For E3, it's game over as many gamers know it.
The Electronic Entertainment Expo, the video game industry's annual trade show in Los Angeles that had morphed into a mecca for fanatics and a spectacle complete with "booth babes" and Lara Croft look-alikes, will be scaled down, a move that could hurt the city's tourism economy.
Organizers announced Monday that the 2007 event would be held at hotels throughout Los Angeles, rather than in the downtown convention center.
The news caught convention center officials by surprise. E3, held here since 1995 except for two years when it was in Atlanta, is one of the largest events at the Los Angeles Convention Center, drawing 60,000 attendees, who inject $19 million into the local economy.
The trade show, sponsored by the Entertainment Software Assn., sprawled over more than 1 million square feet, with companies such as Electronic Arts Inc. pouring millions into attention-grabbing displays.
This year's show featured extravagant after-hours parties that included Nintendo Co. renting out a Hollywood nightclub for a Black Eyed Peas concert and Sony Corp. throwing an Incubus concert at Dodger Stadium. Scantily clad women -- whose costumes included gun-slinging assassins and cheerleaders -- paraded around the show, despite efforts to crack down on provocative attire.
"It's not good news," said Michael Collins, executive vice president of the city's convention and visitors bureau, on the show's move away from downtown. "There is no question that we are going to feel the loss of 36,000 room nights, certainly in '07 and '08."
Collins said he did not know the extent of the loss because the software association's plans for the 2007 event were still being developed.
The news comes as the city is trying to lure convention and meeting planners who have long ignored Los Angeles because it lacked adequate hotel space. Plans for LA Live, the 27-acre entertainment-sports complex near Staples Center -- and the recent announcement of two new hotels there -- have injected optimism into the city's convention business.
The news shocked hard-core video game fans, who lamented the change on Internet message boards.
Entries on blogs and message boards Monday read like this: "NOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!" and "Am I dreaming? ... Someone tell me this is a cruel, late April Fool's Day joke."
