The Winners of 2018

GAME OF THE YEAR

WINNER: Golf Clash – Playdemic

This award recognised the best mobile game released over the preceding year based on creativity, innovation and success.
To be eligible for this award, games must have been given a full release from November 1st 2016 onwards.

FINALISTS:

• Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp – DeNA / Nintendo
• Battle Bay – Rovio Entertainment
• Guns of Boom – Game Insight
• Homescapes – Playrix
• Iron Marines – Ironhide Games
• Lineage 2: Revolution – Netmarble
• Monument Valley 2 – Ustwo
• Titanfall: Assault – Particle City
• Warhammer Quest 2 – Perchang

BEST DEVELOPER

WINNER: Supercell

Any mobile games company with 11 or more staff that has released a game, or successfully grown an existing game, during the preceding year, as well as successfully expanded their business and made an impact on the industry through innovation, creativity and other initiatives.

FINALISTS:

• DeNA
• Gram Games
• Hutch
• Netmarble
• Outplay Entertainment
• Playdemic
• Playrix
• Roblox
• Rovio Entertainment

BEST INDIE DEVELOPER

WINNER: Adriaan de Jongh & Sylvain Tegroeg

This accolade recognised the achievements of a team of up to 10 developers that have released a game, or successfully grown an existing game, during the preceding year.

FINALISTS:

• Edgeworks Entertainment
• Fat Fish Games
• Foxglove Studios
• Juppiomenz
• Part Time Monkey
• Perchang
• Robot Circus
• Rumpus Animation
• Team Ocmo

BEST PUBLISHER

WINNER: Flaregames

Any company that has supported another developer in releasing a game on mobile devices during the preceding year, whether through publishing support, marketing, co-development or investment.

FINALISTS:

• iDreamSky
• Ketchapp
• Kongregate
• Miniclip
• Nexon M
• Scopely
• Spil Games
• Tencent
• Voodoo

BEST DEVELOPMENT TOOL

WINNER: Unity

This award was open to any company providing development tools that help developers make games on mobile platforms be that full game engines or related design tools.

FINALISTS:

• Corona
• Defold
• GameMaker Studio 2
• Haxe
• Megacool
• Roblox Studio
• Unreal Engine

BEST BACKEND SOLUTION

WINNER: GameSparks

This award recognised the companies that supported live games on the market through back-end services to ensure game servers run smoothly and help developers implement special online features.

FINALISTS:

• ChilliConnect
• Heroic Labs
• Photon
• PlayFab
• XtraLife

BEST ADVERTISING & UA

WINNER: Facebook

This accolade was for companies that supported the ecosystem through enabling user acquisition or monetisation through advertising and helped to drive this fast-growing business in games and developers to acquire more users.

FINALISTS:

• AppOnboard
• Google Ads
• Ironsource
• Leadbolt
• Unity Ads
• Vungle
• Zorka.mobi

BEST MARKETING CAMPAIGN

WINNER: Clash of Clans Builder Campaign – Supercell

This award recognised the best developer-run or third-party-run marketing campaigns over the preceding year that led to a game’s growth. This could be through any medium, including online, TV or other.

FINALISTS:

• Angry Birds Evolution: Tribute to Iron Maiden – Rovio Entertainment
• Fastlane: Road to Revenge – Space Ape Games
• Final Fantasy A New Empire: Alexis Ren influencer campaign – MZ
• Gear.Club & Pagani joint launch 2.5M$ Huayra Roadster car – Eden Games
• Into the Dead 2 – Launch campaign – PikPok
• Nonstop Chuck Norris – Flaregames
• Don’t Download Best Fiends Forever – Seriously

BEST ANALYTICS/DATA TOOL

WINNER: App Annie

Any company that supported developers and publishers develop their games and run marketing campaigns through analytics tools and/or providing data on market performance.

FINALISTS:

• AppsFlyer
• Apptica
• DeltaDNA
• GameAnalytics
• GameRefinery
• Pricing Cloud
• Reflection

BEST QA & LOCALISATION SERVICE PROVIDER

WINNER: Keywords

This accolade awarded companies that supported mobile games over the preceding year in the areas of quality assurance and localisation, ensured that both new releases and updates went live with as few problems as possible and were localised appropriately for target markets.

FINALISTS:

• Amber Studio SRL
• GameScribes
• Indienova
• LocalizeDirect
• Pole To Win
• Testronic
• Universally Speaking

BEST TECHNOLOGICAL INNOVATION

WINNER: ARKit – Apple

Any developer or technology company that pushed the boundaries of what’s possible on mobile devices through a new technology, be it hardware or software. This could be an innovative tool or unique use of technology that benefited the industry as a whole.

FINALISTS:

• ARCore
• Daydream
• Facebook Instant Games
• Fitness Village
• Gamee
• Hatch
• Razer Phone

BEST GAME MANAGEMENT & LIVE OPS

WINNER: Gardenscapes – Playrix

This award recognises the impact of significant updates, in-game events or excellent community management over the preceding year for games released in 2016 or before, that have helped take a game to the next level and sustain a title’s life.

FINALISTS:

• Angry Birds 2 – Rovio Entertainment
• Clash of Clans – Supercell
• CSR Racing 2 – Zynga / NaturalMotion
• Dragon Ball Z: Dokkan Battle – Bandai Namco
• Pearl’s Peril – Wooga
• Pokemon GO – Niantic
• The Walking Dead: No Man’s Land – Next Games

BEST RECRUITMENT AGENCY

WINNER: Amiqus

Any recruitment agency that over the preceding year had supported mobile game companies in finding and employing the best staff to develop new games, create new tools or offer key services.

FINALISTS:

• Aardvark Swift
• Datascope
• Games Jobs Finland
• Interactive
• OPM Response
• Scede
• Skillsearch

MOBILE LEGEND

WINNER: Kristian Segerstrale

This special lifetime achievement award recognised a person from anywhere in the world who has achieved a considerable amount of success in their career and has acted as a pioneer in the mobile games space.

The Mobile Legend is a special award to recognise an outstanding contribution to the mobile games industry selected directly by the organisation committee of the Mobile Games Awards.

POCKET GAMER PEOPLE’S CHOICE

WINNER: Dragon Project – GoGame

This was the only award voted for by consumers and recognised the best new game that received a full release during the preceding year. This award was open for voting through PocketGamer.co.uk, with the winner revealed on the night.

The People’s Choice Award was shortlisted by the expert journalists at Pocket Gamer and voted for by the games playing public directly on www.pocketgamer.co.uk