27-10-2007 // 25th Annual Golden Joystick Awards
Slap bang at the start of the London Games Festival and following the midweek BAFTA’s the Golden Joysticks is the backslapping event where the game industry really lets its hair down . It’s also the ‘anti’ awards with the categories voted for by gamers, and not a judging panel of journalists and supposed gaming luminaries. This year there were 750,000 votes from UK gamers making it the biggest yet…
Things kicked off with a champagne reception at the Park Lane Hilton, meaning most people were pretty much lubricated by the time they made their way to the tables for dinner and the awards. Wii Sports cleaned up at the BAFTA’s and Nintendo were hoping for big things here as well but first we had to eat, and with over 500 attendees it’s a pretty impressive feat getting everybody eating at roughly the same time!
The ceremony was hosted by David Mitchell of Mitchell and Webb fame – also the PC in the infamous Mac vs PC adverts. No sign of any Macs at the GJ’s though, it was a gaming awards afterall. With 18 categories to rattle through there were fortunately no long speeches and the big winners on the day were Gears of War and Guitar Hero II with Wii Sports just picking up the solitary award. That’s what happens when you let hardcore gamers loose with the voting!
This being the 25th annual awards it seemed apt that Commodore Gaming should sponsor the after-party – which despite starting at 3.30pm is guaranteed to be filled with merry games industry types from the word go every year. Lo and behold just after 3.30 people started staggering through the doors, heading first for the free bar (the tab soon ran out) and then onto the Commodore gaming bar – with two XX’s playing World in Conflict on two fabulous 70 inch Panasonic screens and another G running the C64 simulator on a slightly smaller Panasonic plasma. However the undisputed star of the show was Toki running on our old faithful C64 – back in the spotlight at the 25th annual Golden Joysticks, 25 years after its launch.
The party finished at around 11pm, with the good, bad and ugly of the UK games industry staggering home looking more than a bit the worse for wear.
And the winners are…
Ultimate Game of the Year 2007 - Gears of War
Sonopress Xbox Game of the Year 2007 - Gears of War
PC Game of the Year 2007 - sponsored by PC Gamer - The Lord of the Rings: Shadows of Angmar
PlayStation Game of the Year 2007 - sponsored by Official PlayStation Magazine UK - God of War II
Nintendo Game of the Year 2007 - sponsored by Official Nintendo Magazine - The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess
Editor's Choice - Gears of War
The Publisher of the Year 2007 - sponsored by Future - Nintendo
The Vivendi Retailer of the Year 2007 - Game
The One to Watch - Sponsored by Total Film - Assassin's Creed
Next-Gen.biz UK Developer of the Year - Codemasters
The GameTribe Online Game of the Year 2007 - World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade
Nuts All-Nighter - Gears of War
The 1Xtra Soundtrack of the Year - Guitar Hero II
The Innovation of the Year 2007 - sponsored by T3 - Nintendo Wii
4Talent Mobile Game of the Year 2007 - Final Fantasy
Games Radar Handheld Game of the Year - GTA Vice City Stories
The Sun Family Game of the Year 2007 - Wii Sports
The Bliss Girls' Choice Game of the Year 2007 - Guitar Hero II