The Finnish Game Awards 2024 took place on Thursday, which saw local developers dress up smart for an evening celebrating the country's flourishing games industry.
At the end of the evening, Remedy took home the Finnish Game of the Year 2023 for Alan Wake 2, continuing a trend seen across international ceremonies.
As a group of Alan Wake 2 developers took to the stage, Joonas Tamminen (Executive Producer) collected the trophy and walked up to the microphone to kick off the acceptance speech, "Thank you very much, this is a great honour. In some of the difficult moments during the development of the game, our COO, Christopher Schmitz, used to say to us that 'You will figure this out, and before you know it, you will be standing on stage accepting some awards and saying that it was a breeze'. The intent was good, but he used to say it so often in the end that it started to become slightly irritating, in the end. Anyway, here we are now, but it was not a breeze and we're only here because of the huge amount of passion, dedication and hard work that went into the game by a lot of people, including the Alan Wake 2 development team, our Northlight Engine team, and a lot of other people at Remedy, so this goes to all of you. Thank you very much!"
After applause, he continued, "And I also want to thank our publisher, Epic Games Publishing, for believing in us and being an excellent partner to work with. Hector, Nico, Brandon, many, many others. Thank you! And Chris, I hope you're watching, I want to specifically dedicate a small piece of this especially to you." The dedication may be particularly poignant as Schmitz is scheduled to step down as COO at the end of the month.
As Joonas stepped back with the rest of the team, Sam Lake (Creative Director) moved forward to the microphone, holding the framed certificate. He gives his thanks briefly in Finnish before switching to English for the rest of the speech. "Thank you very much. This means a lot because this is home, and it has a special meaning. It has a special meaning also because Alan Wake 2 has a lot of Finnish culture in it. It just felt like this is the right time to do it; we've been playing around with the idea in our past games, but we wanted to go big with this one. So we have really, really top-line actors, we have characters with Finnish backgrounds, we have locations that have Finnish heritage, we have Finnish folklore, quirky humour, music in it. And for a big game with a global audience, I think this is exceptional. Finnish culture for us, it's something of our own, and it is a strength. And for the outside world, it is something exciting, exotic and fresh. So, thank you."
Sharing the award news on social media, the company writes, "Thank you to the @alanwake development team and @EpicPublishing, without whose hard work and support Alan Wake 2 wouldn't have been possible. Congratulations to all the winners and nominees! It's joyous and inspiring to see the Finnish game industry innovate and flourish year after year, and we couldn't be prouder to be a part of it."
Organised by Neogames, in co-operation with the Finnish Game Developer Studios Association, while the awards show is invite-only, the full ceremony is streamed to an international audience online.
There are eight awards in total being presented in total including W Love Games Excellence Award, IGDA Volunteer of the Year 2023, and Rookie of the Year. The nominees selected for the "big three", "Big Screen Game of the Year", "Small Screen Game of the Year", and "Finnish Game of the Year" are chosen based on member votes from each of the participating studio members of the Finnish Game Developer Studios Association, the board of which confirms the nominee list. Each member studio allocates 1-5 points, which, all together, gives the full leaderboard.
