Smash Bros and Kirby creator Masahiro Sakurai announced on September 15 during the Japan Game Awards 2026 that he will be discontinuing the “Game Designers Award” category of the awards show. During the ceremony, he talked about the reason behind his decision, while also sharing his thoughts on the importance of maintaining originality in games.
Created by Sakurai in 2010, The Game Designers Award recognized games based on their creativity and innovation. On top of scouting and inviting judges (all of whom need to be directors who have made innovative games – the likes of Fumito Ueda, Shinji Mikami and even Toby Fox), Sakurai also serves as head judge, presents the nominees on stage, and gives the award to the winner. However, after 16 years in the busy role, Sakurai says he wasn’t able to find anyone that would replace him in leading the panel. Considering how he balances his award duties while working on his games, perhaps it’s understandable that he hasn’t been able to find a willing successor, despite years of searching.
Sakurai also laid bare what he called a harsh truth, telling his industry peers that “originality doesn’t really have much impact on sales.” However, he added that the game industry is built on the creativity of many people, and that “an industry that loses its originality will simply die a slow death.”
The last game to receive the Game Designers Award at the Japan Game Awards 2026 was Word Game, an interactive puzzle title by Team9 composed of words that represent objects, characters, and scenes. By altering the meaning of the on-screen text, you solve puzzles and progress through a word-based world. Due to core mechanics heavily relying on Chinese characters, the game is not playable in English.
