I watched a livestream of a toy all day because that’s E3 now

I spent today watching Bethesda broadcast a static shot of the Pip-Boy mascot from the Fallout franchise standing in front of a TV that says “please stand by.” I’m not alone. Tens of thousands of other fans of Bethesda’s games did as well — at this moment, more than 100,000 are still watching the livestream on Twitch. And we’re doing this to ourselves because this is what E3 is now.

The Electronic Entertainment Expo trade show doesn’t kick off in the Los Angeles Convention Center until June 12, but the event began in spirit a couple of weeks ago. Since Walmart Canada leaked unannounced games on its store page on May 11, we’ve had nonstop news ever since. E3 judge’s week happened, Activision had an event for its Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 reveal, EA did one for Battlefield V, and Bethesda confirmed Rage 2 with a gameplay trailer. Many of these events followed days or weeks of teasing from the publishers, and that has taught us to expect big things when publishers start getting cute on social media and Twitch.