The Game Awards (TGA) 2018 was the highest watched event yet. In 2019, things only got bigger and better. Viewer numbers are out, and things are looking great for the relatively new award show. 2019’s show garnished more than 45.2 million global live streams, up 73% from 2018’s record-setting performance of 26.2 million live streams. That’s huge for an award show largely streamed online, and far better than 2018. The rise in viewers can be seen as a huge win for the legitimacy of the awards.

Something evident in this year’s show was the benefit to developers and publishers of showing something groundbreaking at the gala. If you read Keiran’s roundup and review of the event, then you know how big some reveals were. I mean, an entire new home console, the Xbox Series X, debuted at the show. With a declining E3 seeing less participation from the major players, TGA might shape up to be larger than even the event planners expected.

How’s this for improvement? 2019’s show saw over 7.5 million global viewers, including more than 2 million concurrent viewers across Twitch and YouTube. That’s huge for gaming fans, as the show will only improve if people are watching. It’s also huge for sponsors, who can buy ad time knowing that a ton of people in a specific interest group is going to be watching a single event. As eSports grow into its own legitimate sports scene, the entire community is only seeing more and more attention from the corporate world.

Is more corporate money in gaming a good thing? If it’s ads, then sure. If we have to watch commercials to see performances from a killer band like CHVRCHES and get gaming’s biggest names to show up, then so be it. We also know that certain games sell out, and others don’t. That won’t get worse if more companies sponsor things like TGA. So, overall, more viewers and corporate attention both help grow the gaming world’s biggest event of the year.

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