Can an event as big as Gamescom truly be climate-friendly?
James Batchelor
Editor-in-Chief
Monday 28th March 2022
Koelnmesse GmbH - gamescom
Gamescom 2022 was announced earlier this month, and much of the news is as you would expect. The show will return to Cologne's Koelnmesse venue this August, but it will also be a hybrid event with online elements, and the organisers are hoping to attract companies and consumers from all over the world.
However, the additional news this year is that Gamescom is also aiming to reduce and offset the impact it has on the environment.
Games conventions and trade shows are energy-intensive affairs; thousands of demo stations run almost all day long for a full week, hundreds of thousands of people travel around Cologne to get to and from the venue, and the international attendance means people are flying into Germany from all corners of the globe. With such a set-up, can an event like Gamescom truly be "climate friendly," as the organisers claim?
"Almost everything everyone does can be more climate-friendly, and needs to be more climate-friendly soon," Felix Falk, co-organiser and managing director of German trade body Game, tells GamesIndustry.biz. "Everything you can do with an event like Gamescom is not 100% but you have to make a start.
Felix Falk, Gamescom
"We need to start in the different fields of everyone who's part of it: us, visitors, exhibitors and partners. That's why we created this overall concept, to make everyone part of the question, 'How can I contribute to a more climate-friendly event?' That's a question everyone should have in mind... and this is a question for the years to come, so we hope to get better and better."
Gamescom's answer, at least in 2022, is further promotion of the free tickets for public transport it offers for
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