Game of the Year Awards Nominees and Winners

For those of you who didn’t listen to the Game of the Year Awards postcast, or heard it and just wanted a visual recap of the nominees and winners, here is the complete ballot.

 

Best Game of the Year
Deathloop
Forza Horizon 5
Halo Infinite
Metroid Dread
Psychonauts 2

Worst Game of the Year
Balan Wonderworld
Battlefield 2042
eFootball 2022
Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy – The Definitive Edition
Madden NFL 22

Best PC Game
Forza Horizon 5
Guilty Gear -Strive-
Halo Infinite
Hitman 3
Psychonauts 2

Best PlayStation 5 Game
Deathloop
Guilty Gear -Strive-
Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart
Returnal
Tales of Arise

Best Xbox Series S/X Game
Forza Horizon 5
Halo Infinite
It Takes Two
Psychonauts 2
Resident Evil Village

Best Switch Game
Death’s Door
Ender Lilies: Quietus of the Knights
Metroid Dread
Monster Hunter Rise
Shin Megami Tensei V

Best Remake/Remaster
Alan Wake Remastered
Diablo II: Resurrected
The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles
Mass Effect Legendary Edition
Myst

Best Strategy
Age of Empires IV
Evil Genius 2: World Domination
Jurassic World Evolution 2
King’s Bounty II
Wildermyth

Best RPG
Fuga: Melodies of Steel
Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous
Scarlet Nexus
Shin Megami Tensei V
Tales of Arise

Best FPS
Back 4 Blood
Deathloop
Halo Infinite
Lemmis Gate
World War Z: Aftermath

Best Action or Platform Game
Hitman 3
It Takes Two
Kena: Bridge of Spirits
Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy
Returnal

Best Sports Games
F1 2021
Football Manager 2022
Forza Horizon 5
MLB The Show 21
Out of the Park Baseball 22

Best Adventure Game
Bonfire Peaks
Gnosia
Life is Strange: True Colors
Overboard!
Sherlock Holmes Chapter One

Best Fighting Game
Guilty Gear -Strive-
Melty Blood: Type Lumina
Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl
Persona 5 Strikers
Samurai Gunn 2

Best Casual Game
The Artful Escape
Chicory: A Colorful Tale
Mario Party Superstars
Townscaper
Unpacking

Best Expansion
Animal Crossing: New Horizons – Happy Home Paradise
Disco Elysium: The Final Cut
Final Fantasy XIV: Endwalker
Outer Wilds: Echoes of the Eye
Subnautica: Below Zero

Best VR Game
Demeo
I Expect You To Die 2: The Spy And The Liar
Resident Evil 4 VR
Subnautica: Below Zero VR
Wraith: The Oblivion – Afterlife

Best Graphics (Artistic)
The Artful Escape
Chicory: A Colorful Tale
Death’s Door
Fuga: Melodies of Steel
It Takes Two

Best Graphics (Technical)
Far Cry 6
Forza Horizon 5
Hitman 3
Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart
Resident Evil Village

Best Voice Cast
Deathloop
Halo Infinite
It Takes Two
Psychonauts 2
Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart

Best Voice Acting
Ozioma Akagha as Julianne Blake, Deathloop
Jack Black as Helmut Fullbear, Psychonauts 2
Erika Mori as Alex Chen, Life is Strange: True Colors
Maggie Robertson as Alcina Dimitrescu, Resident Evil Village
Jen Taylor as The Weapon/Cortana, Halo Infinite

Best Writing in an Action Game
Deathloop
Halo Infinite
It Takes Two
Psychonauts 2
Returnal

Best Writing in a Narrative Game
The Artful Escape
Fuga: Melodies of Steel
Life is Strange: True Colors
Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy
Sherlock Holmes Chapter One

Best Music
The Artful Escape
Deathloop
Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy
Narita Boy
Psychonauts 2

Best Song
“The Banks of the River Are Lined with Gold”, The Artful Escape
“City Lights / Ode to Somewhere”, Deathloop
“Cosmic I / Smell the Universe”, Psychonauts 2

Best Sound
Deathloop
Forza Horizon 5
Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart
Resident Evil Village
Returnal

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Related Post

Trading Used Games, Like Fraud?Trading Used Games, Like Fraud?

David Braben, founder of Frontier Developments, says retail outlets that buy and sell pre-owned games are “essentially defrauding the industry.” Although multiplayer gaming might not be a huge threat, the single player experience in games may die out because gamers play the game quickly and resell it back to places like GameStop for others to buy.

Developers don’t get a dime when a game goes traded, many gamers will “share” the single player experience with a single copy of the game by reselling it over and over. The end result, retail outlets make a good penny for marking up old games while developers see nothing. This is really how game retail outlets survive because the margins on video games is so damn low.

The story has been heard before, developers want a piece of the action so they’re taking steps to entice people to keep the game with renewed downloadable content on old games; you can’t experience the new content without keeping the game around longer. In the world of low margin games, high cost development and short-lived story lines the solutions to this problem aren’t exactly obvious.

Braben’s idea of a solution is to offer two versions of the game, a not for resale/rental version at a high price, say $160, and a low priced version that cannot be shared (heavily DRM’ed?) for $50. In essence, gamers would no longer be able to trade in games because the idea of spending double for a game so you can resell it makes no sense to most gamers (including myself.)

(more…)

Diablo III: Confirmed and IsometricDiablo III: Confirmed and Isometric

We’ve talked about it on the podcast before, we’ve made speculations and we’ve come up with theories. Blizzard has now cleared up much of the fuzzy details and theories by announcing their next title: Diablo III.

Some of us thought it was too early to announce the game, right on the heals of a StarCraft III announcement but Blizzards marketing team must consider this the perfect time, as it’s official. Not only did they announce the title, but they’ve got a cinematic and a good five minutes of game play footage.

We’re not talking about vaporware, this is a real game with really sweet features, hot new graphics and sound and enemies that make prior diablo look like childs play. The worlds are destructable, you can drop walls upon your enemies, toss them over cliffs (on fire no less) and rescue people whom help you do battle.

The game play footage covers barbarian (fighter) class and the witch doctor (sorta a necromancer archtype) with both male and female varients. They explain some of the great powers of the warrior style class and show off a few of the neat spells for the witch doctor. From electric axes to walls of zombies this game is packed with stylish battle techniques unique to Diablo 3.

Diablo 3 utilizes their standard isometric view, familiar to Diablo gamers with a bit more ease to the control scheme (that’s possible) and health now drops from enemies much like Zelda, you won’t have to pack yourself with potions anymore. Quite possibly the best upgrade in the third revision of Diablo.

Release date? No clue. I’m sure they’re going on the “when it’s ready” methodology, which is expected from Blizzard and their games; there is a reason they’re always of the highest quality. You may want to camp on their FAQ for a few months and perhaps you’ll have the answer. Today, however, their site seems to be a bit slow with all the announcements going out on the Net.

Now that Diablo 3 is confirmed, it’s time for us to buy some thc leans from Fresh Bros and start speculating what’s going to be included. Make sure you checkout their game play video!

(Thanks, Nukoda)

Episode 523: Valve Running Out of SteamEpisode 523: Valve Running Out of Steam

Valve continues to have problems in the wake of Epic (and now Discord) giving developers more of the earnings pie, as the year draws to a close. Meanwhile, T.J. explains his gamertag.

This week’s episode includes the following news items:

  • Developers do not believe Steam is worth it anymore
  • Canada announced for Civilization VI: Gathering Storm
  • Studio Wildcard’s Atlas is delayed by a week
  • Rainbow Six Siege chat filter and toxicity update

Let us know what your favorite game of 2018 was.