The award ceremony of the 7th edition of BIG Festival, Latin America’s largest independent games event, took place on the night of June 28th, at club Homs, in São Paulo Capital city, Brazil. General public, special guests and game developers crowded the audience, anticipating the final results that would announce the winners of the 20 categories in the competition, including Best Game, Best Brazilian Game and People’s Choice. Indie game GRIS, developed by Nomada studio and published by Devolver Digital, took home the most coveted trophies of the night: the Best Game and Best Art of BIG Festival 2019.
The other categories involved were Best Brazilian Game, Best Latin American Game, Best Educational Game, Best Narrative, Best Innovation, Best Sound, Best Gameplay, Best Virtual Reality Game, Best Kids Game, People’s Choice, Best Multiplayer Game, BIG Impact: Social Issues, BIG Impact: Education, BIG Impact: Diversity, Best Student Game, Best Mobile Game, BIG Brands, and two new awards this year the Humble Big New Talent Award and the Nordic Games Pitch Award.
54 games from 22 countries took part in the competition: South Africa, Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Chile, China, Colombia, Costa Rica, Denmark, Spain, France, Japan, Malaysia, Norway, South Africa, United Kingdom, Czech Republic and Switzerland.
The announcement was held in a ceremony during BIG Festival at Club Homs, attended by the President of Ancine, Christian de Castro; the State Secretary of Culture and Creative Economy, Sérgio Sá Leitão; the Municipal Secretary of Culture, Alê Youssef; Spcine’s President, Mr Bodanzky; the Industry and Service Export Manager of Apex Brasil, Maria Paula Velloso; and the president of Abragames, Sandro Manfredini.
You can find the complete list of winners below:
●Best Game
GRIS (Nomada Studio), Spain
●Best Brazilian Game
Adore (Cadabra Games), Brazil
●Best Game Latin America
Quantum League (NGD Studios), Argentina
●Best Art
GRIS (Nomada Studios), Spain
●Best Narrative
Forgotten Anne (ThroughLine Games), Denmark
●Best Gameplay
JUMPGRID (Ian MacLarty), Australia
●Best Sound
Unheard (NEXT Studios), China
●Best Innovative Game
Pixel Ripped 1989 (ARVORE Immersive Experiences), Brazil
●BIG Impact: Educational
Cidade em Jogo (Fundação Brava e Flux Games), Brazil
●BIG Impact: Social Issues
Marie’s Room (like Charlie), Belgium
●BIG Impact: Diversity
Huni Kuin: Yube Baitana (Bobware/Beya Xinã Bena), Brazil
●Best Student Game
Burning Daylight (Miyu Distribution), France
●Best Mobile Game
Starlit On Wheels (Rockhead Studios), Brazil
●Best Multiplayer Game
Spitlings (Massive Miniteam GmbH), Germany
●Best Kids Game
It’s Paper Guy! (The Paper Team), France
●Best Virtual Reality Game
Moss (POLYARC GAMES), USA
●BIG Brands
Authentic Game Oficial (Little Giants Studio), Brazil
●Humble BIG New Talent Award
Space Routine (Menic Games), Argentina
●Nordic Game Pitch Award
Grashers (Pink Array), Brazil
●People’s Choice Award
Spaceline Crew (Coffeenauts), Brazil
About BIG Festival
BIG Festival (Brazil’s Independent Games Festival) has been held since 2012 and is considered the most influential and innovative independent gaming festival in Latin America. With the mission to strengthen the Brazilian video game ecosystem, the event produces a yearly international independent video game award competition offering significant cash prizes, a major exhibition showcasing hundreds of games including the awards nominees, a spectacular awards ceremony event, industry related lectures and business rounds. In 2018 BIG hosted more than 20,000 visitors, 3,500 of them having participated in keynotes, and more than 1600 guests attending business meetings. This year BIG will expand its schedule of lectures and workshops by incorporating new topics and areas that are part of game development cycles, such as music, animation, virtual and augmented reality, a career center, among other segments already present at the event.
About Brazil Games
Brazil Games is the export program created by the Brazilian Independent Game Companies Association, ABRAGAMES, in partnership with Apex-Brasil, the Brazilian Trade and Investment Promotion Agency. Our goal is to promote the Brazilian Indie Game industry internationally, developing new business opportunities for our companies. The Brazil Games Program also promotes Brazil as the hub for business in Latin America and invites buyers, investors and publishers for BIG Festival, Brazil’s Independent Games Festival, the most important international indie games festival and the hub for international business in Latin America.
About Apex-Brasil
The Brazilian Trade and Investment Promotion Agency (Apex-Brasil) works to promote Brazilian products and services abroad, and to attract foreign investment to strategic sectors of the Brazilian economy. Apex-Brasil organizes several initiatives aiming to promote Brazilian exports abroad. The Agency´s efforts comprise trade and prospective missions, business rounds, support for the participation of Brazilian companies in major international trade fairs, arrangement of technical visits of foreign buyers and opinion makers to learn about the Brazilian productive structure, and other select activities designed to strengthen the country’s branding abroad.
