COVID-19 continues to halt industry events
It was inevitable, but now it’s official. Organizers Reedpop and Penny Arcade have regrettably announced the cancellation of PAX East, which had been scheduled to take place at the Boston Convention Center the weekend of June 3, 2021.
The announcement was made via a statement on the official PAX East website.
“In light of ongoing public health concerns, ReedPop and Penny Arcade will not hold PAX East this year,” said event director Kyle Marsden-Kish. “While we hoped PAX East could safely take place, we remained realistic and did not sell any tickets or space to exhibitors to avoid significantly inconveniencing our friends and partners. As we have shown via our actions throughout the pandemic, our utmost concern is the safety of the PAX family – from attendees, exhibitors, and show staff to media and content creators – as well as the local communities that host our celebrations of all things gaming.”
ReedPop/PennyArcade announced that, much like last year, an extended streaming event would be held in PAX East’s stead. PAX Online will take place between July 15-18, and is expected to offer up news, reveals, and interviews pertaining to a wide variety of major and minor video game releases. The statement closes with optimism that 2021’s remaining PAX events – PAX West and PAX Unplugged – might still go ahead as planned.
“Given the United States’ progress towards addressing COVID-19 in recent months, we are cautiously optimistic PAX West and PAX Unplugged will proceed as planned with in-person festivities September 3 to 6 and December 10 to 12, respectively […] ReedPop and Penny Arcade will continue to monitor the situation surrounding COVID-19, observe government guidelines and local laws, and defer to health officials and experts on what is deemed safe. We are grateful for the efforts everyone made to make PAX East happen in 2021, and we look forward to returning to Boston in 2022.”
