Hasbro’s First Ever PulseCon Has Been Announced
By George Robbins
Now that there is currently a pandemic gripping the world and making things difficult, there are many things that must be done differently. Many events which were supposed to be held this year have essentially been cancelled and moved to either next year or the year after. On the other hand, events that don’t want to have to wait that long have been doing their best to make alternative arrangements. These arrangements mostly involve making things available online and this is how conventions have been doing all of their business as of late. The most recent example of a success convention that was held entirely online was the recent DC FanDome convention.
Unlike the other conventions that were supposed to be held this year, DC FanDome was designed from the beginning as being an entirely online convention. Other conventions that have been held thus far have been adapted to be able to go up online, but they were not really prepared for it and it changed everything. Not everything worked out the way that people wanted and a lot of panels for those conventions ended up dropping out and did not take any part in what was happening. Where DC FanDome differed is that it was an event run by DC which gave us insight into all of their future projects and it did exactly what it set out to do. It made DC fans excited about the upcoming projects they are working on.
So if things worked out for DC with DC FanDome, then isn’t it likely that things could work out with other companies holding conventions as well. This might just end up becoming the new thing where instead of having conventions that combine just about everything into one convention, there will be individual conventions. It makes it easier for companies just to hold a shorter convention showing off their products and upcoming projects than to be a part of a larger convention for almost a week. This puts a spotlight on their projects and makes it much more possible to get the information out there that they want in the public eye. This is why companies like Hasbro are starting to come up with conventions of their own.
The Hasbro conglomerate is a company that mostly specializes in things like toys, board games, and other media assets. These media assets are created based upon the toy lines and board games that the company produces and often times they are panned by critics. The thing is though, that they still make a lot of money off of those assets and so they continue to make them. Now that it is clear that conventions can have a successful online presence, Hasbro is trying to get involved in that market. They have just announced their own convention, PulseCon, which will be taking place on September 25-26, 2020. It will be an event where they simply show off all of their upcoming toys and content. If successful, this might be a new era for conventions as many other companies will probably start following suit.