The Esports Awards 2018 were held last night, an annual show dedicated to honoring individuals and companies who have made big waves in the competitive gaming scene. This year, the award for Best Publisher was presented by YouTuber Deji, most commonly known by his YouTube handle ComedyShortsGamer. Deji, fresh off of his controversial boxing match against Jake Paul, decided to become a talking point during the awards ceremony, too, “joking” that Fortnite developer Epic Games had won the award when Blizzard was the real victor. The end result was excruciating.
“This award goes to… Epic Games!” Deji announced, before the camera panned to Epic staff getting up from their seats and making their way to the stage. “No, I’m joking! I’m joking!” the presenter continued, before the music abruptly stopped and he revealed that Blizzard was the real winner.
Blizzard mercifully ignored the “joke,” before one of the hosts took a dig at the YouTuber’s prank. “It just goes to show that you should never let a YouTuber do what a professional host should do,” she said. “We’re gonna have to live through that one. Go on, and soldier through,” her co-host added.
Watch the painful moment below:
While Blizzard Entertainment’s acceptance speech may have been overshadowed, the company still picked up some of the biggest awards of the evening, with Overwatch being named the Esports Game of the Year while the Overwatch League Grand Final was given the award for the Esports Live Event of the Year.
Popular Fortnite streamer Tyler ‘Ninja’ Blevins picked up the award for Esports Personality of the Year and Streamer of the Year, accepting both by way of a video message. Cloud 9 was named as the Esports Organisation of the Year, and Twitch was named as the Streaming Service of the Year, beating out the likes of YouTube and Facebook.
