2020 Origins Award Winners Announced

The Academy of Adventure Gaming Arts & Design is pleased to announce the Origin Award winners and the Academy Hall of Fame inductees for 2020.

Academy Hall of Fame – Class of 2020 Inductees

• Reinhold Wittig, Designer – Game designer since the 1970s with more than 200 titles and exceptional contributions to the professional recognition of game authors.
• Wolfgang Kramer, Designer – Game designer that was a pioneer in area control games, founding member of German Game Authors Guild with more than 10 million copies of his games in print around the world.
• Wolfgang Warsch, Rising Star Award – designer of a dozen games including The Mind, That’s Pretty Clever, and Quacks of Quedlinburg.
• Yahtzee, Notable Product – first produced in 1956, it is considered the grandfather of Roll And Write and Roll and Re-Roll Games.
• Board Game Geek, Notable Product – founded in 2000, BGG is an important resource for the tabletop game community.

Origin Awards 2020

• Best Board Game/Game of the Year: Tiny Towns | AEG | Peter McPherson, Gong Studios, Matt Paquette
• Best Card Game: Point Salad | AEG | Molly Johnson, Robert Melvin, Shawn Stankewich, Dylan Mangini
• Best Family Game: The Quacks of Quedlinburg | North Star Games | Wolfgang Warsch, Dennis Lohausen
• Digital Adaptation: Tsuro VR | Calliope Games / Thunderbox Entertainment Digital | Tom McMurchie
• Best Collectible Game: Marvel HeroClix: Avengers Black Panther and the Illuminati Booster Brick | WizKids
• Best Role-Playing Game: Teens in Space | Renegade Game Studios | Jonathan Gilmour, Doug Levandowski
• Best Game Accessory: Citadel Contrast Paint | Games Workshop
• Best Miniatures Game: Warcry | Games Workshop | Sebastien Tousel
• Best Historical Miniatures Game: Bolt Action: Campaign D-Day Operation Overlord | Osprey Games / Warlord Games | Robert Vella, Peter Dennis
• Best Historical Game: Pandemic: Fall of Rome | Z-Man Games | Matt Leacock, Paolo Mori, Atha Kanaani, Olly Lawson, Antonio Maínez

We would like to thank the 40 volunteers who served on the Origins Award Jury for 2020. They reviewed more than 300 titles and products and we appreciate their service to the industry.

For those interested in being part of the Origins Awards Jury in 2021, please send an email toAcademySecretary@gama.orgwith your name, industry experience, and which jury you would like to be a part of. Review of games will occur in January and February with the goal of announcing finalist in March and winners during the 2021 Origins Game Fair. All jurors receive a complimentary badge for Origins and an invitation to the awards ceremony.

Submissions for the 2021 Origins Awards will open on November 15, 2020. To be eligible for consideration, products must be available for purchase to consumers through retail channels between November 15, 2019 and November 14, 2020. For more information on how to nominate titles or products, please click here.