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

Evolution of RPG’s – Gamers Don’t Want an End?Evolution of RPG’s – Gamers Don’t Want an End?

I remember a day when old RPG games had either a level cap or a definite ending. From Pool of Radiance to Secrets of the Silver Blades to Final Fantasy the game had a final boss or stage and often had some type of level cap. Today, gamers don’t want it to end, they’d rather have the option to wonder around aimlessly or completing minor quests in order to soak up every ounce of money they spent on the title.

linkNow even Bethesda is saying “we’ve learned our lesson” from the whiplash of ending their game title and capping levels. Gamers want to go back and re-try content they missed, they want to run side quests and talk to everyone in the world they want to grind themselves to über powerful levels and become a god in their fantasy world. Can you blame them?

You can’t really blame them for wanting to maximize the content, although it’s slightly more evolved than RPG’s of old. Perhaps it was World of Warcraft and other MMORPG’s that brought us to the stage in life where we all want to squeeze every last RPG dime out of the title. As a kid I wondered the world of Hyrule and covered every tile of graphical color, burned every bush, bombed every stone looking for all the content. However, even Zelda had an end with scrolling credits – you didn’t just land on a platform with your master sword and a dream.

Other titles have used level caps to limit you and draw you into the next release of the game. This was popular in the D&D world because the game is designed to target specific levels of difficulty. They may only allow you to gain level 10 because the enemies are no tougher than level 13, allowing the challenge to be good but not overwhelming. If they allow you to get to level 50 they’d have to design the game so all the enemies grow powerful along with you — that’s not always a desired result.

Final Fantasy is a popular franchise that typically allows you to grow infinitely powerful depending on how much time you want to spend repeat killing the same enemies. Gamers aren’t always into the grind, they just want to grind “enough” to make the challenges a little more do-able.

Today, however, with larger storage capacity, larger development teams and the desire to build more value into your gameplay experience titles have dozens of side quests and sub-plots that are totally optional. The result of so many sub-quests results in a player who is much more powerful at the end of those quests compared to a player who sticks to the narrow path of the main plot. So, games much grow dynamically challenging to keep the fun per dollar high.

Do you like your RPG’s to have a definite end and a high but capped level?

EA Listens To The Public: No SecuROM In The Sims 3!EA Listens To The Public: No SecuROM In The Sims 3!

simsIt seems Spore was the staging point for the SecuROM revolt and the massive amazon 1-star reviews and backlash have not gone on deaf ears. Electronic Arts has opted to leave SecuROM out of The Sims 3, an upcoming release for just that reason.

“We have heard your requests over the past months and here is our plan for The Sims 3,” Sims development head Rod Humble stated on the official website. “The game will have disc-based copy protection – there is a serial code just like The Sims 2. To play the game there will not be any online authentication needed. (casualgaming.biz)

We wonder, did they do this primarily because of the Spore revolt or because the demographic for The Sims is even more casual than that of Spore? Casual gamers expect a casual experience from install to un-install because they don’t want to be hassled with silly copy protection. Or, perhaps casual games like The Sims is less likely to be hacked because it’s not a “hardcore” game?

We’re sticking with the thinking that this is a “good faith” jesture to the gamers for how they “rocked the vote” on the last title as The Sims is one of the best selling series on the PC gaming platform. Lots of sales with lots of fans, why interrupt that momentum with ugly DRM whiplash?

Episode 416: Blowing WindsEpisode 416: Blowing Winds

Unfortunately, we had to skip a week despite recording a good podcast thanks to technical difficulties – don’t worry, we’ll air it at some point in the near future. It was a good episode. This episode had its own issues, as Jonah was unable to record the podcast at home, so he was outside in the New York City night air podcasting with TJ and Scott.

This week’s news includes:

  • Microsoft cancels Fable Legends, closes Press Play Studios, considers shuttering Lionhead Studios UK
  • Report: SpinTires developer sabotaged his own game
  • 10 months later, MAME finishes its transition to open source
  • Valve announces The Lab, a compilation of free VR “experiments”

Let us know what you think.