The Game Awards 2019: Every result, world premiere, reveal and surprise

The Game Awards, the video game equivalent of the Oscars without all the "who's going to host this year?" drama, are over for another year and we have all the winners (and losers) right here. While the ceremony is first and foremost about celebrating the year in video games, it's also a vehicle for companies to reveal some of the projects and games they've been keeping under wraps in the Awards' hotly-anticipated "World Premieres." 

In 2019, those World Premieres were kind of bonkers. There was an entirely new Xbox console announced, on stage. It kind of blew everyone away. There was also trailer after trailer after trailer after trailer. Some of the highlights included a brand new Hellblade game that made my eyes water and Weird West, which looked stylish as all get up. At times, the Game Awards 2019 felt like one giant advert that kept getting interrupted by an awards ceremony. 

Oh, and Chvrches played -- that wasn't a world premiere -- but it was just really bloody good entertainment.

If you want to grab the results and run, then cradle your BB and slam down a Monster Energy drink, because we've got all the results, world premieres and trailers right here. If you want to lambaste me for my choice in video game greatness, keep it civil in our comments or go HAM on Twitter.

You'll find a list of the winners below and an extensive play-by-play further down the page. All the premiere trailers appear right down the bottom. Game on, gamers!

The Game Awards winners

Category winners are in bold. The Esports categories are toward the bottom. 

Game of the Year

• Control
• Death Stranding 
• Resident Evil 2 
• Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice
• Super Smash Bros. Ultimate
• The Outer Worlds 

Best Community Support

• Apex Legends
• Destiny 2 
• Final Fantasy XIV
• Fortnite 
• Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Siege

Best Score/Music   

• Cadence of Hyrule 
• Death Stranding 
• Devil May Cry 5  
• Kingdom Hearts III 
• Sayonara Wild Hearts

Best Narrative

• A Plague Tale: Innocence 
• Control
• Death Stranding 
• Disco Elysium 
• The Outer Worlds 

Best Fighting Game

• Dead or Alive 6 -- Team Ninja/Koei Tecmo
• Jump Force -- Spike Chunsoft/Bandai Namco
• Mortal Kombat 11 -- NetherRealm/Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment
• Samurai Shodown -- SNK Corporation/Athlon Games
• Super Smash Bros. Ultimate -- Bandai Namco/Sora Ltd./Nintendo

Best Audio Design   

• Call of Duty: Modern Warfare
• Control 
• Death Stranding
• Gears 5 
• Resident Evil 2 
• Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice 

Best Strategy Game

• Age of Wonders: Planetfall 
• Anno 1800
• Fire Emblem: Three Houses 
• Total War: Three Kingdoms 
• Tropico 6 
• Wargroove 

Content Creator of the Year

• Jack "Courage" Dunlop
• Benjamin "Dr. Lupo" Lupo
• Soleil "Ewok" Wheeler
• David "Grefg" Martínez
• Michael "Shroud" Grzesiek 

Best Art Direction   

• Control  
• Death Stranding  
• Gris  
• Sayonara Wild Hearts  
• Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice
• The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening 

Best Action Game

• Apex Legends -- Respawn Entertainment/Electronic Arts
• Astral Chain -- Platinum Games/Nintendo
• Call of Duty: Modern Warfare -- Infinity Ward/Activision
• Devil May Cry 5 -- Capcom
• Gears 5 -- The Coalition/Xbox Game Studios
• Metro Exodus -- 4A Games/Deep Silver

Games for Impact

• Concrete Genie -- Pixelopus/Sony Interactive Entertainment
• Gris -- Nomada Studio/Devolver Digital
• Kind Words -- Popcannibal
• Life Is Strange 2 -- Dontnod/Square Enix
• Sea of Solitude -- Jo-Mei Games/Electronic Arts

Best Family Game

• Luigi's Mansion 3
• Ring Fit Adventure 
• Super Mario Maker 2 
• Super Smash Bros. Ultimate 
• Yoshi's Crafted World 

Best Sports/Racing Game

• Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled -- Beenox/Activision
• Dirt Rally 2.0 -- Codemasters
• eFootball Pro Evolution Soccer 2020 -- PES Productions/Konami
• F1 2019 -- Codemasters
• FIFA 20 -- EA Sports

Best Mobile Game

• Call of Duty: Mobile -- TiMi Studios/Activision
• Grindstone -- Capybara Games
• Sayonara Wild Hearts -- Simogo/Annapurna Interactive
• Sky: Children of Light -- Thatgamecompany
• What the Golf? -- Tribland

Best Multiplayer Game

• Apex Legends -- Respawn Entertainment/Electronic Arts
• Borderlands 3 -- Gearbox/2K Games
• Call of Duty: Modern Warfare -- Infinity Ward/Activision
• Tetris 99 -- Arika/Nintendo
• Tom Clancy's The Division 2 -- Massive Entertainment/Ubisoft 

Best Ongoing Game

• Apex Legends 
• Destiny 2 
• Final Fantasy XIV 
• Fortnite
• Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Siege

Best VR/AR Game

• Asgard's Wrath -- Sanzaru Games/Oculus Studios
• Blood & Truth -- SIE London Studio/Sony Interactive Entertainment
• Beat Saber -- Beat Games
• No Man's Sky -- Hello Games
• Trover Saves the Universe -- Squanch Games

Best Performance

• Ashly Burch as Parvati Holcomb -- The Outer Worlds
• Courtney Hope as Jesse Faden -- Control
• Laura Bailey as Kait Diaz -- Gears 5
• Mads Mikkelsen as Cliff -- Death Stranding
• Matthew Porretta as Dr. Casper Darling -- Control
• Norman Reedus as Sam Porter Bridges -- Death Stranding

Player's Voice 

• Death Stranding 
• Fire Emblem: Three Houses 
• Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order 
• Super Smash Bros. Ultimate 

Fresh Indie Game 

• ZA/UM for Disco Elysium
• Nomada Studio for Gris
• DeadToast Entertainment for My Friend Pedro
• Mobius Digital for Outer Wilds
• MegaCrit for Slay the Spire
• House House for Untitled Goose Game

Best Role Playing Game

• Disco Elysium -- ZA/UM
• Final Fantasy XIV -- Square Enix
• Kingdom Hearts III -- Square Enix
• Monster Hunter World: Iceborne -- Capcom
• The Outer Worlds -- Obsidian Entertainment/Private Division

Best Independent Game

• Baba Is You -- Hempuli
• Disco Elysium -- ZA/UM
• Katana Zero -- Askiisoft/Devolver Digital
• Outer Wilds -- Mobius Digital/Annapurna Interactive
• Untitled Goose Game -- House House/Panic 

Best Game Direction

• Control 
• Death Stranding 
• Resident Evil 2
• Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice
• Outer Wilds 

Best Action/Adventure Game

• Borderlands 3 -- Gearbox/2K Games
• Control -- Remedy Entertainment/505 Games
• Death Stranding -- Kojima Productions/Sony Interactive Entertainment
• Resident Evil 2 -- Capcom
• The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening -- Grezzo/Nintendo
• Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice -- FromSoftware/Activision

Esports Awards

Best Esports Game

• Counter-Strike: Global Offensive
• Dota 2 
• Fortnite 
• League of Legends 
• Overwatch

Best Esports Coach

• Eric "adreN" Hoag (Team Liquid, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive)
• Nu-ri "Cain" Jang (Team Liquid, League of Legends)
• Fabian "GrabbZ" Lohmann (G2 Esports, League of Legends)
• Kim "Kkoma" Jeong-gyun (SK Telecom T1, League of Legends)
• Titouan "Sockshka" Merloz (OG, Dota 2)
• Danny "Zonic" Sørensen (Astralis, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive)

Best Esports Event

• 2019 League of Legends World Championship
• 2019 Overwatch League Grand Finals
• EVO 2019
• Fortnite World Cup
• IEM Katowice 2019
• The International 2019 

Best Esports Host

• Alex "Goldenboy" Mendez
• Alex "Machine" Richardson
• Duan "Candice" Yu-Shuang
• Eefje "Sjokz" Depoortere
• Paul "Redeye" Chaloner 

Best Esports Team

• Astralis (Counter-Strike: Global Offensive)
• G2 Esports (League of Legends)
• OG (Dota 2)
• San Francisco Shock (Overwatch League) 
• Team Liquid (Counter-Strike: Global Offensive)

Best Esports Player

• Kyle "Bugha" Giersdorf 
• Lee "Faker" Sang-hyeok
• Luka "Perkz" Perkovic 
• Oleksandr "S1mple" Kostyliev 
• Jay "Sinatraa" Won 

The Game Awards highlights and reactions

The ceremony begins with Lauren Mayberry and Chvrches absolutely killing it singing "Death Stranding". She's sporting some Mads Mikkelsen-black-ink under her eyes and the string section is just going BANG. Anyway, Chvrches are the best. I can actually just stop watching after this.

Yes, boss. It is good. 

Our first award is for Best Narrative and is presented by Jonathan Nolan, co-creator of HBO's Westworld. He makes a couple of jokes that land pretty well and knocks the Sonic movie. Absolutely wonderful. Disco Elysium beats out Death Stranding. That's a really good game with some impressive writing -- it even got a 10/10 on GameSpot.

Our first Reggie sighting warms hearts.

HOLY MOLY NEW XBOX!!!!!

A new trailer, featuring "The Dream of Life" by Alan Watts, appears and we have the full story here: It's a new Xbox Console: The Xbox Series X. Which we are already going to shorten to XSX right here, aren't we? Phil Spencer comes out to detail it. 

There's not a whole lot of details but Phil Spencer, head of Xbox comes out to reveal a project early in development and it's from the Ninja Theory team -- the guys behind Hellblade. It's actually a Hellblade sequel, known as Senua's Saga. The team at Ninja Theory are doing some amazing things and this in-engine trailer looks unreal. CNET recently spoke to Ninja Theory about an ambitious project using video games to battle mental health.

Okay back to the regularly scheduled programming (there's a new Xbox though wow):

Fresh off his Fortnite World Cup win, where he took home $3 million in prize money, Bugha takes out the best Esports player award for 2019.

The first PlayStation 5 just got announced and it's coming Holiday 2020 so... guess we better get a PlayStation release date soon? It's called Godfall and it's a brand new IP from Gearbox. Keith Lee and Steve Gibson are here to chat about it and they are calling it a loot-slasher. It's a solo and co-op game. Keith Lee is definitely reading off a teleprompter and it's kind of weird but man, I wouldn't be able to control myself up there so, big ups Keith!

Geoff returns and rattles off three awards really quickly before reminding us that it's not all about PlayStation and Xbox, there's a third mega-corporation we haven't really heard from yet: Nintendo.

Looks like a new game from the Bravely Default team. Actually, it's just a Bravely Default game: Bravely Default II.

We get a short showing for Magic: The Gathering Arena and then its straight into another World Premiere and then the star of E3: Ikumi Nakamura is here to award the Best Art Direction trophy. Oh my god, she is everything. There is none better... or is there? We couldn't get a repeat of E3 with Keanu.... could we?

Fortnite's got a big Star Wars Risky Reels trailer coming this Saturday and J.J. Abrams is here. He explains you have to be in the game to see the trailer but he doesn't really know how to end his message. J.J., as we know, is not great at endings... *zing*.

Then... uh, someone presses the wrong button and the next big reveal comes: Everyone playing at the time will get a TIE glider.

I have no idea what I am watching. There's a lady, pale and ghostly, and she's twirling around in the dark next to some rocks and trees. There are weird dudes, with no mouths. Oh right, this is Sons of the Forest. Excellent.

I think this is a brand new Harley Quinn trailer? For the new Birds of Prey film! 

Oh, nice CyberPunk 2077 has a lot of really big names on their soundtrack. Refused, Grimes, Run The Jewels, A$AP Rocky, Nina Kraviz, Deadly Hunta, Rat Boy, Tina Guo ... the list goes on. Pretty remarkable set of artists. 

Speaking of... the awards moves onto another performance. A striking red column of light and the silhouette of a dancer as code starts scrawling in the darkness. 

It's Grimes? I fully expect a Cybertruck to show up in the next five minutes... oh wait, there's Elon Musk in the audience! That was super awkward. He wanted to give a standing ovation and yet... no one else did. So he did that awkward thing where you go to stand as if you're giving up your seat for a lady on the bus but then she says no it's okay you sit there and then you're like oh but don't you want to and then she's like oh sincerely it's fine...

Anyway, here's Norman Reedus. It's been a while since we have had any actual awards? So that's kind of nice to see it's still an awards show. 

He awards Best Action Game to Devil May Cry 5 and then we get a new trailer for a Dungeons & Dragons game with the pretty metal In Flames as a backing track. More awards... well, now we get interrupted by Mirage from Apex Legends. He wants to talk about a big Apex Legends party. A rap horn blares in the distance. My heart breaks in my chest. A single tear runs down my cheek. What have we done to this world? Why have we done this to ourselves.

Ah, the awards part was fleeting. We've got more trailers and adverts now guys!

Honeydew and Beaker are here. They are muppets. Beaker is in VR goggles. Not sure what brand. Honeydew just explained that you can't get these goggles off: They are special Muppets VR. They are hear to announce "a new game" which is actually just an Untitled Goose Game skit with Beaker walking around absolutely terrified. I giggled. But Norman Reedus did not.

Oh god, they made a Goose Muppet. This absolutely rules, I am sorry, but this rules. They are here to announce the Games For Impact award -- it goes to Gris. 

We just rattled through three major awards -- Best Sports/Racing, Best Family and Best Mobile games: They went to Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled, Luigi's Mansion 3 (absolutely baller game) and Call of Duty: Mobile

Another World Premiere from WolfEye Studios and it's a western-type, sci-fi type called the Weird West, an Action-RPG from the co-creators of Dishonored and Prey. Has a top-down style, really stylish, great art, not much detail -- but looks good. When we get back Geoff calls it "Wild West".

He's had a couple of stumbles, the great man. He also called Ori something incorrect. We love it here at CNET.

Weirdly, we haven't seen much from Google Stadia at all -- not a lot of talk about streaming services in general, but they have commercials that are... super weird. It feels like Stadia really does not know what the audience wants at all.

Ninja turns up in some sort of camo suit that, look, I am not going to lie big yin, it's not a look. He announces the Best Multiplayer Game is Apex Legends, which really did capture people's attention this year. Was an incredible strategy they went with to release this game and it's still moving along wonderfully. A well-deserved win.

We have a new Ghosts of Tsushima trailer now. It looks impressive. It's a cinematic gameplay trailer, so it seems to be mostly in-engine, but it seems very choreographed. We meet the titular The Ghost, presumably from Tsushima. Then we get some live music to accompany it -- the game will release in Summer 2020. 

Now another premiere we knew about: Gears Tactics. A game nobody asked for, but by golly, you're getting it. We've seens ome gameplay before and I am sure it will be great. Gears is great. Looks very X-COM to me and why *wouldn't* you go X-COM. The Seeker plays in the background. That one is out in April 2020.

Big mood below:

Sydnee Goodman is back and she's presenting an award for the Best Ongoing Game, which sounds like an absolute nightmare to me. Let me off the ride. I can't keep going. Fortnite takes the win here. People are really annoyed about the fact Final Fantasy XIV didn't win on the line.

Geoff starts rattling off awards again. Here we go!

Esports Game of the Year goes to League of Legends, Best VR/AR game goes to Beat Saber and Mads Mikkelsen wins Best Performance for his work in Death Stranding. He's not here and no one gets to accept the award. Kind of weird that a performance category is just... brushed aside? Maybe that's just me?

Alright, after another reel of ads (surprise!) we are back with the Green Day live performance. They start with "Welcome To Paradise", which seems entirely wrong for this particular part of the ceremony. Was everything before this just a hellscape of infinite sadness that lasted for two and a half hours? Is the Paradise part beginning now? Am I being welcomed now? I don't know I am having a bit of a meltdown here. 

They continue with the new one: "Father Of All..." and Billie Joe, lead singer of Green Day, invites some people up to dance. Beat Saber and Green Day drops tonight, Geoff is actually so, so, so excited about this.

We've got five awards to go yet people. That's another 4582 ads. Buckle up.

Hold up, hit the snooze button. Reggie is here. Reggie Fils-Aime is here and he comes out with sunglasses on. "Fils-A-Mech is in the house," he declares.

What a star. He reveals the winner of Fresh Indie Game and he believes it's the "most important award of the night" -- it's Disco Elysium. It turns out I missed the fact it won both Best RPG and Best Indie game when it picked up awards earlier in the night. What an absolutely bizarre way to say congratulations on your great achievement and... also just ignore the other categories but I guess you don't want to get in the way of the adverts. 

Ashly Birch is out here now handing out the Ward for Best Game Direction and it goes to Death Stranding. That makes it the third win for Death Stranding tonight and it's... Actually, let's not go there, hey. Congratulations Hideo Kojima, who would have thought a game about babies in a vat would win best game direction at the Game Awards hosted by your very good friend Geoff Keighley, baby!

We have one award to go and can I just say here and now: Thank you.

I can also say: What happened to Best Action/Adventure Game? 

GUYS, CAN SOMEONE TELL ME? RIP BEST ACTION/ADVENTURE GAME. REST IN PEACE.

Michelle Rodriguez and Vin Diesel come out and there's a Fast N Furious game trailer. It actually looks so dated. It is kind of exposed on this big stage. That's one I would have stashed away for an announce some other time. They talk about being gamers forever, which is fun.

Before the big final Game of the Year announcement we get a huge orchestral score and a couple of singers. Vin and Michelle are presenting the final award. Vin announces Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice as the Game of the Year. He calls it Sek-e-row. Gamers, forever.

It also wins the Best Action/Adventure Game category at the same time, taking home 2 awards.

That's all folks, here's the final tally for multi-award winners:

PRE-SHOW

Oh, I can taste it now... the sweet tang of the Game Awards like a freshly-opened can of Monster*
*I am not sponsored by Monster.

Alright, we are under way here ladies and gentleman, boys and girls. We've got a 30 minute pre-show first up and it's straight into the first award -- Best Community Support. Destiny 2 takes that gong home. 

Our first World Premiere is for Nintendo Switch title Marvel: Ultimate Alliance 3 The Black Order. We knew this one was coming, it's a new trailer, it's Very Marvel Ultimate Alliance and that's totally fine with me.

Lual Mayen drops in to discuss his game Salaam. He explains how when you buy medicine and food in the game it goes to real-world refugees. This is the kind of story that shouldn't be on the "pre-show" but a straight up ceremony part.

Second award is up -- Best score and music -- it's Death Stranding's first win of the night. 

This is actually going at an unreal pace so far. Award -- trailer -- award -- trailer. Another World Premiere is the trailer for Maneater, which sadly isn't a video game about the Nelly Furtado song. Or the Hall & Oates song! So many good songs to use.

Then we drop in with 4 straight Esports awards, for the best coach, host, event and team -- you can see the winners above.

Next: An advertisement for the Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson vehicle "Jumanji: The Next Level" which, if you aren't aware, is a movie about being inside a video game. Very clever tie-in, very impressed. Anyway, I am going to go drink some VOSS water and do some weights at Iron Paradise, bye.

Okay, just kidding I am still here. 

Okay what is this thing? There's a Ghibli-esque hand-drawn animation trailer with a white puffball named Foo? That's I think an alien and he comes back as some whack JoJo's Bizarre Adventure type character. It appears to be a trailer for No More Heroes III. It is certainly a trailer for No More Heroes III -- that's coming in 2020. That was... cool.

Another Final Fantasy VII Remake trailer is here. Aerith (Aeris) features prominently but let's not talk about that... 

The final pre-show award is for Best Fighting Game and, perhaps, unsurprisingly the winner is Super Smash Bros. Ultimate. It's also Doug Bowser's first appearance on the stage. We love Dougy here at CNET and by we, I mean just me. Reggie is also slated to make an appearance this evening, so the showdown between these two should be lit. 

The Game Awards trailers and premieres

As we find the trailers on YouTube, we will update down here!

Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3: The Black Order

Maneater

Humankind

No More Heroes III

Final Fantasy VII Remake latest trailer

Joker in Mortal Kombat 

The Xbox Series X

Hellblade II: Senua's Saga

Godfall

Bravely Default II

Warframe: Empyrean

Magic: The Gathering Arena

Control - Official Expeditions

Sons of the Forest

Ruined King: A League of Legends Story

Dungeons & Dragons Dark Alliance

Ori & The Will of the Wisps

Weird West

Magic Legends

Ghost of Tsushima

Gears Tactics

Naraka Bladepoint

Green Day Performance

Black Desert Mobile

New World

Nine to Five

The Wolf Among Us 2

The Elder Scrolls Online: Elsweyr

Asgard's Wrath

Fast & Furious Crossroads

Correction 2:26 p.m. PT: An earlier version of this article included the Hall & Oates song "Maneater" as the trailer to TripWire Interactive's game "Maneater". This has now been corrected.