Last week, The Game Awards 2019 reached a new milestone with over 45 million livestreams, with a peak of 7.5 million concurrent viewers across the globe. In an era where the video games industry has become bigger than Hollywood, it’s no wonder why the Game Awards has become a must-watch for video games enthusiast.
As you may know, Microsoft chose The Game Awards ceremony to announce its next-gen Xbox Series X console, which was a complete surprise to many. Two years ago, the company waited for its E3 2017 press briefing in June to unveil the name and design of the Xbox One X, and we guess that many were expecting the Xbox team to do the same for “Project Scarlett” at E3 2020.
Phil Spencer (@XboxP3) is here to drop another @XBOX World Premiere! #TheGameAwards pic.twitter.com/jVc8UG4HTw
— The Game Awards (@thegameawards) December 13, 2019
The fact that nothing leaked about Xbox Series X ahead of the Game Awards ceremony is quite impressive, but executive producer and host Geoff Keighley revealed in an interview with Variety that Xbox head Phil Spencer kept the secret by reading a bogus script about Xbox Game Pass during rehearsals.
As pointed out by independent video games industry analysts Benji-Sales, Microsoft likely couldn’t have chosen a better opportunity than the Game Awards to announce its next-gen Xbox console. The show is indeed reaching a massive audience without any help from traditional TV networks.
The Game Awards continues to grow every single year. This year's show had 45 million livestreams as well as 73% growth over 2018
For those that wondered why Microsoft would feel comfortable showing Xbox Series X to the world for the first time here, this is why. Show is massive https://t.co/0qPigOcoFf
— Benji-Sales (@BenjiSales) December 18, 2019
“We have one of the largest live audiences of millennials who are watching a streaming program,” said Keighley to Variety, and this definitely an audience that console makers like Microsoft would want to reach. “The awards are really important to the show and I think they’re very important to game developers and the fans, so we try and sort of balance that. But what we’ve found from all our sort of anecdotal research and feedback from fans is they really do want those announcements in the show,” added Keighley.
