The Zelda development team takes home several well-deserved wins on home soil at the 2023 Famitsu Dengeki Game Awards and CEDEC Awards 2023 in Japan. Facing stiff competition from Street Fighter VI, Final Fantasy XVI, Armored Core VI, and Resident Evil 4, Tears of the Kingdom was crowned Game of the Year and Best Adventure Game at the Famitsu 2023 Awards. The Zelda development staff also received the prestigious MVC Award by Famitsu, which highlights a “best game studio” to work for in the industry.
Last fall before the Famitsu Awards, Eiji Aonuma and the other Zelda staff members also received a Special Award from the Computer Entertainment Developers Conference (CEDEC) for their ingenuity and creativity on Tears of the Kingdom. “The latest work in the series, The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, inherits the worldview of [previous Zelda titles] but adds new excitement and creativity to the game with user creative elements such as the ability to create various things such as vehicles,” states CEDEC’s website on their decision. “Its high degree of freedom has attracted widespread attention, and at the same time it has been highly praised by many users.”
It’s heartwarming to note that their Nintendo and HAL Laboratory colleagues also received several CEDEC awards alongside them, including the CEDEC Best Engineering Award for Kirby and the Forgotten Land. Kirby’s development team was “very honored to receive the highest award,” according to an English translation of CEDEC’s website. “With this joy in mind, we will continue to develop games that are uniquely ours, so that we can continue to deliver new surprises and fun,” said the team. “Thank you very much.”
Masahiro Sakurai, original founder of the Kirby and Super Smash Bros. franchises, received two CEDEC 2023 awards for his own YouTube Channel “Masashiro Sakurai on Creating Games” for presenting invaluable expertise to aspiring game developers everywhere. The channel now has over one million subscribers with its Japanese and English translations combined at the time of this writing. “I was surprised as I didn’t expect that a YouTube program…would receive so much support,” says Sakurai. “Each episode of this program is short, simple, and I try to make it as easy to understand as possible for everyone. We continue to produce this program because we believe that increasing the number of people who watch this program and deepening their understanding of games will be positive for the future of games… Thank you very much!”
