Entries have opened for the 2023 Scottish Games Awards, celebrating excellence and achievement from Scotland’s games ecosystem, with two new categories featured.
The awards are designed to showcase outstanding work across the entire games ecosystem including game design and development, craft categories (audio, art and animation, technical achievement, tools and technology), individual achievement (diversity champion, educator, rising star, community spirit), education and more.
Entries are encouraged from all creators from full-time developers to part-time indies, student teams or individuals working across the entire games ecosystem. Companies working outside the traditional game development space in areas such as animation, immersive media, audio, and digital design are also welcome to enter their work in eligible categories.
The awards are open to work produced between August 1st 2022 and September 22nd 2023.
Entries will close at 18:00 BST on September 22nd 2023. All entries to the Scottish Games Awards are free. You can Enter Here.
The 2023 awards have been expanded with the addition of two new categories – Spirit Of Scotland – which is open to games which feature Scottish culture, heritage, language, characters or landscape and the Pure Quality Award for creative impact – which is open to games which have made a significant impact beyond the commercial return and broken new ground in terms of content, audience, downloads, or general awesomeness.
This year’s competition will be judged by a panel of experts chaired by Chris Scullion, the author and veteran games journalist, and features individuals drawn from across Scotland and the UK.
Chris Scullion said: “The inaugural Scottish Games Awards last year were a fantastic celebration of the Scottish games industry. I feel such events are essential for bringing the industry together and acknowledging as a community its collective achievements, so I’m delighted that it will be returning this year and take great personal honour in being asked to chair it again. I look forward to seeing the best and brightest of Scotland’s games industry coming together again for another brilliant night.”
Brian Baglow, the founder and director of Scottish Games Week, said: “The games sector in Scotland has a huge range of talented, creative and generous people, producing incredible work. From the lecturers in the classroom, to the developers on the cutting edge of videogames, we have truly world-class talent.
“While many people know of the great games Scotland produced in the past, there’s far less coverage of the amazing work being created today. We plan to change that. The Scottish Games Awards celebrate the people and organisations working across the whole games ecosystem, as well as the games being developed by Scottish talent here – and worldwide.”
The 15 categories in the 2023 Scottish Games Awards are:
- Small Budget Game
- Large Budget Game
- Spirit Of Scotland – NEW CATEGORY
- Pure Quality – NEW CATEGORY
- Art & Animation
- Technical Achievement
- Audio
- Creativity
- Best Tools/Tech
- Best Education Programme
- Best Educator
- Diversity Champion
- Community Spirit (Stewart Gilray Award)
- Rising Star
- Lifetime Achievement Award
Entries can be made online, through a simple, accessible Google Form. Full eligibility criteria and entry criteria can be found on the Scottish Games Week website.
Good luck!