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The 12th annual International Mobile Gaming Awards nominees announced

Posted on February 16, 2016 by Fionna Schweit

The 12 annual International Mobile Gaming Awards (IMGA) nominees have been announced. Gamers and nominees’ fans are now invited to vote for their favorite game to determine the People Choice’s Award at www.imgawards.com . Winners will be revealed at the annual IMGA ceremony held in San Francisco on March 15, 2016 at the 111 Minna Gallery. The 12th annual IMGA today has announced 102 nominations, so there is no shortage of choices to vote on.

Daniel Gray, 2016 jury member and Grand Prix Winner (Monument Valley) of the 11th IMGA, commented, “We had everything from arcade-experience games to big titles with very polished design. The breadth of the entire spectrum from front to back was amazing!” This year will also feature a VR category and there are 10 nominees.  According to Maarten Noyons, the IMGA’s founder, “the new category for VR games was a big success. We had a lot more entries than anticipated. The games were built using different devices and controllers and explored different genres such as arcade, shooters and racing games. It illustrated once again the creativity and endless possibilities in mobile gaming”. 

Hit the jump for the full list of nominees.Read More

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2015 Game Awards Draw 2.3 Million Viewers

Posted on December 10, 2015 by Fionna Schweit

Last weeks Game Awards were apparently a great sucess. If you by chance missed the show, and want to know what went down and who did what, take a few minutes to give our breakdown a read. But if like me you watched it live you already know that compared to last year at least it was a MASSIVE sucess. Now Polygon has an interview with show creator, financier, and host Geoff Keighley, where in he says that the show pulled over 2 million viewers and did over 20% better than last year. Additionally the social media game was completly crushed with over a billion (yes thats with a B) Twitter impressions the night of the game awards. That combination of factors esentailly guarantees us another iteration of the game award next year.

Keighley said in an interview with Polygon yesterday “That success, , means that a Game Awards 2016 show is very likely, though it’s too early to say when or where it will be held. With the growth this year and all the sponsor support, I feel pretty confident we will be back next December for The Game Awards 2016,” he said. He went on to say  he was very happy with the format of this year’s show and that he feels it addressed the three big concerns he had coming out of the inaugural show. Personally I agree, and if the production values were just a tiny bit better the show would have been perfect. It seems Geoff is on the same page as me as he went on to say “A tighter production technically, a shorter run time, and more on-stage awards,” Keighley said. “The format feels good, and it’s been nice to see the audience response — two solid years means we’re on the right path.”

The founder and chief presenter did mention at least one this he wanted his show to do better “Next year will be about adding other elements around the show,” Keighley said. “One thing I wanted to do this year was a big eSports tournament the day of the show, but we just didn’t have enough bandwidth to get it done.”

Honestly this really shouldn’t be a suprise, E-sports is a huge draw, and again unsurprising to most people will be the reaffirmation that an awards show about games doesnt need to be on TV, but rather should stream live on the consoles, Twitch, and YouTube. Hopefully next year we get a similar format, as I personally really enjoyed the musical talents of Chvrches and Deadmau5, as well as the moving tribute to Satoru Iwata, and Geoffs call out of Konami for their shit treatment of their golden goose.

overall I loved the show, and really hope that it comes back stronger, better, and faster next year, and it seems like Geoff shares my opinion.

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2nd Annual Game Awards Report

Posted on December 4, 2015 by Fionna Schweit

Last night was the second annual Game Awards, with a full line up of presenters, world game premiers, and musical acts.  Most people probably came for the world premieres, of which there were several.  Included were: Where the Water Tastes Like Wine, Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End, Shaq-Fu: A Legend Reborn, a Telltale Games Batman title, Far Cry Primal, Psychonauts 2, Quantum Break, Rock Band VR, Shadow Complex Remastered, Rocket League‘s Xbox One release, Star Citizen, and The Walking Dead: Michonne.

This is of course also an awards show so here is a list of winners and some of my reactions from the event:

GAME OF THE YEAR: The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt (CD Projekt Red/Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment) – The polish studio behind The Witcher 3 really cleaned up this year, taking home several big awards. I guess I need to play it, since it was really off my radar since it’s a seriously large game that takes so much investment. Im not surprised this happened with the scale and scope, but it did have to beat out Fallout 4 and MGS:V

DEVELOPER OF THE YEAR: CD Projekt Red – Ok I was surprised at this, I haven’t had a chance to play The Witcher 3 yet, but I know it’s a huge beautiful game, but I thought with two huge games this year Nintendo was a for sure this one.

BEST INDEPENDENT GAME: Rocket League (Psyonix) – This one actually kind of disappointed me, the other choices were Axion Verge, Her Story, Ori and the Blind forest and Undertale. All of which I think have better story since well Rocket League doesn’t have a story. There are way too many indie games for this award to work, like did anyone consider Besiege, or Honey pop  (ok that’s a joke). The guys at Psyonix deserve this for sure but I think its hard to nail this category since it just has so many things.

BEST MOBILE/HANDHELD GAME: Lara Croft Go (Square Enix Montreal/Square Enix) – Ok this one was hands down going to Laura Croft go, no questions. If you haven’t checked it out do so. The only real competitor here was maybe the Vault game from Bethesda but the two are super different.

BEST NARRATIVE: Her Story (Sam Barlow) – Her story is not a game that I played, or even heard about at all before this awards show, I honestly disagree with this one it should have been Life is Strange, which I adored.

BEST ART DIRECTION: Ori and the Blind Forest (Moon Studios/Microsoft Studios) – Not surprised here, the bright color pallet and whimsical imagery win this one over the darker tones of most modern AAA games.

BEST SCORE/SOUNDTRACK: Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain (Ludvig Forssell, Justin Burnett, Daniel James/Kojima Productions) – Get what you pay for here, MGS:V was a great game, with amazing visuals, great sound, and a story that mostly did a good job, a well-deserved win here.

BEST PERFORMANCE: Viva Seifert (Her Story) – Other than the presenter confusing the game that won this award, I found myself again surprised that a game that was so under the radar cleaned up so well. I’m sure Viva’s performance was brilliant and this win means I need to check out Her Story for sure.

GAMES FOR CHANGE: Life is Strange (Dontnod Entertainment/Square Enix) – At least Life is Strange gets the nod here, I can’t help but think this is mostly because the main protagonist is a member of the LGBT community and thus the game focuses on some of those issues, but it’s nice to see the shout out.

BEST SHOOTER: Splatoon (Nintendo EAD Group No. 2/Nintendo) – I am so glad this won. Splatoon is one of the best games of this year, and I am really glad to see it receive recognition for what it is an amazing multiplayer shooter.

BEST ACTION/ADVENTURE GAME: Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain (Kojima Productions/Konami) – Glad to see that Metal Gears Open world playground gets this award. The game is amazing, and if you haven’t played it go do it, that’s all I can say.

BEST ROLE-PLAYING GAME: The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt (CD Projekt Red/Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment) – Another win for the polish CD Projekt Red, since this was one of the only major RPGs to come out this year I wasn’t super surprised.

BEST FIGHTING GAME: Mortal Kombat X (NetherRealm Studios/Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment) *Disclaimer I know nothing about fighting games* Iv played this game at the arcade, and it’s a pretty game, but its also the only AAA fighter released this year, so the win is a gimme.

BEST FAMILY GAME: Super Mario Maker (Nintendo EAD Group No. 4/Nintendo) – Seeing Nintendo getting the shout outs at a major game awards show still feels really odd to me, but this has been an amazing year for Nintendo,

BEST SPORTS/RACING GAME: Rocket League (Psyonix) – there are other sports racing games?

BEST MULTIPLAYER: Splatoon (Nintendo EAD Group No. 2/Nintendo) – This one I kinda disagree with, there were other great multiplayer games this year, and while Splatoon was the most original I don’t think it was the best and most polished. I really liked the idea of MGS:V winning this for Metal Gear online, but it didn’t happen.

MOST ANTICIPATED GAME: No Man’s Sky (Hello Games) – Can we stop giving the award to this game please? I get it ok, people want No Man’s sky, and have since they announced it like 4 years ago.

ESPORTS PLAYER OF THE YEAR: Kenny “KennyS” Schrub (Counter-Strike: Global Offensive/Team EnVyUs) – This was a surprise to me, and it was less surprising than the next win.
ESPORTS TEAM OF THE YEAR: Optic Gaming – woah, surprised here, expected this to be a League Team or at least DOTA2.
ESPORTS GAME OF THE YEAR: Counter-Strike: Global Offensive (Valve) – this is a given since its getting its own League on cable TV. With the annoucment that we will be getting a show on TBS on Friday nights and with over a million dollars up for grabs, CS:GO is going to win this no problem.

TRENDING GAMER:  Greg Miller – who? Sorry but I have no idea who that is, honestly and I watch a lot of YouTube.  Props to greg for the win, guess I know who he is now.

BEST FAN CREATION: Portal Stories: Mel (Prism Studios) – this flew under the radar, but it was really an amazing fan creation, playing portal again really made me happy and honestly made me wish for another portal game.

And that’s about that. The awards are still run by Geoff Keighkey and this year the aestitic shifted from spikes MAN MAN MAN style of last year, over to a cyber-styling that I really enjoyed. Also of note was Hideo Kojimas absence, apparently due to a legal issue with his (fromer?) employer Konami. Geoff called out Konami on how they were treating their golden goose. This was graet to hear. There was also a major tribute (like 15 minutes) to Satoru Iwata who’s genius is one of the major reasons Nintendo exits as a game company today.

There was also a huge packed line up of game trailers, premiers and additional information about already out games, take a look at all the video content below the drop

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