Astro Bot — a family-friendly sci-fi adventure video game — on Thursday was named Game of the Year at the Game Awards in Los Angeles.
The platform game featuring the adventures of a small space robot was also awarded Best Family Game, Best Game Direction and Best Action/Adventure Game.
It has sold more than 1.5 million copies according to Sony, which owns the 65-person Japanese studio Team Asobi responsible for the mega-hit.
Photo: EPA-EFE
Onstage at the Peacock Theater, Team Asobi studio director Nicolas Doucet praised the studio for designing a game that “put the user first.”
“It was just about the kids,” Doucet said. “Especially because we had this huge, huge privilege to be potentially the first game to be in the hands of children.”
As video games have exploded into the mainstream, The Game Awards have emerged as the industry’s most prestigious prize for developers.
Last year’s ceremony garnered 118 million global livestreams, organizers said.
By comparison the movie industry’s Academy Awards last year pulled in fewer than 19 million viewers, US media reported.
Medieval fantasy saga Metaphor: ReFantazio was another major winner on Thursday, taking the titles of Best Role-playing Game and Best Narrative.
The game was also produced by a Japanese studio — Atlus — and published by gaming giant Sega.
Poker game Balatro won Best Mobile Game and Best Independent Game.
For their 11th edition, the Game Awards invited celebrities including actor Harrison Ford and rapper Snoop Dogg, who performed a song from his new album Missionary.
Ceremony host Geoff Keighley acknowledged the “sad reality” of widespread layoffs plaguing the industry.
“Over the last three years we’ve lost more than 34,000 jobs,” Keighley said. “This has consequences. You can’t make great games without great people.”
FOREST SITE: A rescue helicopter spotted the burning fuselage of the plane in a forested area, with rescue personnel saying they saw no evidence of survivors A passenger plane carrying nearly 50 people crashed yesterday in a remote spot in Russia’s far eastern region of Amur, with no immediate signs of survivors, authorities said. The aircraft, a twin-propeller Antonov-24 operated by Angara Airlines, was headed to the town of Tynda from the city of Blagoveshchensk when it disappeared from radar at about 1pm. A rescue helicopter later spotted the burning fuselage of the plane on a forested mountain slope about 16km from Tynda. Videos published by Russian investigators showed what appeared to be columns of smoke billowing from the wreckage of the plane in a dense, forested area. Rescuers in
Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr is to meet US President Donald Trump this week, hoping Manila’s status as a key Asian ally would secure a more favorable trade deal before the deadline on Friday next week. Marcos would be the first Southeast Asian leader to meet Trump in his second term. Trump has already struck trade deals with two of Manila’s regional partners, Vietnam and Indonesia, driving tough bargains in trade talks even with close allies that Washington needs to keep onside in its strategic rivalry with China. “I expect our discussions to focus on security and defense, of course, but also
POINTING FINGERS: The two countries have accused each other of firing first, with Bangkok accusing Phnom Penh of targeting civilian infrastructure, including a hospital Thai acting Prime Minister Phumtham Wechayachai yesterday warned that cross-border clashes with Cambodia that have uprooted more than 130,000 people “could develop into war,” as the countries traded deadly strikes for a second day. A long-running border dispute erupted into intense fighting with jets, artillery, tanks and ground troops on Thursday, and the UN Security Council was set to hold an emergency meeting on the crisis yesterday. A steady thump of artillery strikes could be heard from the Cambodian side of the border, where the province of Oddar Meanchey reported that one civilian — a 70-year-old man — had been killed and
‘OPPORTUNITY TO ENGAGE’: Antonio Costa and Ursula von der Leyen are to meet Chinese President Xi Jinping to discuss EU-China relations and geopolitical challenges Top leaders from China and the EU are to hold a summit in Beijing this week, as the major economic powers seek to smooth over disputes ranging from trade to the Ukraine conflict. Beijing and Brussels have been gearing up to mark the 50th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic ties, but a suite of squabbles over state subsidies, market access and wartime sanctions have dampened the festivities. A spokesperson for the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday confirmed that European Council President Antonio Costa and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen would visit on Thursday. The statement came after the EU
RSS