The Game Awards 2024: Astro Bot wins Game of the Year

Astro Bot has received the highest prize on the videogame business’s greatest awards ceremony.

The lovable and vibrant PlayStation platformer beat Closing Fantasy 7 Rebirth, Black Fable: Wukong, Metaphor: Refantazio Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree and Balatro to be named Sport of the 12 months at The Sport Awards .

Accepting the trophy, Nicolas Doucet, studio head of developer Staff Asobi, appeared to pay tribute to rival Nintendo.

Astro Bot additionally picked up three different awards – Finest Household Sport, Finest Motion/Journey and Finest Sport Route.

It was additionally a great evening for the poker-themed indie hit Balatro, which received three awards together with Finest Cell Sport.

Position-playing sport Metaphor: ReFantazio additionally received three awards, in what was a powerful evening for Japanese sport builders.

Black Fable: Wukong, based mostly on Chinese language legends, proved as soon as once more to be vastly well-liked with followers, profitable the publicly voted Participant’s Voice Award.

It was a disappointing evening for Closing Fantasy VII: Rebirth, which had been nominated in seven classes however solely took residence the perfect music trophy.

Melina Juergens, from Cambridge, UK-based studio Ninja Concept, received the perfect perfomance prize for enjoying the title position in Hellblade 2: Senua’s Saga.

There aren’t many occasions the place you may get performances from a full orchestra and Snoop Dogg.

The rapper dropped by to current the Finest Ongoing Sport Award to Helldivers 2, and carry out a brand new track.

And it would not be gaming’s greatest evening with out some shock superstar appearances.

Harrison Ford took to the stage alongside Troy Baker, the man who plays Indiana Jones within the latest sport based mostly on the movie collection.

The Sport Awards – typically known as “the Oscars of gaming” – is commonly criticised for spending extra time displaying commercials and trailers for brand new video games than it does on handing out awards.

Nevertheless, final 12 months organisers claimed the occasion attracted 118 million livestream viewers, and people previews are one of many greatest attracts for gaming followers.

In newer years, larger publishers have tended to save lots of their greatest bulletins for their very own separate reside occasions.

As anticipated, there was no new data on Grand Theft Auto 6 or Nintendo’s subsequent console – two of essentially the most anticipated upcoming releases.

However that did go away room for a model new sport from Naughty Canine, the PlayStation studio recognized for hits together with The Final of Us, Uncharted and Crash Bandicoot.

Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet, launched with a shiny trailer blended to It is a Sin by the Pet Store Boys.

A sequel to Capcom’s Okami was additionally revealed, and Polish developer CD Projekt Pink confirmed The Witcher 4 was in improvement.

A standard criticism about The Sport Awards is that it usually fails to acknowledge wider points within the business.

Towards a backdrop of widespread layoffs worldwide – a development that has continued this 12 months – critics of the 2023 present known as for winners to be given extra time on-stage to talk out.

This 12 months’s the occasion launched the Sport Changers Award.

The winner, Amir Satvat, a director at Tencent Video games within the US, arrange a private mission to assist just lately laid-off sport builders discover new work.

In an emotional acceptance speech, he stated “rising up, all I ever needed was to be part of the online game business”.

He additionally thanked his mother and father, who he stated “taught me that my worth lies in how I deal with different individuals”.

Larian Studios boss Swen Vincke, who introduced the Sport of the 12 months award after his crew’s Baldur’s Gate 3 received the title final 12 months, was additionally praised for his remarks.

He took goal at chasing market share and “arbitrary gross sales targets” and mourned the “misplaced artwork” of studios making “a sport they need to play themselves”.

This 12 months’s ceremony came about as a strike by online game actors over AI protections and dealing circumstances rumbled on.

Appearing union SAG-Aftra and Sport Staff of Southern California introduced plans to distribute leaflets outdoors the Peacock Theatre venue, the place the ceremony is held, this 12 months.

Different controversies this 12 months have included the nomination of Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree within the Sport of the 12 months class.

Some followers argued the growth pack – an add-on for 2022 Sport of the 12 months Elden Ring – should not have been eligible.

And others have been upset when three of 5 nominations for the Participant’s Selection prize – the one award solely voted for by followers – went to free-to-play cell video games together with Genshin Affect.

The remainder of the winners are determined by a panel of business specialists and a fan vote which counts for 10% of the ultimate rating.

There are 30 awards in whole throughout a variety of classes together with audio design, finest unbiased sport and accessibility and innovation.

The total record of winners is on the Game Awards website.

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