The 2009 Electronic Entertainment Expo or E3 was alive and kicking and let me say Iam so relieved as a journalist to know that one of the hardest media pass to require lives up to its billing. And I’ll go back to my first E3 Expo in 2006. It was a freaking’ nightmare and we had to jump through many hoops to even qualify as media. I thought that it was pretty intense and then I went to cover E3 and I was blown away for three straight days trying to report on the massive 45 billion a year video game industry. And after I filmed over seven plus hours of interviews of gamers, developers and publishers, celebrities and booth babes I was highly eager to attend the 2007 E3 Expo and then the lights went out. Then Electronic Software Association (ES A) and gam ing industry executives suddenly cancelled the 2007 E 3 E xpo under the rationale that the past E3 Expos had become to un-family friendly and full of scantily clad booth babes.  Maybe it was to save marketing costs of publishers, but the idea was not thought out well or the impending ramifications to mid-tier publishers like Midway, Atari and Universal Games.

Some independent prom oters tried to create a replacement event called eForAll 2007, but it was a complete disaster and barely filled South Hall with few major game publishers. The gaming industry had private meetings for insiders. This was more of a GDC type vibe. Microsoft rented out Santa Monica High School and had a big outside glitzy event to launch their new Fall and Winter 2007 game titles. But nothing compares to E3. And the 2008 E3 was for selected media only conference that still was a flop on every level because most gamer media did not want to fly out to LA for a low scale event that was not going to generate any consumer attention.

I always thought the original reason to shut down the biggest single gam ing event in the U.S. was beyond dumb. For example, every hall or space inside and outside the convention center was used in som e way for the 2006 E3 Expo. I mean when I went to check in at this year’s E3 Expo media center I remember this being the 2006 Atari booth. The media lounge was where the 2006 Midway Exhibit. Times had greatly changed and what once a mega media, mega hyped and mega celebrity driven marketplace that took over the whole LA Convention center in every nook and crannywas now mainly in the West and South Hall. Below I will breakdown a set of photos I took at the 2009 E3 Expo and a brief Twitter type description. And I will end my recap with a list of the 2009 E3 Expo winners and a list of E3 game trailer links.

In the E3 E xpo media lounge I did run into Malik “Tha-Truth” Forte and a few highly intelligent brothers with Iron Star Gaming www.ironstarmovement.com who were making their own waves in the gaming biz. We talked about the status of blacks in the gaming biz. I wish we had more time to kick it with them. But I’m sure I’ll hear from them again soon. Maybe next year I will spend more time hanging out with the gamer press.