This piece of news might signal troubled times for long-running video game conference, E3: Activision has announced that it will not be attending this year's event.

Though it's still early to say as to how this will affect the event, it's certainly not good news for E3 as Activision's presence will certainly be missed.

Activision is the company behind ginormous game franchises such as Call of Duty, Guitar Hero, and Tony Hawk. Its absence shouldn't be taken lightly as it's one of the oldest and biggest studios around, and is behind major games across all platforms, including the PC.

Here's just a small sampling of how big they are: Guitar Hero 3: Legends of Rock alone was one of the biggest games last year; Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, another giant success from late last year, is still on top of Xbox Live Activity.

Activision didn't state why it was bowing out of the event, but they did give the following statement: "After careful consideration, for business reasons Activision has decided not to participate in any official E3 activities. We wish the ESA best of luck with the show."