Hades wins Game of the Year at Game Developers Choice Awards 2021

Umurangi Generation takes home the IGF Grand Prize

Both the Game Developers Choice Awards and Independent Games Festival Awards took place yesterday as part of GDC 2021. At the former, Supergiant’s Greek myth roguelite Hades took home the big award, while indie photography sim Umurangi Generation won the Seumas McNally Grand Prize at the IGF Awards.

The GDCA Game of the Year award wasn’t the only trophy Hades took home that night, as Supergiant also won the Best Design and Best Audio awards. Sucker Punch Productions also picked up two awards, in Best Visual Art and Audience Award, for Ghost of Tsushima. And Best Debut went to the multiplayer indie horror game Phasmophobia, from developer Kinetic Games.

On the IGF side, Umurangi Generation took the Grand Prize as well as the award for Excellence in Narrative. Genesis Noir also picked up two awards, for Excellence in Audio and Excellence in Visual Art, and the community-driven narrative sports sim Blaseball won the Nuovo Award, for games that “think differently about games as a medium.”

The Game Developers Choice Awards also gave a Pioneer Award to Tom Fulp, who created the Flash game-hosting site Newgrounds, and a Lifetime Achievement Award to Laralyn McWilliams, who holds 28 years of experience in the industry, including being the Creative Director for Sony Online Entertainment’s Free Realms and as the lead designer for Full Spectrum Warrior.

Here’s the full rundown of the awards:

2021 Game Developers Choice Awards winners:

Best Audio: Hades (Supergiant Games)

Best Debut: Phasmophobia (Kinetic Games)

Best Design: Hades (Supergiant Games)

Best Mobile Game: Genshin Impact (miHoYo)

Innovation Award: Dreams (Media Molecule / Sony Interactive Entertainment)

Best Narrative: The Last of Us Part II (Naughty Dog / Sony Interactive Entertainment)

Best Technology: Microsoft Flight Simulator (Asobo Studio / Xbox Game Studios)

Best Visual Art: Ghost of Tsushima (Sucker Punch Productions / Sony Interactive Entertainment)

Best VR/AR Game: Half-Life: Alyx (Valve)

Audience Award: Ghost of Tsushima (Sucker Punch Productions / Sony Interactive Entertainment)

Game of the Year: Hades (Supergiant Games)

Pioneer Award: Tom Fulp

Lifetime Achievement Award: Laralyn McWilliams

2021 Independent Games Festival Awards

Best Student Game: Vessels (Local Space Survey Corps, LLC)

Excellence in Audio: Genesis Noir (Feral Cat Den)

Excellence in Narrative: Umurangi Generation (Origame Digital)

Audience Award: Arrog (Hermanos Magia and Leap Game Studios)

Excellence in Design: Teardown (Tuxedo Labs)

Excellence in Visual Art: Genesis Noir (Feral Cat Den)

Nuovo Award: Blaseball (The Game Band)

Seumas McNally Grand Prize: Umurangi Generation (Origame Digital)

Archives of the full ceremony for both awards can be found over on the GDC Twitch channel or YouTube channel.