Golden Joysticks Little More Than Bad Joke Circle Jerk

The UK games industry furthered the suspicion that it comprises little more than a set of self-serving marketing execs as the ‘results’ of last Friday’s Golden Joysticks ceremony are dissected.

Here are the awards and respective winners:



A few points. We’re told that The One to Watch for this Christmas is Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess from Nintendo. We found this interesting, given that Zelda isn’t expected to hit retail until the summer of next year in any territory.

There’s more. We’re told that the one to watch for 2006 is Resident Evil 5, a game about which nothing is known.

Next is an award so brilliantly stupid we can’t think of anything to write about it. Best Film-Based Game of 2005 - Resident Evil 4. Genius.

The rest comprises a list of things that sold well (as voted for by the kids who decide these matters) and things that people have heard of, as not voted for by the aforementioned kids. Given that about half the awards are not the result of a public vote, we found the BBC’s blanket statement interesting “The awards are voted for by the readers of computer and games magazines.”

Ignoring the undeniable fact that the awards represent little more than an embarrassing self-parody, Future wheeled out head of 'Filling Microsoft Marketing Pamphlets' James Ashton-Tyler, who used to go by the name of James Ashton. Perhaps he got married, perhaps he became ‘a bit pretentious’. It's not for us to say. "We're very excited about what happened this year " he said. You see, some of the time reading Xbox press releases, talking about how exciting everything is, has worn off. You go, James! "Not only was the event bigger than ever, but the number of voters who took part showed how much the Golden Joysticks means to real gamers. The night was a real celebration of the best on offer from the UK gaming industry as a whole."

Or the exact opposite of that...

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