Satoru Iwata.jpg

Today brought the Golden Joystick awards in the UK, a long-running event that is voted upon by the public. Nintendo secured a few awards, though the most touching was awarded to the company's former President.

Satoru Iwata was posthumously awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award, having passed away earlier this year. The official press release described this award as follows:

Satoru Iwata, the Nintendo CEO who sadly died in July this year at the age of 55, was honoured with the Lifetime Achievement Award. A revered man of the gaming industry, Satoru was the driving force behind many of Nintendo's products including the Wii and DS, and is credited for bringing gaming to the masses by making it family entertainment. Starting out as a programmer in the 1980's for a subsidiary of Nintendo, he became president in 2002, the first outside of the company's founding family. He was renowned for first and foremost being a gamer and was described as "... having the brain of a game developer and the heart of a gamer". His contribution and impact on modern gaming is second to none.

Elsewhere Wii U title Splatoon received two awards, Best Family Game and Best Nintendo Game. Also of note for Nintendo gamers is that Kerbal Space Program won the Best Indie Game award, with the title confirmed to be on the way to the Wii U eShop.

It's a nice honour for the late Iwata-san to be honoured, providing further proof that his passing has had a profound impact on gamers and many involved in the games industry.