The Special Recognition Awards, given out by Kraków Technology Park to those especially well-deserving in the Polish games industry, went to Łukasz Hacura – founder of Anshar Studios. It’s worth mentioning that the company – responsible for the popular Gamedec, among others – is celebrating its tenth year of operation.
Digital Dragons Awards for 2022 – winners
Best Polish Game: Dying Light 2: Stay Human (Techland)
Best Polish Game Art: Serial Cleaners (Draw Distance)
Best Polish Game Audio: BLACKTAIL (THE PARASIGHT)
Best Polish Game Design: Dying Light 2: Stay Human (Techland)
Best Ongoing Polish Game: Cyberpunk 2077 (CD PROJEKT RED)
Best Foreign Game: Elden Ring (FromSoftware)
Special Recognition Award: Łukasz Hacura
The list of nominated games in all Polish categories was co-created by the entire gamedev community via a survey sent out by the organizers. The final verdict was in the hands of the jury: Wojciech Kasprzyk (Gameplanet), Mateusz Witczak, dr hab. Paweł Węgrzyn (Uniwersytet Jagielloński), Krystian Smoszna (Gry-OnLine.pl), Mariusz Borkowski (GameMusic), Michał Król (Graczpospolita), Marcin Wronka (Ustatkowany Gracz), Ewa Czekała (Polsat Games) and Shin Imai (IGN Japan).
The last couple years belong to the darker winners of Digital Dragons Awards – last year The Medium won while this year Dying Light 2 is celebrating. Techland did its absolute best releasing a sequel worthy of its great first instalment. While the competition was stiff, Aiden’s adventures can once again boast fluent parkour, combat that’s just a lot of fun and adrenaline that’s boiling during night time treks through the city. The game’s promised constant evolution and support over the years guarantees new expansions and activities as we wait for the next game. While I’m used to the high quality of Polish games I am still tremendously happy that such big titles are being made in our studios. - said Marcin Wronka, ustatkowanygracz.pl, jury member.
At this year’s Digital Dragons Awards we saw the triumphs of literally giant games – Cyberpunk, Dying Light 2, Elden Ring. Quite deserved triumphs, results of not only budgets and hard work, but also great design, gameplay and devotion to their fans. But it is also a victory for the indie or premium indie segments: Serial Cleaners and BLACKTAIL are authentically, audio-visually outstanding in a way that seemingly only smaller titles can manage. In fact, all the nominees deserved to win, including the smaller, adorable Railbound. Not to mention the titles that weren’t nominated – it’s not their fault but of the absolute cornucopia provided by the Polish and global gamedev. - Jacek Wandzel, Digital Dragons Awards and Indie Showcase coordinator added.
Digital Dragons Conference continues
This year’s gala was hosted by Polsat Games’ journalists Radosław Nałęcz and Tadeusz Zieliński, co-creators of the TV show Faux Paux, alongside Anna Krampus-Sepielak, Chief of Digital Dragons from the Krakow Technology Park. The gala’s jazzy score was provided by Krakow Street Band.
The winner in the Best Polish Game category received a special prize funded by the conference's technology partner, AMD, in the form of a professional PC kit, at the heart of which is an extremely powerful Ryzen Threadripper Pro processor.
The Best Polish Game Audio award was presented by Marta Nawrocka, a representative of the Krakow Film Music Festival. Last year, the KPT and the FMF established cooperation and since then the works awarded in the music category have been presented during the FMF. Last year's winner - Arkadiusz Reikowski's soundtrack from The Medium - will be heard on May 25.
For those who couldn’t make it in person to the ICE Congress Centre, the event will be broadcasted on Polsat Games on May 26 at 8pm and later on Super Polsat and Interia. The event was supported by the Małopolska Voivodeship, which is also Digital Dragons’ main partner.
The awards gala finished the first day of Digital Dragons, an international B2B conference for the games industry. This year’s edition was record-breaking – Kraków was visited by over 2300 guests from all over the world. The organizer, Krakow Technology Park, is preparing more for Tuesday, May 16. Apart from hours upon hours of expert lectures and discussions we will also learn of the winners of this year’s Indie Showcase – a review of the most interesting independent games.
Partners
MAIN PARTNER
Województwo Małopolskie is the Main Partner of the event: the regional authorities implementing a range of projects that serve innovation and economic development of Małopolska, and its attractiveness for investors. Małopolska is a perfect location for running business, particularly based on new technologies. Evidence of that is the number of new ventures growing every year, including dynamically developing tech start-ups. Thanks to the massive support given to entrepreneurship and the optimal utilization of EU funds and other public funds, Województwo Małopolskie positively stands out among other voivodships.
MAIN SPONSOR
Techland is one of the biggest and best-known Polish game developers with studios in Wroclaw and Warsaw. For over 30 years, we've carried a tradition of providing gamers with unforgettable experiences. We're an international team of over 400 highly-skilled professionals driven by a passion for gaming, always striving for the best quality.
We’re fueled by the support of our global community built on the foundation of successful AAA franchises such as Call of Juarez, Dead Island, or Dying Light. The gamers' trust in our games has resulted in our newest project, Dying Light 2 Stay Human, selling more than 5 million copies across all platforms within the first month after release.
On top of continuously growing the world of Dying Light through a robust post-launch support plan for Dying Light 2 Stay Human, we're also working on an unannounced AAA Open World Action RPG set in a brand new fantasy universe; our biggest project to date.
Techland's mission strictly determines every aspect of our work: we want to create unforgettable experiences.
The press kit for the event is available at the following link: https://pr-outreach.com/en/game/digital-dragons,73.
For any questions about Digital Dragons please get in touch with Agnieszka Szóstak at agnieszka.szostak@pr-outreach.com or call +48 881 951 601.