South by Southwest (SXSW) announced their second annual Gaming Awards. YouTube sensation Markiplier and actress/comedian Janet Varney will be co-hosting the event. Janet is best known as the voice of Korra, from Nickelodeon’s The Legend of Korra. Markiplier currently has 4,762,857 YouTube subscribers and has only been on YouTube for around 3 years.
Nominations for the event will be accepted through December 12, 2014, with the event itself taking place on Saturday evening, March 14, 2015. For the first time the event will be hosted at Austin, Texas’s premiere entertainment venue, ACL Live at the Moody Theater.
[blockquote cite=”Justin Burnham, SXSW Gaming Project Manager”]“The gaming world is growing rapidly and people everywhere are looking to games as their first choice for entertainment.”[/blockquote]
New to this year are six award categories, such as “Mobile Game of the Year,” “Table Top Game of the Year,” “Most Anticipated Crowdfunded Game” and “Most Valuable Esports Team,”. These new additions show the awards are considerate of relatively recent trends in gaming; crowdfunding for example hasn’t been around for that long. All developers are encouraged to submit their games from 2014.
Last year The Last of Us won Game of the Year. What game do you think should win this year? Tell us in the comments below!
