It’s finally happened! Months of preparation and excitement have led to the opening of the envelopes during an amazing award ceremony in Kortrijk Xpo where the Belgian Game Awards 2020 trophies got to know their rightful owners.

The big winner of the night was Brukel. Bob De Schutter managed to cash in on three of his four nominations and goes home with the awards for:

• Serious Game of the Year (awarded by Cronos Invest)
• Debut Game of the Year (awarded by hub.brussels)
• He also won the hearts and votes of the public to receive the Audience Award out of the hands of Game Mania’s CEO

The only category Brukel got bested in was Best Narrative, which was handed out by veteran games writer Susan O’Connor to Journey for Elysium by Mantis Games.

Flemish Minister of Media Benjamin Dalle awarded No Players Online by Adam Pype the award for Student Game of the Year.

Fourth time’s the charm for Bart Bonte. His fourth colour themed mobile puzzle game Blue won the award for Mobile Game of the Year, awarded by Wallimage.

Very much to their own surprise, Brussels based RamRam games won Most Anticipated Game of the Year for their quirky adventure 30 Birds. BGA sponsor Amplo was happy to do the honours.

According to Flanders DC, the best Flemish games studio of the moment is Triangle Factory. Having released De Slimste Mens ter Wereld app and working on cutting edge mobile VR games, them winning Studio of the Year is fully deserved.

Esports have become a staple of the games industry, so for the first time there were awards for both players and tournaments.

• Best Esports Competition of the Year went to ESL Proximus (awarded by FLEGA)
• Best Esports Pro Player of the Year was won by League of Legends player Gabriel “Bwipo” Rau (awarded by WALGA)
• NBA player Bryan Badjie was deemed the Best Esports Rookie Player of the Year (awarded by Microsoft’s Aapo Latvala)

Before awarding the PC/Console Game of the Year, there was a celebration of Swen Vincke‘s career. As announced earlier, the founder of Larian Studios and one of the founding fathers of the Belgian games industry, was awarded the very first Lifetime Achievement Award. A few days away from a big Baldur’s Gate 3 unveiling at PAX East in Boston, Vincke wasn’t able to attend in person, but expressed his thanks in a video message.

Finally, Nanotale – Typing Chronicles by Fishing Cactus was awarded PC/Console Game of the Year by Walloon Minister of Media Bénédicte Linard.

Congratulations to all winners and a big thank you to the other nominees for not making it easy on the judges. We’d also like to express our special thanks to our host Soe Nsuki for expertly guiding us through the evening, to all partners who made the continued celebration of Belgian games possible, to our jury members and visitors. Finally, thank you for not booing the politicians in attendance or bombarding them with tomatoes. A definite plus in our books.

And now if you’ll excuse us, there seems to be a party going on somewhere. Enjoy the rest of 1UP and see you next time!