I can't vouch for the PS2 days because my memory isn't that great when it comes to E3s and keeping track of this stuff. But 100% during the PS3 and PS4 era there was ALOT more communication with the gamers. They don't even do Playstation Experience anymore. That was a Shawn Layden thing and they killed it once he was going to leave as CEO of Playstation. They showed TLOU2 for the first time there in 2016. Along with showing games like Uncharted 4 and Bloodborne there. Real gameplay demos too!
They started skipping E3 in 2019 too. I don't think these changes were coincides.
Maybe, but there's a parallel happening which much more simply explains the change: live video showcases.
Nintendo Direct started in 2011; by 2013, the stream was popular enough that they pulled out of doing the annual E3 live reveal+business report showcase. (They still had floor space at E3, but at the time it was shocking to not have a keynote, to the point that reports/comments were that "Nintendo wasn't doing E3".) 2019 was when Sony launched State of Play, but even at E3 2018, Sony was already experimenting with not doing the big showcase sizzle reel, and instead had the intimate 4-game experience of Spidey / Death Stranding / Ghost of Tsushima / TLoU2. In 2019, State of Play took over.
Streams have made both trade shows and in-person announcement blowouts an extravagance that publishers don't need to bother with anymore. Publishers can get as much done with one YT stream as they could an expensive conference hall and stage show with press and attendees. COVID then reconfirmed that the old approach was unnecessary. So now, not only do all the console manufacturers have their own semi-regular Showcase and Spotlight streams, but each publisher now has its own set of announcement event video shows. And E3 is dead.
Sony did have four years of its own exclusive PlayStation Experience fan event (the North American version started in 2014; Europe before and Asia afterwards had their own PS fan events in different capacities, but the PSX we know of in the US was a major international event.) Even by 2017 though, PSX was running short on explosive announcements, and there was no 2018 or 2019 PlayStation Experience, nor was there one to support the launch of PS5 (for some unfortunate reasons, but who knows if they ever planned to bother?)
...I lament the death of PSX events, for sure, and don't know why fan events died off (Microsoft had one for a short while too,) Some companies still do, and events like QuakeCon and BlizzCon are regular moments to put on the calendar. However, these tend to be based around tourneys/merch more than announcements, and announcements at fan events have tapered down given the smaller slate and longer schedules at all publishing houses. They don't have as much to announce anymore (unless they have a GAAS, in which case the announcement is more stuff for the same product,) and the parent companies want to maximize announcement timing on their own business schedule.
Had these current consoles launched under different conditions, i think there might have been some live fan events for that old razzle-dazzle, but even then, look at the games which have come out or been announced in the three years since launch.... what would those megaton reveals have been at PSX 2020? It's 2024, and still not a lot of big bombs have dropped.