Rumors are churning from some folks in the know that PSX is being let go because of both negative reception from last year's format, plus possibility of PS5s confirmation in 2019.
Nah, it was just because they have nothing to show to make it worthwhile. I'm going to end up repeating myself partially but I made a post back in July where I suggested there would be no PSX this year:
https://www.shenmuedojo.com/forum/i...-fit-if-s3-is-a-gamescom-no-show.91/post-1163
I went the past two years and had a lot of fun, but the majority of the show floor consists of Sony's big upcoming titles. Last year it was Detroit, Shadow of the Colossus remake, Spiderman, God of War, and Days Gone with the last 3 not even having the games playable there. Sony's stuff makes up over half of the show floor, all of the large booths with elaborate attractions were theirs, and they don't really have enough upcoming first party titles to warrant a big show this time.
They have Days Gone, that had a booth last year with nothing playable. They have Dreams, that had a booth last year with nothing playable. They have Death Stranding, that didn't have a booth last year but did have a presence in the form of an hour long panel. The former two games I believe have playable trade show demos now, but they're not enough to carry a dedicated event. They haven't announced any new first party AAA titles this year that are coming out in 2019 and worthy of carrying a show.
I don't think the format had anything to do with it not happening this year; I didn't like having to watch the Friday thing from my hotel room having flown half way across the country to attend, but the show itself was unchanged. I do think PSX is likely to happen next year once they've announced the PS5 and exclusives that they will want to show off there. It's Sony's private show and they won't hold it unless they have content to hold it up.
Outside of that, our biggest shot to see the game will be MAGIC in February and E3 2019.
Cedric already indicated that he wants the game at MAGIC next year, he asked on Twitter what people would want to see if Shenmue 3 was there. I don't believe he confirmed that it will be there, but rather his question implies that he wants it to be.
I wish there was a smaller North America-based event that it could have a presence at, but that seems unlikely. PSX, despite the long line to get inside, is much less crowded than popular events like E3 and PAX. And it was easy to get tickets for and there were plenty of hotels in walking distance. For me it's not worth going overseas by myself for almost a week just to attend a 1 day event featuring one game and some other small stuff. I've considered PAX Australia as an overseas game convention I'd be willing to attend because that is easy to get tickets for and reasonably sized, but I don't think MAGIC is worth over 14 hours of jet lag and lost vacation days for me. ? (Only thing to make it worth it would be if I people I knew were interested in visiting France for a week around that time, but that's not happening.)
