"Overwatch" was the surprising and successful result of scrapping a previous Blizzard project.
Team action game "Overwatch," already a huge success in commercial terms, has been recognized for its achievements in the craft with three accolades and a Game of the Year title at The Game Awards.
Held on the evening of December 1, The Game Awards blended previews and trailers for upcoming games with an award ceremony acknowledging some of the best releases over the previous 12 months.
Launched in May 2016 on Windows PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, "Overwatch" emerged from what had originally been planned as a sci-fi MMO before transforming, after seven years of development, into its current form.
Blizzard Entertainment, built on the successes of its tentpole "Warcraft," "Starcraft" and "Diablo" franchises, then spent two years adding layers of polish to create a competitive, team-based shooter that would reach across unnecessary generational and gender divides.
For its efforts and excellence, Blizzard received the Best Studio or Best Game Direction award, while "Overwatch" itself was named Game of the Year after clinching both Best Multiplayer Game and Best eSports Game.
Those four wins gave it a comfortable margin over fellow multi-award winners "Doom," "Uncharted 4: A Thief's End," "Inside" and "Pokémon Go."
In fact, while "Overwatch" was nominated for six awards, the only two it didn't win went to "Doom" and "Inside."
Fourth in its series and melding tradition with innovation, "Doom" won Best Action Game as well as Best Music/Sound Design; small team Playdead received Best Art Direction and Best Independent Game for the unsettling single-player adventure "Inside."
PlayStation exclusive "Uncharted 4" won Best Narrative while lead actor Nolan North won Best Performance, and mid-year mobile sensation "Pokémon Go" took the Best Mobile/Handheld and Best Family Game categories.
And sci-fi shooter "Titanfall 2" should not be overlooked. Though its initial commercial reception might not have met expectations, despite critical praise, it was the fifth nominee for Game of the Year, alongside "Overwatch," "Doom," "Inside" and "Uncharted 4."
Other winners on the night included "That Dragon, Cancer" (Games for Impact Award,) "Rez Infinite" (Virtual Reality), "Dishonored 2" (Action-Adventure), "The Witcher 3" expansion "Blood and Wine" (Role-Playing Game), "Street Fighter 5" (Fighting), "Civilization VI" (Strategy) and "Forza Horizon 3" (Sports/Racing).
Most anticipated was March 2017's "Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild," and also fans voted Marcelo David (Coldzera) of SK Gaming as Best eSports Player, Cloud 9 as Best eSports Team, and YouTube host Steven Williams (Boogie2988) as Trending Gamer.
Best Fan Creation remained unannounced after Nintendo issued post-nomination takedowns against "Pokémon Uranium" and "Metroid" homage "Project A2MR," leaving only "Brutal Doom 64" and "Skyrim" mod "Endereal" the remaining candidates.
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