The eSports Industry Awards is a thing and they have announced their finalists and categories. The awards will be taking place on Monday, November 21st in Brewery, London. Julia Hardy (@itsJuliahardy) and Gadget Show’s Jason Bradbury (@JasonBradbury) will host as over 600 figures in eSports will gather for the event. which will also be streamed live on Now TV, Twitch, and Gfinity. An international judging panel consisting of eSports media, broadcasters, and ex-players will determine the overall winners. Public voting will also be available later in the year.
Here are the finalists for each category that have been announced along with my pick for the winners! A lot of my picks are not necessarily who I think will win but just my personal favourites of the nominations.
Best eSports Coverage Website 2016
GosuGamers
HLTV.org
Dexerto
ESPN
PC Gamer
Aftonbladet E-sport
Yahoo Esports
Red Bull eSports
The Score eSports
The Daily Dot
Team Liquid
The eSports Observer
Slingshot eSports
Jonny eSports Pick: AYBOnline! Well, maybe next year. From this list, I like The Daily Dot a lot.
Best Hardware Provider
Intel
SteelSeries
BenQ
Creative
Logitech G
Plantronics Gaming
Astro Gaming
Scuf Gaming
AMD
Asus ROG
MSI
Razer
HyperX
Alienware
HP
Acer
Jonny eSports Pick: Logitech, mostly because I just got a G810 keyboard this year and love it.
Best Streaming Platform
Twitch
YouTube
Azubu
MLG.tv
Hitbox
Jonny eSports Pick: Right now it’s YouTube for me until Twitch finally switches completely over to HTML5.
eSports Commercial Partner of the Year
G2A
Newegg
Intel
Turtle Beach Europe
AlphaDraft
HTC
Monster
DXRacer
Red Bull
Anheuser-Busch InBev
Jonny eSports Pick: How’s this even decided? The company that throws out the most cash? I’ll give this to HTC just because of the Hai Cloud 9 Retirement commercial
eSports Game of the Year
CS:GO – Valve
League of Legends – Riot Games
Dota 2 – Valve
StarCraft II – Blizzard Entertainment
Call of Duty – Activision
Smite – Hi-Rez Studios
Halo – Microsoft
Heroes of the Storm – Blizzard Entertainment
Overwatch – Blizzard Entertainment
Rocket League – Psyonix
Super Smash Bros – Nintendo
Street Fighter V – Capcom
Jonny eSports Pick: Counter-Strike keeps getting better every year. Shout out to Rocket League and Smash Bros though!
eSports Journalist of the Year
Richard Lewis
Duncan Shields
Jacob Wolf
Tyler Erzberger
Chris Higgins
Philippa Warr
Chris Thursten
Jonny eSports Pick: Maybe someday I’ll make this list but until then Tyler Erzberger is a personal favourite.
eSports Photographer of the Year
Joe Brady
Stephanie Lindgren
Helena Kristiansson
Robert Paul
Adela Sznajder
Jonny eSports Pick: I honestly don’t have an opinion on this one. Sorry photographers!
eSports Publisher of the Year
Valve Corporation
Activision
Blizzard Entertainment
Ubisoft
EA
Microsoft
Capcom
Nintendo
Sony Computer Entertainment
Codemasters
Psyonix
Riot Games
Jonny eSports Pick: Blizzard wins because Overwatch
New eSports Game of the Year
Rocket League – Psyonix
Overwatch – Blizzard Entertainment
Vainglory – Super Evil Megacorp
Street Fighter V – Capcom
FIFA 16 – EA Sports
Jonny eSports Pick: Overwatch again because Overwatch. Rocket League is dope and Vainglory is very good too though.
Streamer of the Year
Spencer FC
Steel
Lirik
Ali A
KSI
PhantomL0rd
Sodapoppin
Michael “Imaqtpie” Santana
Jonny eSports Pick: Ayy, let’s go! Imaqtpie!
Finalists in the following categories will be announced later this year:
2016 Broadcaster of the Year
Best Live Event 2016
Console Player of the Year
eSports Personality of the Year
eSports Rookie of the Year
eSports Team of the Year
PC Player of the Year
UK eSports Player of the Year
Jonny eSports is the co-host of the Outplay Podcast that airs live on Twitch.tv/aybtv on Wednesdays at 7:30pm, as well as the host of the reSports Radio Show (Sundays at 4pm on CKUW 95.9FM in Winnipeg) and Director of Into The League. He still isn’t level 5 in Pokemon GO because he’s a scrub. His opinions are his own.
