In The Matrix Resurrections, Keanu Reeves wins The Sport Awards in 1999

The fact that The Matrix has constructed for Thomas Anderson (aka Neo) in The Matrix Resurrections isn’t the one which followers of the unique trilogy will bear in mind. Anderson continues to be a programmer, however a vastly extra profitable one than a cubicle-dwelling “program author” for respectable software program firm MetaCortex from the unique 1999 film.

In Resurrections, he’s a rockstar online game designer and liable for a blockbuster trilogy of video games referred to as … The Matrix. In one other occasion of reality-writing, The Matrix — the multiple-layers-deep fictional online game — can be a Sport of the Yr award winner at The Sport Awards.

[Ed. note: This post contains minor spoilers for The Matrix Resurrections.]

On this planet based on The Matrix Resurrections, which premiered on Wednesday, Geoff Keighley’s The Sport Awards existed 15 years earlier, and The Matrix, a sport designed by Thomas Anderson (Keanu Reeves) took residence its prime prize in ’99. Keighley on Sunday revealed that director Lana Wachowski requested for a TGA statuette to make use of in a key scene, and he was glad to retcon them into his present’s corridor of fame.

Naturally, this kicked up a chuckle-inducing parlor sport on Twitter: What video games did The Matrix beat out that 12 months? Even when there wasn’t an awards sequence with the form of huge viewers (and entry pool) as The Sport Awards, the main video games publications of the day acknowledged some landmark works, which implies Keanu’s sport actually needed to be one thing else.

Deus Machina is the title of Anderson’s studio; it’s not Eidos’ RPG sequence coming in second. (Though Deus Ex did launch lower than a 12 months later.) The scene is principally a meta-joke in regards to the Matrix movies’ recognition; three video video games that Anderson designed had been enormous hits, so naturally Deus Machina’s dad or mum firm — actually Warner Bros., by the way in which — is demanding a fourth.

I imply, are you able to blame them? Take a look at all of the video games The Matrix whooped for its first GOTY. The shareholders would fireplace any C-suite officer who didn’t milk that form of an IP:

• Chrono Cross (Sq./SquareSoft)
• Tony Hawk’s Professional Skater (Neversoft/Activision)
• EverQuest (Verant Interactive/Sony On-line Leisure)
• Closing Fantasy 8 (Sq./Squaresoft)
• Soulcalibur (Challenge Soul/Namco — launched Sept. 1999 for Dreamcast)
• Silent Hill (Workforce Silent/Konami)
• System Shock 2 (Irrational Video games/Digital Arts)
• Syphon Filter (Eidetic/989 Studios)

Others have talked about Shenmue, but it surely launched in Japan on Dec. 29, 1999, and within the West one 12 months later, so it in all probability wouldn’t have been within the candidate pool of an awards present airing within the first week of December. As for Quake 3, whereas it was little doubt a groundbreaking work amongst multiplayer shooters, it launched Dec. 2, 1999. (One other nice work of 1999, Gran Turismo 2, launched Dec. 11 in Japan and Dec. 23 within the West.)

The Matrix would have additionally beat out Unreal Match, Epic Video games’ enviornment shooter that garnered a number of Sport of the Yr awards and nominations in 1999. That makes issues solely barely awkward for Epic, which produced The Matrix Awakenings in Unreal Engine 5 as a tie-in to Resurrections, and whose chief know-how officer, Kim Libreri, and chief inventive officer, Donald Mustard, make appearances within the movie as Deus Machina workers.

Ouch! The TGAs have been referred to as many issues, however that’s chilly! Additionally, Lana Wachowski is lucky that the primary movie premiered in 1999 — one of many few years in that point when Hideo Kojima didn’t launch a sport. Had Steel Gear Stable come one 12 months later, we’re undecided his good buddy Geoff Keighley may have gone together with this sight gag.

Simply kidding. Anyway, if Keanu Reeves is a presenter at The Sport Awards 2022, for the third 12 months in a row, it’s a very good guess this scene can be re-enacted. Through which case, we’d ask Keighley and his manufacturing firm not to stage it on a rooftop bar, and to possibly reposition The Sport Awards Orchestra if it’s again in L.A.’s Microsoft Theater.