Brighton, UK – 26th September 2016 Over 75,000 gamers attended EGX at Birmingham’s NEC to take part in the biggest and the best gaming show in the UK.
Hosted in partnership with Virgin Media, the show boasted over 200 playable games, the largest showcase of indie games in the world and a host of global first-play exclusives including Bethesda’s Dishonored 2 and Playtonic’s Yooka-Laylee.
UK hands-on exclusives included the recently unveiled PlayStation 4 Pro and blockbuster games such as Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare, Gears of War 4, Titanfall 2, Battlefield 1, Final Fantasy XV, Horizon: Zero Dawn and more – all playable and pre-release. EGX is now securely established as the most important date in the UK calendar for developers to exhibit their latest games and for gamers to experience them for the first time.
EGX has also grown as a place to reveal new games and features, with this year’s show hosting announcements of the next titles from Square Enix Collective and Failbetter Games, and Shovel Knight’s appearance in Yooka-Laylee. Popular elements of the show included multiple eSports stages and tournaments such as the GFinity $100,000 Counter-Strike: GO invitational and the UK’s only Premier Event on the Capcom Pro Tour, as well as the UK Preliminaries for the European Cosplay Gathering.
The show’s official retail partner Amazon offered ultra-fast delivery via Prime Now to the show floor, ensuring that gaming fans could instantly purchase and pre-order games and hardware more conveniently than ever before.
“We’re delighted with the feedback from attendees who loved the introduction of Scan & Buy on the Amazon app for a convenient way to buy and pre-order games and hardware across this leading gaming event“ said Russell Jones, Video Games & Software Category Leader, Amazon.co.uk. “This was the first time we have offered Amazon Prime customers delivery of products via Prime Now direct to any event, and the service which enabled attendees to order games and consoles was very well received.”
It was not just consumers that turned up in huge numbers as media attendance reached record levels. Hundreds of journalists from all sectors of the media were present and the event attracted national coverage from mainstream outlets such as BBC News, Newsbeat and Newsround, The Mirror and the Sunday Times. Hundreds of influencers including YouTube superstars Syndicate, The Yogscast and Outside Xbox were also in attendance to meet and greet thousands of their delighted fans.
Rupert Loman, CEO of EGX’s parent company Gamer Network added, “EGX 2016 was our biggest and best show yet. I’d like to say thank you to all of our partners, sponsors and exhibitors for helping create another outstanding experience for UK gamers – and of course I must thank the community for making the event so special. Next year will be the 10th anniversary for EGX and we are already planning to mark that milestone with something even more spectacular”.
The next EGX event is EGX Rezzed, taking place at Tobacco Dock in London from March 30th to April 1st 2017. Irrational Games founder Ken Levine has already been announced as the keynote speaker, and tickets are now on sale at www.egx.net/rezzed .
EGX returns to the Birmingham NEC September 21st–24th 2017.
