What impact did the past summer shows have? The Xbox showcase was particularly successful, as an analysis shows.
An E3 was not held this year and it seems that the fair will not return. Online events serve as a replacement, including the Summer Game Fest, but also shows by individual publishers. Examples include the State of Play and the Xbox Games Showcase to be named.
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But which show content attracted the most interest from influencers, gamers and press representatives on social media, including YouTube, TikTok, Instagram and Twitter/X, as well as on gaming websites and the like? An analysis by Fancensus has been carried out on this, in which overall PR and social flare scores were calculated based on the coverage on 3,000 websites and posts in the networks mentioned.
The calculations (via Games industry) were carried out for individual games. To this end, various metrics were examined, from front page positioning to video views, interactions on Twitter/X and the YouTube engagement rate. In addition, each channel was weighted according to its importance for a title's campaign.
Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 close to peak
Each game could reach a maximum score of 100. The maximum score would mean that this game basically dominates every single metric on all five channels (website, YouTube, TikTok, Instagram and X). This is almost impossible, but “Call of Duty: Black Ops 6” with a flare score of 93, it came close to this record.
Below is the Flare ranking based on the average score of the games presented in the shows. The Xbox Games Showcase and the Summer Game Fest were able to benefit from the sheer volume of game presentations in terms of the overall score.
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| Events | Total score | Number of games | Score cut |
|---|---|---|---|
| Xbox Games Showcase | 536 | 31 | 17 |
| State of Play | 209 | 14 | 15 |
| Ubisoft Forward | 136 | 9 | 15 |
| Nintendo Direct | 264 | 30 | 9 |
| Summer Game Fest | 523 | 61 | 9 |
| Future Games Show | 218 | 62 | 4 |
| PC Gaming Show | 271 | 77 | 4 |
Most of the top 10 appearances were at the Xbox Games Showcase
Broken down into the five most important shows, the following picture emerges: Five of the top 10 games with the highest flare score were shown at the Xbox Games Showcase. This gave the Redmond-based company first place.
At the other end of the ranking is State of Play. Here, only one game made it into the top 10. At the same time, it is striking that ten of the 14 games presented during the PlayStation Show made it into the top 50. This is by far the largest proportion.
| Name of event | Top 10 | Top50 | Number of games | Share in top 50 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Xbox Games Showcase | 5 | 17 | 31 | 54.84% |
| Ubisoft Forward | 2 | 3 | 9 | 33.33% |
| Summer Game Fest | 1 | 14 | 61 | 22.95% |
| Nintendo Direct | 1 | 6 | 30 | 8:00 pm% |
| State of Play | 1 | 10 | 14 | 71.43% |
Microsoft was particularly able to benefit from “Call of Duty: Black Ops 6.” The shooter achieved a flare score of 93, while “Assassins Creed: Shadows,” the second-place game, only achieved a flare score of 39. It was achieved with the gameplay teaser shown at the Xbox Games Showcase.
This is followed by the announcement of “Doom: The Dark Ages” (XGS, Score 39), the full gameplay reveal of “Assassins Creed: Shadows” at Ubisoft Forward (Score 37) and the presentation of “Dragon Age: The Veilguard” (XGS, Score 32). “God of War Ragnarök” (PC version), “Monster Hunter Wilds” and “AstroBot” were shown at the State of Play and each received a score of 24. You can see the complete table on the Gamesindustry website.
State of Play leads in awareness
A consumer survey by Fancensus, on the other hand, found that State of Play is particularly well-known and of interest to many gamers. 71 percent of participants said they knew about the PlayStation Show, while 43 percent were interested in it or even watched the event. The Xbox Games Showcase and Nintendo Direct had slightly lower figures.
| Events | Known | interest |
|---|---|---|
| PlayStation Showcase | 71% | 43% |
| Xbox Games Showcase | 69% | 37% |
| Nintendo Direct | 67% | 36% |
| The Game Awards | 66% | 37% |
| State of Play | 65% | 38% |
| PC Gaming Show | 60% | 32% |
| Nintendo Partner Direct | 60% | 30% |
| Xbox Developer Direct | 60% | 30% |
| Ubisoft Forward | 55% | 26% |
| Summer Game Fest | 53% | 28% |
| Future Games Show | 51% | 26% |
| Gamescom Opening Night Live | 49% | 25% |
| Devolver Digital | 45% | 21% |
The latter survey was based on only 1,318 participants from the USA and Great Britain, which means that the result is only partially meaningful.
Further explanations of the statistics and additional figures Gamesindustry provides a detailed article.
More news about State of Play, Summer Game Fest 2024, Xbox Games Showcase.
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