and Wargaming won't have booths at E3 2016. The two major publishers join Activision Blizzard and Electronic Arts, which announced in recent weeks that they are also opting out of the show (though EA will have a press event and "hands-on" demos at an off-site location in the days before the show starts).

Wargaming, which has maintained a large E3 booth since 2011, summarized the reasons for its departure in an e-mail to Venturebeat. "From a strictly business perspective, E3 just doesn’t fit our current direction," a company spokesperson said. "It’s a show that is very centralized on retail product, and as a free-to-play digital download gaming company, we’ve realized that while the show may be a good fit for lots of other publishers and developers, it’s currently not a great fit for us."

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