Upcoming gaming events: gamescom digital 2020

This year’s gamescom won’t take place the same way it did in Cologne like last year, but the digital version of gamescom 2020 still seems to offer some good gaming times.

Photo: Koelnmesse

Even if the Coronavirus situation is a harsh reminder that normal life isn’t possible anymore, at least the koelnmesse team, together with many developers and publishers, gives people a bit of entertainment back. Unlike the #ddc2020 (devcom digital conference) (see my preview), it won’t take place for two whole weeks, but just from August 27-30, 2020.

Despite not filling the entertainment areas with stations to play (or queues to wait), the list of gamescom 2020 partners who provide the latest news of their games is quite long. The gamescom 2020 program doesn’t reveal what kind of content one can expect, but taking into account how important the esports scene and Twitch have become, it’s only fair to assume that one will only see other people play and present the games. The involvement of Steam has also become a reality, as demos and sales will be part of the digital experience, even if this will only be interesting for PC gamers. In addition to YouTube, the content platform TikTok will also become a gamescom partner.

The shows section still looks like an interesting proposition: gamescom: Daily Show presents highlights of its own formats, but also involves game companies and partners, gamescom: Awesome Indies shows announcements and news about indie titles, gamescom studio has interviews with developers and background information about new announcements, while gamescom: Best of Show summarizes the highlights of gamescom 2020 and presents the gamescom award.

This is quite a lot to take in, and even if I’ll sorely miss talking to developers/publishers in person during press appointments and play games in the public area (still not sure how this will work digitally this year for the press), I still hope that we’ll return to normality (or craziness) as last year on Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, and Day 4.

While this part of the article is usually reserved for giving details about the tickets (or their availability), I’ll keep it short: Anyone who’s bought a ticket before it wasn’t final that gamescom would go digital will keep it for next year (although I’m not so sure the Coronavirus situation will be resolved by then…). Anyone else can simply attend this year’s digital form of gamescom 2020 for free! So head over to the official website when it’s time to celebrate gaming again.

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