Recap: 1st Annual NY Videogame Critics Circle Awards

The American videogame industry, and the majority of the people writing critically about it, has coalesced largely on the West Coast. But the New York scene has been ascendant in recent years, and the growing number of critical voices on this side of the country spurred longtime videogame critic Harold Goldberg, author ofAll Your Base Are Belong to Us: How Fifty Years of Videogames Conquered Pop Culture, to start a local group for those critics.

That group, theNew York Videogame Critics Circle, held its first-ever awards show last night, hopefully the first of many, in conjunction with theNYU Game Centerat the school’s Cantor Film Center. I was pleased to attend the classy affair, joining many New York-area colleagues from some of your and my favorite publications as well as representatives from the developers and publishers behind the nominated games.

I had the honor of presenting — along with new Kotaku recruitTina Amini— the “A Train Award” for Best Mobile/iOS Game, which went to Superbrothers and Capybara Games’Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP. (I should note that, as one of the Critics Circle’s newest members, I did not vote on any of the awards given out last night.)

Bastionnarrator Logan Cunningham hosted the show, and attendees were treated to live performances of two songs from the game’s terrificoriginal soundtrackby Ashley Barrett and audio director Darren Korb. You can watch the second performance above; it’s the song “Setting Sail, Coming Home,” which plays at a pivotal point in the game’s final stage. (Thanks toRuss FrushtickofVox Gamesfor the recording.)

A battle scene in Battlefield 6 Open Beta

It was a wonderful evening, and I look forward to playing all the great games that will be nominated for next year’s show. Here’s the full list of winners: