Square Enix scales down E3 attendance

By Ellie Gibson Published 21 May, 2009

Swine flu puts the wind up 'em.

Square Enix has told good old GamesIndustry.bizthat it is only sending a limited number of Japanese staff to E3 in Los Angeles next month, what with all the swine flu.

Other companies such as Capcom and Koei have already announced similar plans. Turns out hundreds of cases of swine flu have now been reported in Japan, prompting the Government to advise citizens to avoid international travel.

"A limited number of executives / employees from Square Enix's headquarters in Japan will be attending E3 this year, given the recent worldwide spread of H1N1 flu," said the company in a statement.

Koei's said something similar to Kotaku, and it turns out Capcom won't be showing Dead Rising 2 at E3 after all. In addition, producer Keiji Inafune declined to turn up at the Nordic Game Conference this week.

E3 organisers the Entertainment Software Association previously said they hoped the swine flu issue would be "a thing of the past" by the time the show rolled around. With just over a week to go, that doesn't look likely. Eurogamer will still be getting on that plane though; we ain't afraid of no swine flu. Also we could do with a few weeks in bed.

Picture of Ellie.

About Ellie Gibson

Since joining Eurogamer in the mid 2000s, Ellie has written about subjects as diverse as the fall of Gizmondo, the rise of Hollyoaks actresses in Red Alert games and the noise a bear makes under NSFW circumstances.

Read more articles from Ellie by visiting the Ellie Gibson archive page.

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Comments (16) Latest comment 3 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • Sonic_D #1 3 years ago

    What a load of ponces.

  • JohnnyWashnGo #2 3 years ago

    Who needs people?
    Let the games do the talking ;)

  • LHH #3 3 years ago

    The Japanese are quite freaky about illnesses (could be asia in general actually)

    I know 'cos I read it somewhere. >_>
    Edited by 1 at 21/05/09 @ 11:48

  • peterfll #4 3 years ago

    Ha ha. What a load of old rubbish, the Japs are happy-snapping in their normal numbers all over London and are travelling abroad.

    Trust me, they're always under-feet when I cross Tower Bridge each day.

  • neonemesis #5 3 years ago

    Excuse my ignorance but what the hell is happening with Swine Flu anyway? It's been ages since I heard anything about it on the news. All I hear about is MP expenses blah blah blah.

    Is the virus still a big thing at the moment?

  • LHH #6 3 years ago

    @neonemesis

    only in countries with shit healthcare dohohoho

  • KujiGhost #7 3 years ago

    I thought Swine Flu was just a giant marketing campaign for Resident Evil 5...

  • miiiguel #8 3 years ago

    @notmyrealname: I don't think it's a lie, a few collegues at work refused to go to a conference in Boston because they're affraid of the flu - it wasn't even a decision of the board, it was the actual guys who didn't want to go.

  • HermitArcader #9 3 years ago

    Post deleted at 09:17:39 22-12-2011

  • Cadence #10 3 years ago

    Best way to kill this virus is to stop reporting on it.

  • Golgo #11 3 years ago

    Swine fever? They must have heard the booth babes are back this year.

  • Indy #12 3 years ago

    The news just reported that most new cases of swine flu are erupting in Canada, Mexico, United States and... Japan. So if they already have it in the country, what's the big deal?

  • stevetuck #13 3 years ago

    Square Enix and there whole host of mediocre games...

    Next it will be Swine Flu delays Final Fantasy 13 for another year

  • owl #14 3 years ago

    I'm sure Esuna removes abnormal status ailments such as swine flu.

    Sorry, that was terribly geeky.

  • riz23 #15 3 years ago


    It was Owl. Good job!

  • Daikon #16 3 years ago

    Turns out hundreds of cases of swine flu have now been reported in Japan, prompting the Government to advise citizens to avoid international travel.

    Sorry Ellie, but this is incorrect.
    In fact the Japanese government has decided to stop screening incoming flights for passengers infected with swine flu and will now focus on limiting infections within Japan.

    Of course before swine flu was present in Japan the government did advise citizens to avoid international travel to affected countries but now there are hundreds of cases within Japan there's not much of a point in doing so.