{"id":1655,"date":"2017-02-21T15:03:52","date_gmt":"2017-02-21T22:03:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.taterboy.com\/blog\/2017\/02\/dice-awards-turn-20-how-gamings-academy-awards-have-grown\/"},"modified":"2017-02-21T15:03:52","modified_gmt":"2017-02-21T22:03:52","slug":"dice-awards-turn-20-how-gamings-academy-awards-have-grown","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.taterboy.com\/blog\/2017\/02\/dice-awards-turn-20-how-gamings-academy-awards-have-grown\/","title":{"rendered":"DICE Awards turn 20: How gaming\u2019s Academy Awards have grown"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Freddieweb<\/a> http:\/\/1u88jj3r4db2x4txp44yqfj1.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/wong-day1-300×205.jpg 300w, cialis 40mg<\/a> http:\/\/1u88jj3r4db2x4txp44yqfj1.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/wong-day1.jpg 655w” sizes=”(max-width: 578px) 100vw, 578px”><\/p>\n

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Anniversaries have a way of creeping up on us.<\/p>\n

The game academy\u2019s annual DICE Awards<\/a> event is now in its 20th year, while the DICE Summit<\/a> event is in its 17th. I\u2019ve been to all of the summits, which gather the elite of the game industry in Las Vegas every year. I\u2019ll be going to the summit and awards again this week in Las Vegas, and I thought it would be nice to reminisce about the past 20 years of an event that honors the artists of the game industry.<\/p>\n

Now world-famous, the DICE Awards and the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences had a slow start. The awards show and the academy only got off the ground because a handful of people thought that games should get the same recognition as movies, books, and music.<\/p>\n

In 1992, entertainment lawyer Andrew Zucker started early efforts to create an academy that resembled the Academy of Motion Picture Artists, which puts on the Oscars. It held its initial show in 1994, hosted by actors Leslie Nielsen and Jonathan Taylor. A second show was held in 1995, and the ratings weren\u2019t good.<\/p>\n

\"Winners<\/p>\n

Above: Winners of the 4th annual DICE Awards.<\/p>\n

Image Credit: AIAS<\/em><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\u201cI think maybe five people watched it. There were more people in the room than were watching it on TV,\u201d joked Joseph Olin, who served as president of the AIAS from 2004 to 2010, in an interview with GamesBeat. Olin now serves as department chair for digital entertainment at the Universidad Pontificia Bolivariana, a private university in Medell\u00edn, Colombia. \u201cCan you believe it\u2019s 20 years since the academy started?\u201d<\/p>\n

In 1996, a second effort was rekindled to establish AIAS as a nonprofit group.\u00a0Nintendo executive Peter Main, Sega\u2019s Tom Kalinske, and game industry trade group leader Doug Lowenstein helped get it started. They chose game developer Glenn Entis as the first president of their fledgling group, and Lowenstein\u2019s group, which had changed its name from the Interactive Digital Software Association to the Entertainment Software Association, provided the early funding.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

Above: The early Call of Duty team (with Grant Collier speaking) at the 7th DICE Awards.<\/p>\n

Image Credit: AIAS<\/em><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

The organization evolved\u00a0and went through a few different leaders.\u00a0The ESA withdrew funding for a while. But the idea of video games as an art form didn\u2019t die.<\/p>\n

Rich Hilleman and Lorne Lanning, two veteran game makers, wanted to start the DICE Summit (short for Design Innovate Communicate Entertain) in order to fund the academy, which started holding its DICE Awards (then known as the Interactive Achievement Awards) on an annual basis starting in 1998.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe awards were given out based on peer recognition, which was \u2014 and still is \u2014 novel versus the other award systems,\u201d said Ted Price, the CEO of Insomniac Games. \u201cAs a game developer, I found this incredibly compelling. Receiving an award from other craftspeople in the industry is arguably the highest form of praise.\u201d<\/p>\n

Price joined the effort, helping to fund the academy as it struggled. He saw too many narrow-minded individuals who didn\u2019t recognize games as an art form. Like many game makers, he wanted everybody to get past the idea that video games caused violence and weren\u2019t good for much else.<\/p>\n

\u201cI remember being in a board meeting where we asked, how can we make the academy more relevant?\u201d said Price. \u201cWhile the awards were great and growing in popularity, we saw a chance to add more to the conversation around games. Rich Hilleman proposed holding a limited attendance conference in Vegas where the best and brightest were invited to share their ideas with the industry. It was at that moment the DICE Summit was born.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Bing<\/p>\n

Above: Bing Gordon spoke on the Golden Age of Gaming at the 14th DICE Awards.<\/p>\n

Image Credit: AIAS<\/em><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Started in 2000, the summits turned out to be inspiring in ways that the founders didn\u2019t imagine. They featured memorable talks from game leaders such as Jason Rubin<\/a>, Seamus Blackley, Mark Cerny<\/a>, Doug Lowenstein<\/a>, Bing Gordon<\/a> (as far as I could understand him), Jenova Chen<\/a>, Bobby Kotick<\/a>, Todd Howard<\/a>, Rhianna Pratchett<\/a>, and Jesse Schell<\/a>. Behind the scenes, Olin recalled it was very hard to get some of these people to talk.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere was a lot of negotiation when Bobby Kotick finally decided to speak,\u201d Olin said. \u201cThe drama is more about who wins the poker tournament.\u201d<\/p>\n

Schell, however, scored lots of laughs and video views for his talk on the gamification of everything.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe question for each DICE is, will someone speak from the heart? Because those are the talks we like the best,\u201d Olin said. \u201cThe challenge is to find people who are interesting who will say something.\u201d<\/p>\n

For me, the networking at the DICE Summit was always great, and I was able to meet people at DICE who gave me interesting scoops on the Xbox 360 and the PlayStation 3. The event is part of the joy of covering video games<\/a>. I remember one moment during DICE when Cliff \u201cCliffyB\u201d Bleszinski pitched Ed Fries, then at Microsoft Games, on a new title. Fries said he might give Bleszinski a chance. Fries turned to me and said, \u201cYou didn\u2019t hear this.\u201d And not long after that, work began on Microsoft\u2019s Gears of War.<\/p>\n

The DICE Summit also brought together artists from different media. Gabe Newell and JJ Abrams<\/a> gave a memorable talk in 2013 about the differences between movies and games (their collaboration still hasn\u2019t surfaced). And Metal Gear Solid creator Hideo Kojima went on stage<\/a> with filmmaker Guillermo Del Toro last year.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo me, what\u2019s magic about the AIAS is its mission to elevate the art and craft of games. It\u2019s easy to forget that just a few years ago, we were under siege,\u201d Price said. \u201cLegislators were drawing parallels between games and controlled substances. We were on the verge of being censored and having our creative rights stripped away. While the ESA commendably led the battle all the way to the Supreme Court, I think the efforts of the AIAS to demonstrate the value of games to society helped quite a bit. Games are complex, vibrant works of art, and the AIAS continually reminds us of this via the awards and DICE.\u201d<\/p>\n

The work of fighting for the cause of gaming as an art was exhausting. Olin left the AIAS in 2011 in part because he was worn out\u00a0and because everything took a few more calls to get done than it should have.<\/p>\n

\u201cI felt pretty good about what I had accomplished in my tenure, and I was tired of fighting,\u201d Olin said. \u201cIt was time for a change.\u201d<\/p>\n

In 2012, after Martin Rae had taken over, the summit reorganized its format<\/a>\u00a0and renamed the awards show as the DICE Awards. Jay Mohr, the comedian and longtime host of the awards, was dropped<\/a> from the show.<\/p>\n

\u201cI mixed the framework up, added roundtables, and shortened the schedule,\u201d Rae said. \u201cI wanted to have one or two talks that, after people left, could change the course of a business.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Martin<\/p>\n

Above: Martin Rae of the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences.<\/p>\n

Image Credit: AIAS<\/em><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Now the AIAS\u2019 mission is\u00a0to promote and advance the worldwide interactive entertainment community, recognize outstanding achievements in the interactive arts and sciences, and host an annual awards show, the DICE Awards, to enhance awareness of games as an interactive art form.<\/p>\n

\u201cTwenty years ago, the industry was still young, but one thing was clear. Video games were just as much an art form as an entertainment medium,\u201d said Don James, the executive vice president of operations at Nintendo of America and one of the initial instigators. \u201cA small group of game designers and industrial professionals felt the art form should be recognized. That was how it all started, and I am proud to still be part of the Academy and the DICE Awards. They are unique, as they are the only game award given by peers in the industry.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rae said he noticed during his tenure that the rise of social media made game developers more conscious of what they were saying on stage. In the age of livestreaming and Twitter, everyone was aware\u00a0of how their words could be taken out of context. #GamerGate, the rebellious anti-games-press and anti-feminist movement, didn\u2019t help.<\/p>\n

\"Geoff<\/p>\n

Above: Geoff Keighley (left), Guillermo Del Toro, and Hideo Kojima at the DICE Summit.<\/p>\n

Image Credit: Dean Takahashi<\/em><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\u201cIn the current entertainment climate, awards shows are difficult to do and be relevant and meaningful,\u201d Rae said. \u201cWe\u2019re a really cool industry. Patting ourselves on the back is good for people in the room. Making it relevant for people outside the room was hard.\u201d<\/p>\n

He added, \u201cThe conversations you have with people before they hit the stage are extraordinary. By the time they hit the stage, they\u2019re conscious of social media and press. It\u2019s always hard chasing great talent for the stage. I definitely saw people become more cautious. In the #GamerGate stage, people could have an opinion, state it, and then be eviscerated for it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rae said he tried to get more diverse people on stage as it reflected not only who made games but also who was playing games. But that fear of social media also hurt that effort, he said.<\/p>\n

\"Rhianna<\/p>\n

Above: Rhianna Pratchett, the writer of Rise of the Tomb Raider, at the DICE Summit.<\/p>\n

Image Credit: Dean Takahashi<\/em><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Going forward, Price believes that the academy can expand to become more relevant.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs the games industry continues to expand in new directions \u2014 with virtual reality and augmented reality for example \u2014 I think it\u2019s even more important for the academy to continue its mission in helping the world understand why games are culturally and socially relevant,\u201d Price said. \u201cThis is beneficial for all of us in that, at least in my opinion, it gives even more meaning to what we do in game development.\u201d<\/p>\n

Games are more global and diverse than ever before. They\u2019ve become a $100 billion industry worldwide.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think one big opportunity is for the AIAS to reach more developers and invite them to participate in the academy\u2019s mission to elevate our craft,\u201d Price said. \u201cWhether this is through joining the peer panels, speaking at or attending DICE, or just voting in the awards, the more voices we have, the better it is for our industry. Since the AIAS is non-profit, we do have limited resources. My hope is that existing members and the press can jump in and help introduce more developers to what we do.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Mike<\/p>\n

Above: Mike Fischer, formerly of Epic Games, is the new president of the AIAS.<\/p>\n

Image Credit: Dean Takahashi<\/em><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Mike Fischer is the new president of the academy, replacing Rae, who left last year. In an interview, Fischer said, \u201cI have been in the industry a long time. I was fortunate to have my career rise with the industry itself. I wanted to give something back, and what drove me crazy is I never felt our interactive art gets the respect it deserves as an art form.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fischer wants to make the AIAS more global and get it involved with the lives of members on a year-round basis. There are more than 30,000-plus members, though the U.S. alone has more than 220,000 game developers and other related employees.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe can continue to become more global,\u201d Fischer said. \u201cThe summit is still in its awkward teenage years, and it will continue to evolve.\u201d<\/p>\n

He looks forward to new technologies, such as the AR\u00a0technology of Magic Leap. Magic Leap\u2019s Graeme Devine will speak at this year\u2019s event while Price and Oculus\u2019 Jason Rubin will speak about VR.<\/p>\n

On Thursday night, for the 20th DICE Awards, the academy will have a video retrospective on the past two decades. And as part of the 20th anniversary celebration, the AIAS is releasing a video series dubbed \u201cThe Game Makers<\/a>,\u201d a series of interviews on the craft of making games.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are not the movie industry,\u201d Rae said. \u201cI get it. But they do an extraordinary job year-round cultivating the art. They treat the art form with reverence, and I think our industry can do a better job of that. The industry would do itself a service to rally around and do a better job of it. We need a vehicle for high-visibility recognition for people in our craft.\u201d<\/p>\n

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