Who are the Top Winners at The Game Awards 2017?
The Game Awards this year is being positioned as the industry's version of the Oscars, and the ceremony delivered in every sense of the word. There's the lavish production, a great set of titles competing this year, a host of Hollywood celebrities and the token onstage rant.
The biggest winner of the night was "The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild," Nintendo's opener for their new Nintendo Switch. The game bagged 2017's "Game of the Year," as well as "Best Game Direction," and "Best Action/Adventure Game."
The side-scrolling game "Cuphead" took home its haul for the night, too, getting "Best Art Direction," "Best Independent Game," "and "Best Debut Indie Game."
"Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice" also won its share, being awarded "Best Audio Design," "Games for Impact," and a "Best Performance" for Melina Juergen's role for the game.
"Overwatch" took a couple of awards too, winning "Best eSports Game" and "Best Ongoing Game," as the PC Gamer lays out the winners in their full list.
The night would have been perfect, too, if the organizers remembered to also announce the award for "Best Multiplayer." It was only the next day, Friday, Dec. 8, that awards host and organizer Geoff Keighley would confirm that "PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds" won the awards to Polygon.
It's the game reveals that carried a huge part of the show, as a large segment of the 8.6 million viewers tuned in expecting to see breaking news on some of the biggest titles. The sheer quality of the games on display, though, helped establish the show's legitimacy, as The LA Times points out.
"Let's treat it with a more little more gravitas," Geoff Keighley, an organizer for The Game Awards, referred to games in general.
"It's important, especially with entertainment that is still coming of age, for the fans and creators to say to everyone, 'Here's our best. Look what games can be,'" Bethesda Softworks' Todd Howard agreed with him.