The BAFTA Young Game Designers Awards took place on Saturday 23 July 2016 at 195 Piccadilly. Finalists and their families travelled from far and wide to attend – after a fun welcome reception, our audience took their seats and our hosts, Ben Shires and Jane Douglas, took to the stage.
Amy-Leigh Hickman, star of The Dumping Ground and EastEnders, was up first to present both Game Concept categories.
Game Concept (10-14 Years)
Aysheq Hussain won the Game Concept (10-14 years) award with his game Imagibots – Save Eden Green. The game follows the traditional platform game format and starts in the Professor's laboratory in the village of Eden Green.
Game Concept (15-18 years)
YOU ARE BEING FOLLOWED by Nic Gordon was the winning game for the Game Concept (15-18 years) award. The game is a virtual reality story-driven game, containing puzzle and exploration elements, where you only see what you can hear.
Our second special guest of the day was Dev Griffin, presenter of Radio 1’s weekend Breakfast show. Dev presented the awards for both Game Making categories.
Game Making (10-14 years)
Charlie Thurston won the Game Making award (10-14 years) with his game Apocalypse Alpa. Apocalypse Alpha is a text adventure game where the world has been ravaged by a deadly and mysterious infection you must scavenge for supplies and weapons, fight your way through the hordes of infected and reach the Airbase in one piece.
Game Making (15-18 years)
Spectrum by Daniel Smith was the winning game in Game Making (15-18 years) category. The game is a mind-bending first person puzzler that challenges you to switch colours and manipulate gravity in order to escape a digital labyrinth.
Hero and Mentor Awards
Jo Twist, CEO of UKIE, presented the YGD Mentor award to Michael Warburton. Michael is Head of Games Development at Cambridge Regional College and creator of Rizing Games - the first FE educational commercial games development studio in the country.
The YGD Hero award was presented to innovative games developers Media Molecule, creators of multi-award winning critically acclaimed titles such as LittleBigPlanet and Tearaway.
