Well, The Game Awards for 2024 just ended a few days ago and I can say it was marginally better than last year’s event. Sure, there were a few missteps here and there (and we’ll probably look into a couple of them here) but things did feel much more smooth. There were some genuinely good World Premieres shown off as well (which we’ll also tackle a bit later). There’s still a bit of an imbalance when it comes to actually handing out awards on stage and those World Premiere trailers. Still, I do think Geoff Keighley is starting to find a good mixture between the two. And it only took him a decade to start figuring it out! So, congratulations, Geoff Keighley!

But like with every year, there are some moments during The Game Awards that I feel need a little more special mention. Not because they delivered a super hype World Premiere or whatever. Rather, these are the moments that happened during the show that just came off as rather odd to me. So, with that, let’s talk about the “awards” I would want to give out for the Game Awards in 2024!

The “What Are You Standing Up For?” Award

The “What Are You Standing Up For?” Award is for the person who just felt the need to start walking up to the stage… even though they weren’t called up to the stage. The winner for this year is, without a doubt, Ken Kutaragi.

Now, I can’t really blame Ken Kutaragi for standing up and ready himself to bask in the adulation of the Game Awards audience. After all, Geoff Keighley just gave him a special mention as he is the “Father of the PlayStation” and, without him, Sony wouldn’t be the gaming juggernaut it is today. However, I still find it rather embarrassing for him to walk to the stage and take a bow only for Geoff Keighley to make an awkward segue to Statler and Waldorf from The Muppets. Some say he’s still standing there waiting for his moment.

The “No Duh!” Award

The “No Duh!” Award is given to the winner of any particular category wherein, well, there wasn’t any real competition to begin with. So, of course, it was going to win! This year, the award goes to Tekken 8.

While the fighting game community was eating good in 2024 thanks to games like Street Fighter 6, King of Fighter XV, Guilty Gear Strive and many more older games still delivering, there weren’t any real new fighting games that came out this year. Granblue Fantasy Versus: Rising was more of an update to the first game and, as good as Marvel Vs. Capcom Fighting Collection: Arcade Classics is, it’s still just a compilation of classic games.

The only real competition to Tekken 8 would be Dragon Ball: Sparking! Zero but it doesn’t feel like a competitive fighting game in the traditional sense. So, it was smart for The Game Awards to avoid any controversy and give the win to Tekken 8. Besides, it is a great fighting game so it does deserve to win anyways.

Speaking of Tekken 8…

The “That’s the Wrong Final Fantasy Character!” Award

This award is given to the Final Fantasy character who is joining the Tekken 8 roster when that slot should have been given to Tifa Lockhart. The winner for this category is Final Fantasy XVI‘s Clive Rosfield.

In all honesty, Tifa Lockhard seems built to be in a fighting game. As someone who doesn’t use any fancy weapons and relies on her punches and kicks, she would be perfect in a game like Tekken 8. However, it appear the head honchos of Final Fantasy don’t want her in them, perhaps because they wouldn’t want her to get beat up by “lesser” fighters. So, they opted to add Clive Rosfield to the roster. Well, I guess Noctis played pretty well so I am okay with Clive’s entry. But still, when’s Tifa?

The “I’ll Have What He’s Having” Award

This award is given to the person who, in all likelihood, took a little sumthing sumthing to get himself super hyped to speak to the live crowd of The Game Awards. And the award goes to Josef Fares, the head honcho of Hazelight Studios.

To be fair, Josef Fares does look like, shall we say, a far out guy. What I mean by that he’s more of a non-conformist so he doesn’t seem like the type of guy can be reined in, even if he is told to tone himself down in a global show like The Game Awards. Still, if he does take a little something extra so he can be as confident as he is during this segment, I wanna know what that substance is.

The “You Didn’t Have To Go So Hard But I Love You For Doing So” Award

This is the award given to the person during The Game Awards who went above and beyond the call of duty during the show. This is to recognize a person’s efforts to not just give a hundred percent but to do so much more than that. Like with every entry of The Game Awards, the winner is Flute Guy.

While he did have some competition from Keytar Man this year, Flute Guy, real name Pedro Eustache, was an unstoppable force during the traditional musical medley performed prior to the announcement of the winner of Game of the Year.

Not only did Flute Guy gave us a performance filled with a lot of energy and exuberance, he did so while playing more than just one instrument, making the other guys in the orchestra look lazy with their one single instrument! At one point, Pedro Eustache could be seen holding one giant wind instrument in one hand while blowing into a teeny tiny flute in the other! He actually dual wielded two wing instruments at the same time! If that doesn’t deserve an award, I don’t know what does!

BONUS: The “Are You In The Right Awards Show?” Award

This is the award given to the person who obviously isn’t incredibly passionate about gaming but he or she still showed up to The Game Awards. The winner of this award is Harrison Ford.

As good as an actor Harrison Ford is, I’m pretty sure he doesn’t know a lick about the gaming industry or even the people he was presenting with. Don’t get me wrong! This was still a pretty cool moment. But Harrison Ford just looked extremely out of his element here.

What other “awards” would you give to the Game Awards 2024 show? Let me know in the comments section below!