The indie/pseudo-indie space still has a lot of great games. And the reception to those are vital for convincing the few remaining funding sources to “take a risk” on their next game.

But that is also not what the keighleys are. They are basically E3 in that it is about the big publishers and platform owners doing big announcements and a select few smaller studios being allowed to pad things out and get cut if Kojima decides he wants another jerk off session.

But I assume there will be a Steam demo event of some form during this (it feels like we have one of those every week now). There are also actual indie groups that do showcases around the same time. And THOSE are a spectacular time where it is clear people love the games they are working on. Also it is usually a great contrast to “all dudes, all the time” on the keighleys and actually having developers on the indie showcases.