The Computer Entertainment Supplier’s Association (CESA) announced the winners of the CEDEC Awards 2023. Nintendo-affiliated entities won four of the five awards available. Masahiro Sakurai, the Kirby and the Forgotten Land development team, and Eiji Aonuma’s Zelda team received awards in this presentation.
Masahiro Sakurai received the most honors, winning two awards thanks to his YouTube channel “Masahiro Sakurai on Creating Games.” The association gave him the Game Design and Visual Arts awards for thoroughly sharing his knowledge of game designs and visuals that can be easily understood by not only aspiring game creators but also artists and other people. Sakurai was already aware when his channel made the nomination lists for both categories in late June 2023. The judges ultimately decided that Sakurai’s channel deserved to win both awards.
The development team for Kirby and the Forgotten Land, from Nintendo and HAL Laboratory, won the Engineering Award. The judges noted that the team had published its technology for procedurally generating terrains at a low cost and a tool that changes together with the project. They appreciated the team for sharing their secret techniques to help other developers improve as well.
Image via Nintendo
While CESA usually awarded the Special Award to individuals, it gave the 2023 award to not only Eiji Aonuma but also the whole development team for The Legend of Zelda series. The association noted how the series continued to have strong impacts on many users worldwide with its ingenuity. The judges added that the latest entry, Tears of the Kingdom, brought a new stimulant of creativity with a new feature to craft rideable vehicles and other things from in-game objects.
Image via Tango Gameworks
Bethesda’s Tango Gameworks was the only non-Nintendo team that won an award in CEDEC Awards 2023. The Hi-Fi Rush sound team received the Sound Award for creating a new rhythm game genre by fusing music with action. The judges noted that every sound in the game, from map objects to character steps, synced well with the music beats. Hi-Fi Rush is the only game available on PC and Xbox Series X|S in this award list. It was also the last title Shinji Mikami worked on at Tango Gameworks before Bethesda announced his eventual departure from the studio in February 2023.
In the 2022 edition, FromSoftware and Cygames shared the spoils for their achievements in Elden Ring and Uma Musume: Pretty Derby, respectively. Cygames won the Sound and Engineering awards, while From Software had the Game Design and Visual Arts awards, with Hidetaka Miyazaki personally receiving the Special Award.
