Disney’s D23 2024 Expo is virtually ignoring Disney video games

It’s almost that time again! Disney’s D23 Expo is happening in less than a month and it’s a celebration of everything Disney! Theme Parks, Movies, TV shows, and games??? Well at least this upcoming year, not so much it seems…

Disney released their schedule for the D23 Expo happening in early August, and there is one lone panel about videogames, and it’s for just one game, the upcoming Epic Mickey Rebrushed. That’s it. An entire convention all about Disney, and just one panel about one game.

Granted, video games have never been a huge focus of D23, but in recent years they had become more of a presence. You could see updates on a few current games, maybe, see a couple of mobile games and get a look at one or two big releases. Nothing major but it had been growing and seemed like it would be more of a thing at this convention where Disney talks about things that are really important to that company.

So just having one panel about one video game that’s a remaster of a frankly middling at best original certainly seems like a giant step back. It’s not like Disney doesn’t have stuff in the pipeline either. Marvel Rivals is having a closed beta soon and we could certainly use to see more of that before it comes out. When is the next Disney Dreamlight Valley expansion? What about showcasing the new Disney Pixel RPG that was literally announced mere days ago? When are we going to hear more about this partnership/giant investment with Epic Games? Wouldn’t D23 be the perfect event for that?

Even if you don’t focus on the two really big Disney IP video games coming out later this year, Indiana Jones and the Great Circle and Star Wars Outlaws, there is plenty of smaller stuff you could have a panel about. And D23 is a perfect place to talk about smaller remasters and re-releases of older games instead of a bigger video game convention or press event/stream where they’d likely get lost in the shuffle among other games.

I don’t think this means Disney is cutting back on their investment in the videogame space, to the contrary they’ve actually made some staffing moves that imply they are more serious about their games than they have been in quite some time. And yes there are other avenues to showcase them. But D23 is just Disney focusing on Disney and so Disney games would get more of a focus and should be part of this celebration of all things Disney. I really hope this year is a rare exception and that the presence of Disney games at D23 will continue to grow.

That’s it for today, I will most likely have another post up either Sunday or Monday so see ya real soon!