Dragon Age: Inquisition Wins GOTY at SXSW

[Steven Bogos]

Dragon Age: Inquisition Wins GOTY at SXSW

Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor also won the most awards of the show, taking home three of the 21 honors.

Last week, gamers were a little bit puzzled by Dragon Age: Inquisition [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/140100-Destiny-wins-Game-of-The-Year-at-BAFTA-Awards] has taken away the top prize, Monolith's Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor also performed extremely well, taking home three of the 21 awards.

For what it's worth, Destiny did actually still win an award at SXSW - the "Excellence in Technical Achievement" award.

The complete list of categories and their winners are as follows:

Game of the Year: Dragon Age: Inquisition - Electronic Arts/BioWare
Mobile Game of the Year: Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft - Blizzard Entertainment
Table Top Game of the Year: Star Realms - White Wizard Games
Excellence in Gameplay: Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor - Warner Bros. Interactive/Monolith Productions
Excellence in Art: Child of Light - Ubisoft/Ubisoft Montreal
Excellence in Animation: Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor - Warner Bros. Interactive/Monolith Productions
Excellence in Technical Achievement: Destiny - Activision/Bungie
Excellence in Visual Achievement: Far Cry 4 - Ubisoft/Ubisoft Montreal
Excellence in Narrative The Wolf Among Us - Telltale Games
Excellence in Design and Direction: Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor - Warner Bros. Interactive/Monolith Productions
Excellence in SFX: Alien: Isolation - SEGA/The Creative Assembly
Excellence in Musical Score: Transistor - Supergiant Games
Excellence in Multiplayer: Super Smash Bros. Wii U - Nintendo
Excellence in Convergence: South Park: The Stick of Truth - Ubisoft/Obsidian Entertainment
Most Valuable Character: Ellie, The Last of Us: Left Behind - Sony Computer Entertainment/Naughty Dog
Most Valuable Esports Team: Cloud9
Most Valuable Online Channel: Rooster Teeth
Most Valuable Add-On Content: The Last of Us: Left Behind - Sony Computer Entertainment/Naughty Dog
Most Anticipated Crowdfunded Game: Star Citizen - Cloud Imperium Games
Matthew Crump Cultural Innovation Award: This War of Mine - 11 Bit Studios
Gamer's Voice Award: Speedrunners - tinyBuild

Source: GameSpot [http://www.gamespot.com/articles/dragon-age-inquisition-wins-another-game-of-the-ye/1100-6425927/]

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[ecoho]

I guess screw Bayonetta 2 then, for like the 12th time. Another win for the game that doesn't excel at anything but is somehow called the best it seems. Atleast it isn't Destiny, though that really was an anomaly and DAI winning again being the norm is better only marginaly.

Left Behind being the most valuable add-on content in the year Reaper of Souls came out is a joke.

Bayonetta 2 while a great game is only on one console so yeah its going to be screwed over in favor of a multiplatform release and reaper of souls wasn't near as good as left behind, that's coming from someone who didn't like The Last of Us and loved diablo 3.

 

[Bat Vader]

Nice. I love Dragon Age: Inquisition and I am happy to see it win another Game Of The Year award.

 

[runic knight]

I still haven't gotten to tear into DA fully yet, so can't say it was less deserving then Bayoneetta, though it certainly seemed to have more flaws. Got to mirror MC1980 a bit on this one though, least it wasn't Destiny again (that was embarrassingly sad), and a damn shame that last of us beat out Reaper of Souls. I didn't even know that Last of Us had DLC til this last week, but the impact Reaper of Souls had was to revitalize interest in a game that was damn near written off as dead on arrival. Perhaps there is something more to Left Behind that I didn't notice when watching lets plays and such, but in terms of content amount, value to the game and overall influence to shaping opinion of the game as a whole, Reaper just beat the hell out of it.

 

[Saviordd1]

It is nice to see Shadows of Mordor winning awards that they actually seem to deserve this time though, especially gameplay, considering the only notable thing about it was the Nemesis system.

It certainly wasn't notable for it's story or adherence to Tolkien.

OT: Good for them. Dragon Age Inquisition was a genuinely excellent game. While not everything they did worked its obvious they put a lot of effort into it and tried to push the Dragon Age franchise forward. Which means Bioware has staved off the Maxis-like execution for a few more games.

 

[ecoho]

... and reaper of souls wasn't near as good as left behind, that's coming from someone who didn't like The Last of Us and loved diablo 3.

Left Behind was fine, but in a category called most valuable add-on content, a decent but short DLC shouldn't beat a proper, meaty expansion pack, not to mention the patch that came with Reaper of Souls straight up fixed a lot/most of the problems that game had on the gameplay front. It saved the game in the eyes of a lot of people, while Left Behind was, well, more Last of Us in a slightly disjointed fashion.

I think the fact that reaper of souls DID fix a lot of the issues may be why it lost. I mean think about it was more like a glorified patch with a new class and a more levels. Were as left behind just added to what most think was a great game(once again I am not one of them but I can see their point of view.)so yeah its down fall may be because reaper of souls had to fix a lot of things that it didn't get the award.

 

[Nick Hamilton]

DRAGON AGE WAS SO BORING HOW DOES THIS KEEP HAPPENING. I have nothing but love and addiction for Destiny, even though it's a little botched start i know they can fully bring out the potential, much better than Dragon Age imo.

 

[TT Kairen]

As much as I really liked Inquisition, didn't you say Destiny winning doesn't make sense because it didn't win any of the other categories it was nominated for?

At this year's British Academy of Film and Television Arts awards, Bungie's MMOFPS Destiny took home the coveted "Game of The Year" award... despite not winning any of the other categories it was nominated in. The move shocked and confused the audience, who were expecting favorites such as Alien: Isolation and Middle-Earth: Shadow of Mordor to take home the grand prize.

Yes right here... but I see no other wins for Inquisition, yet it makes more sense?

 

[Karadalis]

Oh come on guys.. is this really a surprise?

First its from bioware... second it ate up the budget of a small 3rd world country to make...

and third this game is so "progressive" and has so much "diversity" that it bleeds tumblr out of all its orifices.

Cant even get myselfe to finish this game and i finished both DAO and DA2: Revenge of the clone dungeon.

Heck.. they even put in an optional hunky bisexual male fucktoy with the personality of a wet blanket in.

Whats this you ask?

"Zhe zound of progress my friend!"

What? No... no im not simply salty because flirting with the female dwarf scout didnt go anywhere and i was left with militant feminist and silly french accent diplomat i didnt really care about... not at all.

 

[IamGamer41]

Shouldn't Technical Achievement and Visual Achievement be the same thing? What is so technical about Destiny that makes it better then any other game say like Super Meatboy? Its not graphics because Farcry4 won that?

 

[Karadalis]

Shouldn't Technical Achievement and Visual Achievement be the same thing? What is so technical about Destiny that makes it better then any other game say like Super Meatboy? Its not graphics because Farcry4 won that?

The only thing that would come to mind are "behind the scene" stuff like how the game was programmed, server infrastructure... how they achieved the different gameplay modes during programming...

but wasnt the game really buggy and used age old mmo mechanics?

Yeah.. really dont see it either...

 

[Haerthan]

Bring forth the buckets for I wish to collect the angry tears of gamers and place them upon the altar of Bioware, the Great and Terrible!

It is nice to see Shadows of Mordor winning awards that they actually seem to deserve this time though, especially gameplay, considering the only notable thing about it was the Nemesis system.

Got one you can pass me? I mean I already read some that were particularly salty. Together we shall wet our altars in Bioware's name so that they continue to survive the abusive parenting of EA.

 

[VanQ]

The winners on this list all seem like "safe" games. They won't draw much ire from any group in particular for having won. I wonder if Rooster Teeth was thrown in there to honor their recent loss. I can't think of anything of note that they do besides make game related machinima, then again I haven't followed Rooster Teeth since Red vs Blue ended (the first time) so I could simply be ignorant to their actual value.

 

[LetalisK]

What? No... no im not simply salty because flirting with the female dwarf scout didnt go anywhere and i was left with militant feminist and silly french accent diplomat i didnt really care about... not at all.

Silly Italian accent! Didn't the ridiculous poofy outfit give it away? Because god forbid we make a fantasy game with unique cultures when we can just rip off stereotypes of renaissance europe.

OT: Meh, okay. DA:I is one of those games I don't enjoy, but I don't begrudge others for enjoying it. Just not my cup of tea, though I can see how it is for many people.

Off-topic: Speaking of SXSW and Austin, anyone know how Austin is in the summer? From what I've read, it sounds kinda miserable, but reading =/= believing.

 

[Chimpzy_v1legacy]

The winners on this list all seem like "safe" games. They won't draw much ire from any group in particular for having won.

I agree, but I guess that is just what these award thingies are like. But, at the very least, I can understand why these winners were chosen over other games that may or may not be more worthy of it, unlike the BAFTA's, where several of them left me mildly baffled.

 

[Fireprufe15]

Can someone explain this to me? According to the awards, it doesn't have the best graphics, best design, best gameplay or best narrative, yet somehow it is the best game? How does that even make sense.

I'm also calling BS on Destiny winning best technical achievement. What did Destiny achieve technically that hasn't been done by a million billion other video games?

 

[Karadalis]

What? No... no im not simply salty because flirting with the female dwarf scout didnt go anywhere and i was left with militant feminist and silly french accent diplomat i didnt really care about... not at all.

Silly Italian accent! Didn't the ridiculous poofy outfit give it away? Because god forbid we make a fantasy game with unique cultures when we can just rip off stereotypes of renaissance europe.

OT: Meh, okay. DA:I is one of those games I don't enjoy, but I don't begrudge others for enjoying it. Just not my cup of tea, though I can see how it is for many people.

Off-topic: Speaking of SXSW and Austin, anyone know how Austin is in the summer? From what I've read, it sounds kinda miserable, but reading =/= believing.

Italian?

Well in german she sounded rather french to be honest. Just like the rest of Orlay or whatever that silly region is called.

Just wish the companions would have been a tad more believable? Likable? Less over the topish?

Rather liked DA:O choice of companions more... had better chemestry