Skip to main content

2017 Google Play Award winners excel in design, functionality, delightfulness

Sundar Pichai stands in front of a Google logo at Google I/O 2021.
This story is part of our complete Google I/O coverage
Updated less than 6 days ago

Last year, Google hosted its inaugural Google Play Awards at Google I/O, its annual developer conference in Mountain View, California, during which it crowned the year’s best Play Store games and apps. And this year, it announced the winners of the second annual competition at an gala on Thursday evening.

The competition was fierce. The contenders were broken out over 12 categories, and had to adhere to a set of criteria for consideration. All had to have high user ratings, pass Google’s bars for technical performance, and have received an update or been launched since April of last year.

Recommended Videos

Memrise took home the Best App category, thanks to a “beautiful design,” “intuitive [interface]” and “high user appeal.” The judging panel was especially impressed by its creativity — users are tasked with “duping enemy agents” in a “distant Universe” by demonstrating mastery of languages including French, Spanish, German, English, Chinese, Japanese, and more.

Image used with permission by copyright holder

The Best Game award went to Transformers: Forged to Fight by Kabam, which won Google’s judges over with “strong mechanics,” “stellar graphics,” “strong engagement,” and “retention tactics.”

In the Standout Indie category, Mushroom 11 took the crown for “artistic design,” “gameplay mechanics,” and “overall polish.” A combination of intuitive touch controls, challenging puzzles, eerily beautiful visuals, and ethereal electronica music by The Future Sound of London sealed the deal.

The Standout Startup category went to Hooked by Telepathic, which “offers a unique experience” while “achieving strong organic install growth.” The Google team was impressed by the app’s innovative method of storytelling — spooky thrillers unfold message by message over a series of texts.

best android apps
Image used with permission by copyright holder

Runtastic got the Best Android Wear Experience award — Google praised its “great design,” ability to “delight,” and “functionality.” The judging panel lavished special praise on its robust activity tracking, audio coach, leaderboard features, built-in music player, and integration with Google’s Fit platform.

The Best VR Experience award went to Virtual Virtual Reality by Tender Claws, which Google’s judges called “highly immersive.” The inventive title, which runs on Google’s Daydream VR platform, tasks players with tasks like jumping between realities and “vacuuming up” worlds.

WOORLD by Funomena won the Best AR Experience. Its “creative” and “imaginative” technology, pioneered with the help of Katamari Damacy creator Keita Takahashi, was one of the most effective uses of Googles’s depth-sensing, spatial-tracking Tango technology in Google Play, the judging panel said.

Image used with permission by copyright holder

Red Bull TV won the best TV Experience for its “large-screen format” and “intuitive experience.” Google noted that the it adhered closely to Android’s style guideline, and made especially good use of Android TV’s built-in search functions.

The competition’s other winners included ShareTheMeal by the United Nations, which won Best Social Impact for affecting “meaningful” social change for “people around the world”; IFTTT, which took home the Best Accessibility Experience award for “[serving] people with disabilities” and “special needs”; Animal Jam by WildWorks, which won Best App for Kids for encouraging “creativity,” “exploration,” and “education”; and Blizzard’s Hearthstone trading card game, which won the Best Multiplayer Award.

The Google Play store is a big deal — it’s the primary way the more than 2 billion Android users around the world find and update apps and games. It’s estimated to generate more than $3.3 billion in revenue annually, and Google said that over the past year alone, more than 85 billion apps and gamest were downloaded on Google Play.

Kyle Wiggers
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Kyle Wiggers is a writer, Web designer, and podcaster with an acute interest in all things tech. When not reviewing gadgets…
Google has a magical new way for you to control your Android phone
Holding the Google Pixel 8 Pro, showing its Home Screen.

You don’t need your hands to control your Android phone anymore. At Google I/O 2024, Google announced Project Gameface for Android, an incredible new accessibility feature that will let users control their devices with head movements and facial gestures.

There are 52 unique facial gestures supported. These include raising your eyebrow, opening your mouth, glancing in a certain direction, looking up, smiling, and more. Each gesture can be mapped to an action like pulling down the notification shade, going back to the previous app, opening the app drawer, or going back to home. Users can customize facial expressions, gesture sizes, cursor speed, and more.

Read more
Google just announced 10 huge updates for your Android phone
The Home Screen on the Google Pixel 8 Pro.

Google I/O, the annual everything-Google-software fest, has kicked off. As usual, Android takes center stage. From enhanced privacy and Google Wallet upgrades to theft detection and app safety checkups, there’s a lot to look forward to here.

From Android 15 features to more general Android updates, here’s a breakdown of all the major Android announcements from I/O 2024.
Making life easier with Google Wallet

Read more
Everything announced at Google I/O 2024
Rose Yao on Google I/O 2024 stage.

Android, Wear OS, and Pixel may be Google's household names, but it was Google Gemini, its emerging AI technology, that stole the limelight at Google I/O 2024. The company's annual software celebration sets the stage for everything the company has planned for the coming year, and this year, CEO Sundar Pichai unambiguously declared that Google is in its "Gemini era." From AI searches in your Google Photos to virtual AI assistants that will work alongside you, Google is baking Gemini into absolutely everything, and the implications are enormous. Here's an overview of everything Google announced this year.
Gemini takeover

Users upload more than 6 billion photos to Google Photos every day, so it's little wonder that we could use a hand sifting through them all. Gemini will be added to Google Photos this summer, adding extra search abilities through the Ask Photos function. For instance, ask it "what's my license plate again" and it'll search through your photos to find the most likely answer, saving you from needing to manually look through your photos to find it yourself.

Read more