A French site called GameCube-FR has received word that Paris will be the home of a brand new gaming expo called the World Game Show, or WGS. It's being touted as the European equivalent of E3 or the Tokyo Game Show. Here's the announcement, as translated by GameCube-FR. (Hit the link above to see the original version in French; we are not responsible for translation errors!)

Paris Expo 11th, 12th, 13th and 14th April 2002 from 9 AM to 9 PM, nocturnal 12th and 13th til midnight.

- Thursday : professional meeting evening from 8 to 10 PM.

- Admittance : 50 Frf

- 4-day price : 180 Frf

- Pré-vente : 40 Frf

- Forfait pré-vente 4 jours : 140 Frf

This first edition will count about 250 exhibitors regrouping essential actors of videogame industry :

- Big constructors.

- Big developpers, editors and game releasers.

- Developpement studios and specializes structures.

- PC and most famous consoles contests.

- A Jap’Animation area.

Besides, in accordance with the evolution of the videogame industry, and jobs that are generated, a new edition of the Game Job exposition (recruitment in videogame jobs) will stand all over the duration of the W.G.S in a open-access area.

Visitors:

More than 70000 people are waited for the W.G.S from France and all over Europe.

Le World Game Show and Paris

Since the 90s; the success of the video games is exploding and this indutry is keeping growing up:

- 7 millions of french gamers in2001.

- An industry which is more important than the movie industry.

However, the expositions accepted to this sector are still a few numeral, and they generally stand in the US or Japan. In Europe, they are reserved for profesionnals.

Our will is to create the first big exposition dedicated to general public.

Men and jobs chose Paris to stand an international-vocation and public exposition.

Paris Expo is one of the most famous places for big expositions and the only one french place to respond to the demands of such an exposition.

World Game Show Concept :

The biggest part of the expo will be reserved to stands which will come to present, sell or simply communicate on their coming products:

- The next generation consoles which will be released in Spring 2002 in Europe.

- The most waited games of 2002, on every support.

- New periphericals for PC and Mac.

The W.G.S is an expo conceived for its visitors, passionated or just novices. Our objective is to create an amusement park of videogames, which will just be beyond the simple exposition.

- A more than 3000m² animation area will be reserved to the consoles and PC contests, with presencze of the best japanese and US gamers.

- A scene and a television platform will welcome invited japanese people, and the cosplay too (see Jap'Animation Village), concerts, and cartoons projections.

- Expositions, conférences and a dedication stand will be organised with the coming of well-known japanese directors and designers.

After the public closing of the expo, two noctural days will be organized friday 12th and saturday 13th. The first will be dedicated to Jap'Anmation and the second to videogames.

Villages

In addition to the traditionnal areas, the expo is divided in seven villages:En plus des espaces traditionnels, le salon est divisé en sept villages à thèmes :

- Professionnal Village « Business To Business » : In addition to the VIP exhibitors, the World Game Show dedicate an area to the profesionnals and journalists of videgame industry in order to favour their meeting to each other: equiped-rooms are available for meetings, negociations or private conferences.

Jap’Animation Village: Japanese Animation and videogames share a common history where numerals talents illustrated themselves. The W.G.S is there to renovelate this union trough an area and activities dedicated to a media having transcended the barriers of traditionnal animation.

This village will organize: a quizz on common universe of jap'animation and video games, a cosplay where costumed visitors will parade, a 20 to 30 minutes parody, a concert with songs of our childhood cartoons, and an animation night where visitors will be able to watch videos on the best of animation in videogames, and also an exclusive movie.

The contest village : Conviviality in competition represent the pure essence in a meeting between players. It's based on this principle that the W.G.S suggest to its visitors the biggest contest ever organised in Europe in order to welcome players from all horizons.

Therefore, in addition to the numeral contests organised all over the expo, french players will be able to play against US and japanese champions, test their knonledge with a quizz on videogames world et participate to a huge noctural contest.

Import Village: An area reserved to the latest japanese and US new games, for the most pleasure of the hardcore gamers.

RPG Village: For the first time, an area dedicated to the RPGs (Role Playing Game) which are the biggest sell and the most popular in the gaming community.

Computer science Village : An area dedicated to the latest technological progresses in components, periphericals (graphics...), and design for Mac and PC.

Youth Village : An area for the youngest people showing the latest games.

Game Job Area

The first recruitment exposition in the videogames jobs.

Great short-range perspectives...

The exponential development of online gaming sites is promising: the market is estimated to 82.000.000$ in 1999 and should reach 5.000.000.000$ in 2004 (source:DATAMONITOR). New technologies to Internet access should bring more gamers to the online gaming.

New tendances…

Due to the perspectives offered by WAP, UMTS and GPRS technologies for mobile-phone games, about 1.000.000.000 of mobile-phones will be in circulation in 2002, and they are potentially gaming consoles.

An emerging industrial pole: 30 % of recruitment on 2 years

There are a thousand jobs in France in videogame industry, but with the explosion of the market, a growth of the manpower is predictable, 30% on 2 years.

Therefore, this market don't dispose of specialized schools in videogame jobs (game designer, mapper 3D… ) nor recruitments offices.

30 societies will be here and 5000 visitors will be particularly waited in this area, and lots of candidates specialists in videogames jobs.