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The Week Ending February 8, 2000

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GamesCon No More
A week ago it seemed the stage was set for 20,000 gamers to convene in San Francisco for the GAMESCON multiplayer game event on February 19-20, but late last week work came down that the event was unceremoniously cancelled because of sponsorship pullout. Long-time readers of this column may remember I was initially doubtful of the event's mandate to have game developers premiere early versions of their games at the show, but it appeared the San Francisco show had already lined up the exclusive first look at Shiny Entertainment's Sacrifice.
So, what went wrong? The simple fact of the matter is that these huge multiplayer gaming festivals require incredible financial as well as technological resources – It's not easy to link up hundreds of gamers on high-end computer rigs. Still, I have to give credit to Mark Chandler, the man behind GamesCon, who tirelessly worked behind the scenes to bring his idea of a "game show for gamers" to fruition. I have no doubt that the GamesCon concept will be back in one form or another in the near future, but it's unfortunate that such a major festival to celebrate multiplayer gaming had to be cancelled in the mean time.

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Geoff Keighley
Editor-in-Chief
GameSlice