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The GDC 2020 show floor looks increasingly sparse with each passing day as companies pull out due to concerns regarding COVID – 19, the coronavirus. Now, Activision Blizzard and Amazon are the latest to pull out of the show, citing concerns about the disease in their reasons for pulling out of GDC 2020.
Both Amazon and Activision Blizzard announced their withdrawal from GDC 2020 on February 28, 2020. Amazon was the first to state that it would withdraw its presence from the program. Blizzard came next with its own announcement and, understandably, its partner company Activision followed soon after. In each announcement, the reasoning for withdrawing from GDC was the same. Concerns about the coronavirus have caused great concern and each company is not willing to risk the health of the staff to be present at the fair.
Blizzard will no longer be attending this year’s @Official_GDC due to growing concerns related to COVID-19. The health and well-being of our teams is our highest priority.
– Blizzard Entertainment (@Blizzard_Ent) February 28, 2020
GDC’s big party retreat is becoming an increasingly common story as the month of the event begins. Facebook, Oculus, and Sony got things started and it wasn’t long before other companies started to follow suit. Some of the other major players in attracting GDC assistance included Microsoft, Unreal (and by extension Epic Games), and Unity, all of whom contribute significantly to both the floor presence and panels at GDC.
Amazon and Activision Blizzard’s departure entirely from GDC 2020 means that more than 10 major players have left the program overall at this point. It remains to be seen what happens to the program, this being the case. GDC itself has not made any formal decision as of yet to cancel the event.
Still, GDC would not be the last event to drop its program on short notice. The coronavirus has also affected IEM Katowice and EVE Fanfest 2020, with the former restricting attendance on the site and the latter canceled entirely. At this point, a cancellation may be the best in the case of GDC.
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