Sunday 22 October 2017
BA FTA 195 Piccadilly
London
W1J 9LN
B
AFTA was founded seventy years ago this year by
the leading lights of the British film industry. Its
original purpose was to ‘recognise those who had
contributed outstanding creative work towards the
advancement of British film’. Entertainment technology has of
course advanced exponentially since then; the original celluloid
medium first eclipsed by the cathode ray tube, then by video and
interactive gaming, and now by digital and online platforms. But
whatever new media emerge the honouring and encouraging of
superlative artistic achievements in these fields remain at the core
of BAFTA’s mission.
In BAFTA recast its remit to fully encompass
technological advances, tasking itself to ‘support, develop and
promote all the art forms of the moving image, by identifying
and rewarding excellence, inspiring practitioners and benefiting
the public’.
But long before this BAFTA had already spotted the
paradigm shift in the art of the moving image brought about
by rapid sophistication in the video gaming industry. By the
mid-s video games had become a fully-fledged art form.
They had progressed suciently as a medium to empower their
audiences with a completely new entertainment experience.
This new generation of games evolved a new type of movie-
BAFTA AT 70 SELECTS
LEGO GAME SERIES
As part of our BAFTA at 70 celebrations we are delighted to welcome ARTHUR PARSONS,
for a special Games presentation, hosted by KEZA MACDONALD.
goer, the gamer. For the first time gamers could interact
with life-like screen characters (rather than the basic and
plodding, pixelated graphics of earlier releases); and they
could influence the outcome of storylines rather than just
passively enjoying them. These cutting-edge games gave
birth to new professional design skills too, the artistry needed
to craft smooth and enjoyable game-play and create rewarding
and accessible replayability.
To recognise these new art forms, BAFTA’s then
Vice-President David Puttnam inaugurated the Interactive
Entertainment Awards in . This quickly expanded its
categories to become today’s BAFTA Games Awards
Ceremony, arguably the most prestigious international
awards ceremony for today’s games-makers.
We are privileged to have with us today someone all too
familiar with the Games Awards Ceremony - Arthur Parsons,
the man leading the team at Britain’s most popular and
successful collaborations between a gaming developer and a
gaming franchise - TT Games and Lego. Together TT Games
and Lego have won five BAFTAs in the last ten years across
numerous categories.
Arthur was behind the development of this world-beating
Lego Game Series right from the beginning and he is now TT
Games’ Head Designer and Lego
Games Director.
Arthur has been a pivotal figure at TT
Games’ studio for nearly twenty years,
moving there from famed Liverpool
games house Psygnosis. He is passionate
about his craft and about the importance
of hardwiring fun into every production.
He has helped develop more than
franchise titles whilst at TT Games, from
the LEGO series to Crash Bandicoot
and Toy Story. He attributes some of his
success to the vital quality control tests
carried out on each of his games by his
nine-year old daughter!
Knutsford-based Arthur was
nominated in two categories at the
BAFTA Games Awards for his work on
Lego Marvel Super Heroes () (Best
British Game, and Best Action and
Adventure Game) and is currently Game
Director for the forthcoming Lego Marvel
Super Heroes II that we are fortunate
enough to be showcasing at today’s event.
LEGO’s lucrative partnering with
video game developer TT Games
(originally called Travellers Tales) began
with the launch of family-orientated
best-seller Lego Star Wars: The Video
Game (). This platinum-selling
video game, with its many unlockable
characters and fluid game-play modes,
was rewarding to play whilst feeding
its players’ own creative instincts, in an
echo of the imaginative world of physical
Lego itself.
The sequel, Lego Star Wars II: The
Original Trilogy () was the real break-
through. Lego Star Wars II saw widely
praised improvements in the quality of its
level-environments, and a slick game-
play that earned it the British Academy
Games Award for Best Gameplay.
Significantly Lego Star Wars II introduced
gamers to Lego character adaptations
that were, according to appreciative
critics, funny, self-referential and adorable
portrayals in their own right – characters
that were to be reprised to great eect
in the later big screen Lego movies.
In the then head of home
entertainment at Warner Bros, Kevin
Tsujihara needed no prompting to
recognise the quality and potential of this
important Lego gaming franchise. Seeing
at once the incredible talents of the TT
Games design team, Tsujihara quickly
persuaded his studio bosses to purchase
the developer – everything has been
awesome ever since, with a stream of
top quality Lego character games series,
including Lego Batman, Lego Indiana Jones,
Lego Lord of the Rings, Lego Harry Potter
and Lego Marvel Super Heroes.
L G S BAFTA ins
Best Game Play (2006)
Lego Star Wars II
Best Children’s Game (2008)
Lego Batman
Best Children’s game (2011)
Lego Pirates of the Caribbean
Best Family and Social Game (2013)
Lego Batman II – DC Super Heroes
Best Children’s Game (2016)
Lego Dimensions
KEZA MACDONALD
Keza MacDonald has been writing about
video games for more than years.
She is currently Editor of Kotaku UK, a
website about games and gaming culture.
www.kotaku.co.uk/author/kmacdonald/
BAFTA HERITAGE SCREENINGS
This event is part of our special
programme celebrating BAFTA
at and has been generously
supported by Heritage Lottery Fund.
Sunday 22 October 2017
BA FTA 195 Piccadilly
London
W1J 9LN
BAFTA AT 70 SELECTS
LEGO GAME SERIES
