Nintendo scored big at the DICE Awards, one of gaming’s biggest nights for honoring the best games of the year. Nintendo’s The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild won Game of the Year.
The DICE Awards are selected by industry peers who are members of the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences, which has 33,000 members. The Legend of Zelda came away with four of the 24 awards, and Nintendo itself won 10 awards as either developer or publisher.
The game takes players on a world of adventure as they travel across vast fields, through forests and over mountain peaks as they discover what has become of the kingdom of Hyrule. It played a big role in the success of the launch of the Nintendo Switch hybrid home and portable game console.
Cuphead, developed by the tiny Canadian developer Studio MDHR, won three awards. Games honored with two awards each were Sony’s Horizon Zero Dawn, Ready At Dawn’s Lone Echo/Echo Arena, PUBG’s PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds, and Nintendo Snipperclips.
Other top honorees were Fire Emblem Heroes for Mobile Game of the Year, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe for Racing Game of the Year, Injustice 2 for Fighting Game of the Year, FIFA 18 for Sports Game of the Year, Snipperclips for the Sprite Award, and PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds for Outstanding Achievement in Online Gameplay.
“Every year, the DICE Awards brings the global interactive entertainment industry under one roof to recognize and honor the very best in video games – the games that captivated and inspired us, and kept us entertained for hours on end,” said Meggan Scavio, president of the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences, in a statement. “On behalf of the Academy, I am thrilled to congratulate this year’s winners of the 21st DICE Awards.”
Above: If Betty Boop was an evil sea monster.
In addition to the awards for the industry’s best games and creators from the previous year, the DICE Awards also celebrated Genyo Takeda, special corporate advisor at Nintendo, with a Lifetime Achievement Award.
He is the seventh recipient to receive the honor from the Academy. Takeda was recognized for having been at the forefront of shaping the video games hardware industry in his career-long tenure at Nintendo with the development of the Nintendo 64, Nintendo GameCube and the Wii system.
The 21st annual DICE Awards ceremony was co-hosted for the second time by Greg Miller, cofounder of internet video show and podcast Kinda Funny, and Jessica Chobot of Nerdist News. The show came at the end of the elite gaming event DICE Summit 2018 event in Las Vegas.
Here’s the full list:
Game of the Year
The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
Publisher: Nintendo
Developer: Nintendo
Outstanding Achievement in Game Direction
The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
Publisher: Nintendo
Developer: Nintendo
Above: Aloy has guts in Horizon: Zero Dawn
Outstanding Achievement in Game Design
The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
Publisher: Nintendo
Developer: Nintendo
Immersive Reality Technical Achievement
Lone Echo/Echo Arena
Publisher: Oculus Studios
Developer: Ready At Dawn
Immersive Reality Game of the Year
Lone Echo/Echo Arena
Publisher: Oculus Studios
Developer: Ready At Dawn
Mobile Game of the Year
Fire Emblem Heroes
Publisher: Nintendo
Developer: Intelligent Systems and Nintendo
Handheld Game of the Year
Metroid: Samus Returns
Publisher: Nintendo
Developer: MercurySteam and Nintendo
DICE Sprite Award
Snipperclips
Publisher: Nintendo
Developer: SFB Games
Outstanding Achievement in Online Gameplay
PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds
Publisher: PUBG Corp.
Developer: PUBG Corp.
Above: If you team up, the action can get pretty intense in PUBG.
Strategy/Simulation Game of the Year
Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle
Publisher: Ubisoft Entertainment
Developer: Ubisoft Milan and Ubisoft Paris
Sports Game of the Year
FIFA 18
Publisher: Electronic Arts
Developer: Electronic Arts
Role-Playing Game of the Year
NierR: Automata
Publisher: Square Enix
Developer: PlatinumGames
Racing Game of the Year
Mario Kart 8 Deluxe
Publisher: Nintendo
Developer: Nintendo
Fighting Game of the Year
Injustice 2
Publisher: Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment
Developer: NetherRealm Studios
Family Game of the Year
Snipperclips
Publisher: Nintendo
Developer: SFB Games
Adventure Game of the Year
The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
Publisher: Nintendo
Developer: Nintendo
Action Game of the Year
PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds
Publisher: PUBG Corp.
Developer: PUBG Corp.
Outstanding Technical Achievement
Horizon Zero Dawn
Publisher: Sony Interactive Entertainment
Developer: Guerrilla Games
Outstanding Achievement in Story
Horizon Zero Dawn
Publisher: Sony Interactive Entertainment
Developer: Guerrilla Games
Outstanding Achievement in Sound Design
Super Mario Odyssey
Publisher: Nintendo
Developer: Nintendo
Outstanding Achievement in Original Music Composition
Cuphead
Publisher: StudioMDHR
Developer: StudioMDHR
Outstanding Achievement in Character
Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice – Senua
Publisher: Ninja Theory
Developer: Ninja Theory
Outstanding Achievement in Art Direction
Cuphead
Publisher: StudioMDHR
Developer: StudioMDHR
Outstanding Achievement in Animation
Cuphead
Publisher: StudioMDHR
Developer: StudioMDHR
