Amin Abbas
DUBAI: Games & Media Entertainment Expo (GX 2024), the ultimate gaming expo in the Middle East was held from Nov. 7-9 at the Kuwait International Fair.
Organized by Fikra, the three days gaming event hosted multiple veteran Japanese video games artists, composers, producers and directors such as: Takashi Tokita (Live A Live, Parasite Eve and Chrono Trigger), Yoko Shimomura (Kingdom Hearts), Yuzo Koshiro (The Revenge of Shinobi, Streets of Rage and Ys), Hitoshi Ariga (Mega Man and Pokémon), Junji Seki (Twinkle Star Sprites and OMEGA 6), Takaya Imamura (Star Fox, F-ZERO and OMEGA 6), Kazuko Shibuya (Final Fantasy), Yasumi Matsuno (Final Fantasy Tactics, Final Fantasy XII and Tactics Ogre), Mitsuhiro Arita (Pokémon, Shin Megami Tensei and Monster Hunter).
Western video games veterans also attended such as: David Wise (Donkey Kong Country) , Grant Kirkhope (GoldenEye 007, Banjo-Kazooie, Donkey Kong 64, and Perfect Dark), Nicolas Roye (Final Fantasy XV, Shenmue III and NieR: Automata), Caitlin Glass (Street Fighter), Andreas Escher (Katakis, Turrican II: The Final Fight and X-Out) to meet up with the fans at the event.
Yousef Abdulaziz Al Roumi, Founder and Managing Director of Fikra told Arab News Japan that this year marks the 10th anniversary of GX since it was launched in 2014.
“No other event in the Middle East has been able to gather this many gaming icons in one place before,” he said.
“The biggest challenge for this year’s edition of GX was making sure we don’t crumble under the weight of this legendary event. That’s why we were packing our schedule with everything our fans love about gaming: personalized meet and greets with gaming’s stars; epic tournaments where players put their skills to the test; and a massive array of creators sharing their vision of what gaming means to them,” he explained.
Regarding the response and feedback from the attendees of the event, Al Roumi said: “The response was fantastic and it was the best feedback we ever had in our history. Everyone came out of the event super happy and we achieved our mission of delivering the ultimate gaming event in the Middle East.”
“The goal was always to make Kuwait a driving force in gaming in the Middle East. As GX grew in reputation and size, we were able to achieve many of our goals, which you can see this year especially with the number of legends participating,” he added.