Game Awards 2023

 

So here we are on the other side of the Game Awards and I have to eat some major crow- Grand Theft Auto 6 absolutely struck no deal with Geoff Keighley in order to make an appearance. I figured it was an inevitability what with the relatively insanity of announcing a game more than a year out from a release window, but more the fool's me- I guess. I just can't believe Rockstar would steal the Award ceremonies thunder like that- I know they do their own thing but damn, that was cold! Ahh I'm losing the forest for the trees again, we should just be happy for Geoff and what he achieved bringing another solid night of the Game Awards sans all those meddlesome controversies that were bubbling in the background. I don't think there are any winners that seem wildly out of pocket, even if a nomination or two absolutely was. (Destiny for best community support? Was that some sort of inside joke?) And I'm happy to say we didn't get another 'Deathloop' scenario of an unending sweep. Thank god.

This year I can't really pretend to have been all that excited about the reveals of the Game Awards showcase because to be honest, none of them really excited me. Don't get me wrong, there was nothing utterly mindnumblingly dull- like the Motorsport sections of Xbox conferences, but the most I saw were those 'yeah, genre fans will like this one' style games. When talking about what makes an Ultimate Game of the Year candidate, it's typically the importability of genre lovers. It's the sort of game that can slide through the gates of who should like the game and settle into just about anyone's laps, which is why Action Adventure games are so often candidates- because there aren't really strict action adventure fans out there- so every type of gamer can make time to slide them into a schedule. In that light, I don't think this year unveiled any potential Game of the Year contenders for next year.

However what we did get was a little looksie-loo at what SEGA are planning to drown the next few years of their line-up with. That's right, we're getting no less than 5 remakes of their classic titles, all of which seem to be borrow roughly the same 'updated' visual style with the exception of the iconic Jet Set Radio, which I didn't know SEGA owned until just that moment. We also got a teaser glimpse of the next Monster Hunter game, which is probably going to be my point to swing back aboard the train after totally blanking Monster Hunter Rise. And we have ourselves the most pitiful viewing of Kojima's next game OD, which was so horrifically insubstantial I can't even cobble up enough neurons to speculate on it. All we saw was literally faces in a 3D capture environment- have they even started putting together builds of this one yet? Sheesh! I mean sure, announce a Jordan Peele partnership if you want, but don't waste everyone's time!

Of course the big upset this year was the fact that despite being nominated for over 7 awards, Spider-Man 2 walked away with a big fat 0- which has set off about half of the potential fans because, whoops- Spider-Man 2 is still being kept off of PC. (If ya'll wanted votes, you should have given us PC gamers a reason to vote!) Personally I'm surprised that they're so surprised. Spider-Man 2 just plain didn't land with the same culture splash the first one did, any reviewer who isn't a career Insomniac meat-rider found themselves lukewarm on a sequel that played things a little too 'safe', and most of the categories Spider-Man 2 was nominated for was also shared with Baldur's Gate 3- the year's actual phenom. They weren't gonna win that fight! I just hope this gives Insomniac the kick in the butt to really try and knock it out of the park with the last game in their trilogy!

But positivity and having fun is a commodity that can be ill-afforded in this world where everything has to be everything else all the time. Many have made their displeasure known about the fact that in a year of record layoffs for the Game Industry, Geoff Keighley mentioned nothing on the topic himself- whereas in the past he has been known to sometimes expend 20 seconds or so throwing some shade where it's needed. That sort of candid armchair solidarity has petered out as the Game Awards have grown into more of a night about having fun and showing off big game trailers, the stand-in for E3 if you will- but this year I suppose people have grown incensed with this status quo. Particularly a lot of the game journalism outlets, the very same who have try their darndest not to care about the award ceremony and to pay it as little mind as possible, sometimes even delegitimising it's growing status with pithy Twitterisms. That same class are now upset that The Game Awards, as the official front of the games industry apparently, isn't doing it's due service. Mixed messages be flying.

And of course it goes on even more than that with questions about Geoff not bringing up Palestine, which is- I'm going to be honest, probably a bit of an insane hang-up to have. The industry lay-offs thing is fair, Geoff clearly turned a blind eye to that, but Palestine? Not sure I really care to hear about what a Game Industry personality thinks about Palestine, personally. The same way I don't really care what an actor has to say, or a Twitch Streamer. It's not really their area to comment. Unless you're seriously asking Geoff to condemn the concept of violence, because if that's the case you really need to check your 'weirdo American' card at the door. In the rest of the world we don't need to hear every single person in the world verbally denounce every horrific war crime, it's kind of a sincere solidarity which isn't helped by performative declarations of outrage. Seriously, Americans need to learn some damn taste.

Honestly the real controversy here has to be the tipping of the show away from the awards and further into the advertising portion of the show. We've seen footage of how award acceptance speeches were literally kept on a timer this time around, even after pushing out Christopher Judge to tell them they have all the time they need. And for what? Geoff had no showstopper announcements for the night, nothing that would have made or broken the evening by it not being present. His team squashed the special moments of so many acceptance messages in order to pander to a middling line-up of game announcements that could have been made at any point. Seriously, it's verging on losing sight about who we should be celebrating here. I want to see the personalities of the industry on display, you know- a freakin' personality!

Geoff Keighley has addressed his shortcomings in this area and claimed that he asked his staff to relax the rules as the show went on. (Which I frankly don't believe. That footage telling the winner to wrap up and sod off was taken from the Game of the Year award- literally Larian's big moment.) But at the very least the man has made note and committed himself to tweaking things come next year, which is a mark of respect and feedback I admire from the man. It certainly speaks a lot more than the endless article writers who never liked the awards, trying to grandstand their dismissal into some grand act of virtue that should be sang about. "Let us all gather around and wring our hands in praise of the brave article writers who slept during the game awards- truly they are the blessed among us!" Nah, rather than tear down the biggest award show of the year, like they are all desperate to do, I'd rather have some fun with the gaming community. You know, 'fun'? Like, the point of games in the first place? (These people, sheesh.)