Game Awards 2021: All Video Game Oscar Winners & Major Announcements

Event news Game Awards 2021: All Video Game Oscar Winners & Major Announcements

The pre-show

Before launching hostilities for good, host Sydnee Goodman occupied the audience gathered for the occasion during the pre-show with the first awards ceremony as well as several announcements, some of which were unexpected. Between the teaser of Chainsaw Massacre, the opening of pre-orders of Babylon’s Fall (March 3, 2022), Sunbreak DLC (Summer 2022) for Monster hunter rise without forgetting the fighting game Persona 4 Arena Ultimax scheduled for release on March 17, 2022, there was something for everyone even before the ceremony began in earnest.

The 2021 winners

The 2021 Game Awards kick off in earnest with a musical and orchestral performance by Sting who performs the song What Could Have Been from the soundtrack of the animated series Arcane. Now it’s time for Geoff Keighley and the awards that are the reason for the ceremony organized at the Microsoft Center located in Los Angeles.

Josef Fares and Hazelight Studios (A Way Out) appear as the big winners of the Game Awards 2021. It Takes Two leaves with 3 awards including Best Multiplayer Game, Best Family Game and especially Game of the Year (or GOTY). We then find a tie on the podium Forza Horizon 5 (Best Audio Design, Innovation and Accessibility) and Deathloop (Best Artistic Direction, Best Direction) with 2 prizes.

The big revelations

The Game Awards are synonymous with World premiere avalanche, and the 2021 edition has kept all its promises on this point. The never-before-seen trailers chained for more than 3 hours, and some of them marked the spirits more than others.

The first trailer to have the effect of a bomb was without hesitation the one formalizing the Star Wars project developed by Quantic Dream. The Parisian studio behind Beyond Two Souls and Detroit Become Human is now collaborating with LucasFilm Games on the development of an action-adventure game based on the universe imagined by George Lucas. Star Wars Eclipse of its official name takes place on the Outer Rim in an unexplored region in the Age of the High Republic, a period known as the Golden Age of the Jedi. The game aims to be faithful to the original material while developing new stories impacted by the choices of the players throughout the adventure.

Alan Wake fans have been eagerly awaiting the announcement of a sequel for over 10 years, beyond the American Nightmare DLC and the recent remake. The wait was long, but the patience of the fans is finally rewarded. Remedy Entertainment in the person of Sam Lake has unveiled a first teaser ofAlan wake ii whose release is scheduled for 2023. Total change of register with the following game. Warner Bros. continues to tap into the DC universe to enrich its catalog. After Batman, the Justice League and the Suicide Squad, it’s now the turn of Wonder woman to shine during a solo run developed by Monolith productions (Middle Earth: The shadow of Mordor and The shadow of the War).

The other announcements

Difficult to make a choice when faced with such an eclectic bed of announcements. However, after careful consideration, some titles by their concept, their creative team, their main character or their license, do well. The major science fiction series were particularly in the spotlight. Between the adventure game The Expanse: A Telltale Series, the 4X Dune: Spice Wars (early access in 2022) and finally Star Trek: Resurgence (spring 2022), fans of an epic on the edge of space should be delighted.

Rumors suggested the development of a new Sonic game on the model of a legend of the adventure game … the aptly named The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. The Game Awards 2021 were the occasion for the publisher Sega to confirm the existence of an open world project in the universe of the supersonic blue hedgehog. Sonic frontiers developed without much surprise by the Sonic Team will be released in 2022 on PC as well as on old and new generation consoles.

The next game from the creator of Silent Hill – Keiichiro Toyama – must have caught our eye. Slitterhead is a horror action game developed by Bokeh Game Studio with Akira Yamaoka, with musical compositions. There is no doubt that the presence of these two Japanese artists behind the success of the Silent Hill saga risks arousing the curiosity of fans. Finally, among the intriguing announcements is Nightingale, a game imagined by former BioWare executives (Dragon Age, Mass Effect) mixing survival and crafting in a fantastic Victorian universe.

Confirmations

Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice had branded the minds of many players in August 2017. The start of a sequel and its formalization two years ago almost to the day had delighted fans. Unfortunately, Ninja Theory is very discreet, and communicates very little. Nevertheless, after several months of waiting, Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II finally unveiled gameplay, and the slap lived up to expectations during a dark and highly cinematic sequence, punctuated by a tribal soundtrack and the multiple voices of the heroine.

The Game Awards show how busy the 2022 release schedule is already. Between Horizon Forbidden West, A Plague Tale: Requiem, Dying Light 2: Stay Human, Elden ring, The Lord of the Rings: Gollum and Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League, the coming year promises to be rich in video game experiences as varied as they are enticing.

Beyond video games

The border is, as Keanu Reeves pointed out, increasingly sharp between cinema and video games. Adaptations as well as cross-media projects have multiplied for several years, and the Game Awards 2021 could not escape the phenomenon. Beyond a trailer for Guillermo del Toro’s next film, namely Nightmare alley starring Willem Dafoe, Bradley Cooper and Ron Perlman, it was respectively two films and a Live Action series that caught our attention.

The actor who lends his voice to the mascot of Sega gave viewers the first official trailer for Sonic 2 with Jim Carrey (Dr. Robotnik) as well as the characters of Tails and Knuckles. In a completely different register stood the film Matrix Resurrections of which a short clip was broadcast, but above all The Matrix Awakens, a video game experience developed under Unreal Engine 5 and already available on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X / S. To conclude in style, it’s hard to miss the first teaser of the series in live shots. Halo, produced by Paramount + and scheduled for 2022, which by its visuals has been able to seduce fans of the saga initiated by Bungie and Microsoft two decades ago.

The list of awards

Here is the list of prizes awarded during the Game Awards 2021 ceremony:

• Games for Impact: Life is Strange True Colors
• Best Esports Athlete: Singles
• Best Esports Team: Natus Vincere
• Best Esports Coach: Kkoma
• Best Esports Event: 2021 League of Legends World Championship
• Best Audio Design: Forza Horizon 5
• Best Independent Game: Kena: Bridge of Spirits
• Best Performance: Maggie Robbertson (Resident Evil Village – Lady Dimitrescu)
• Best Action Game: Returnal
• Best Art Direction: Deathloop
• Player’s Voice: Halo Infinite
• Best RPG: Tales of Arise
• Best Score & Music: NieR Replicant ver.1.22474487139 …
• Content Creator of the Year: Dream
• Best Multiplayer Game: It Takes Two
• Best Mobile Game: Genshin Impact
• Best Narrative: Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy
• Best Action Adventure Game: Metroid Dread
• Best Ongoing Game: Final Fantasy XIV Online
• Innovation in Accessibility: Forza Horizon 5
• Best Game Direction: Deathloop
• Best Esports Game: League of Legends
• Best Family Game: It Takes Two
• Best Fighting Game: Guilty Gear -Strive-
• Best Strategy Game: Age of Empires IV
• Best VR & AR Game: Resident Evil 4 VR
• Most Anticipated Game: Elden Ring
• Game of the Year: It Takes Two