Qualla: Gamescom

Gamescom: Introduction

Sat, 16 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Tim Bartel, CC BY-SA 2.0. There is a building beside the Rhine in Cologne called the Koelnmesse, and for one week every August it is the loudest place in the global video game industry. Gamescom 2025 drew 357,000 visitors and 1,500 exhibitors. It is the largest gaming event in the world - bigger than Tokyo Game Show, bigger than anything in the Americas after the death of E3, bigger than the Leipzig event it was created to replace. Geoff Keighley hosts the Opening Night Live show the evening before the gates open to the public, and millions of people watch trailer drops and surprise announcements stream out of a stage in Cologne. The story of how this happened is, at its heart, a turf war that the upstart won.

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Image: Tim Bartel | CC BY-SA 2.0

Gamescom: The Leipzig Walkout

Sat, 16 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Sergey Galyonkin from Raleigh, USA, CC BY-SA 2.0. From 2002 to 2008 the biggest German games event was Games Convention, hosted by the Leipzig Trade Fair in the eastern German city that had been a centre of book publishing for centuries. For a brief period it was the largest games trade show in the world. But Leipzig was outgrow...

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Image: Sergey Galyonkin from Raleigh, USA | CC BY-SA 2.0

Gamescom: The Knockout

Sat, 16 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit CHR!S, CC BY-SA 3.0. The two events were scheduled for the same weekend in August 2009. Two German cities. One industry. Game developers, publishers, and journalists had to choose. They chose Cologne. After a deal between Gamescom organisers and the Game Developers Conference, Leipzig folded - Games ...

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Image: CHR!S | CC BY-SA 3.0

Gamescom: Opening Night Live

Sat, 16 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit dronepicr, CC BY 2.0. In 2019 Geoff Keighley - the Canadian games journalist who created The Game Awards - launched Opening Night Live, a streamed showcase the evening before the convention floor opens. Trailers premiere. Release dates leak. Studios time their biggest announcements to land on the ONL ...

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Image: dronepicr | CC BY 2.0

Gamescom: Last Show Standing

Sat, 16 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Sergey Galyonkin from Raleigh, USA, CC BY-SA 2.0. When E3 - the Electronic Entertainment Expo, the legendary Los Angeles show that defined the games industry from 1995 to 2019 - was discontinued during the COVID-19 pandemic and never recovered, Gamescom became the largest event of its kind on Earth by default. It already was the...

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Image: Sergey Galyonkin from Raleigh, USA | CC BY-SA 2.0