Giant Bomb GotY 2018 Fantasy League Discussion

I picked Tetris Effect as GOTY because it seems to have the best general consensus among the GB crew. Then again I was totally off last year when I thought Super Mario Odyssey was a shoe-in for GOTY.

I think Artifact could be a sleeper. I can see Ben and Brad really getting into this game. I didn't include it into my list because I think Celeste, Astrobot and Hitman 2 will garner more positive vibes.

RDR2 is going to be a disappointment considering what Jeff and Dan had to say about the game in recent podcasts. I still included RDR2 in my list considering how much Alex and Abby like the game.

Even though I think COD Black Ops 4 is going to be Jeff's GOTY, I don't see anyone else adding it to their lists so I omitted it.

Considering how wild last year discussions went, I think this year will be a bit less controversial in terms of what could be the GOTY. I do have high hopes that Tetris Effect will win GOTY based on recent podcasts, but that is never a good way to assume based on how feelings can change in the next few weeks. Of course, Jeff is such a wild card when it comes to the games he enjoys so who knows what will happen when it comes to the placement of RDR2.

Even though I have my own GOTY which is Monster Hunter World, I don't think that Jason will have enough support to make it into the Top 6. Maybe around 8-10 for sure. Worst case it doesn't make it on at all.

This was tricky. Except for Brad (RDR 2), Jason (Deadcells) and Abby (probably RDR), I have no idea where everyone head space is and there seems to be no real consensus except for Hitman and Tetris Effect. I dont know if those games are liked well enough to win and Tetris Effect is just more Tetris. I think Astro Bot could be a real dark horse but who on the crew has played it. I have it feeling it might come down to Alex again. Should be fun listen when it comes out next month.

Also I just realized i submitted Astro Boy instead of Astro Bot. Oh well :(

Steve this contest strangely exposed what a weird, “disappointing” but not actually year this was for games. I wasn’t bored once this year. I had Fortnite and PUBG and their long shelf life predecessors Rocket League and Overwatch. Even crappy games like Mario Tennis and Mario Party seemed okay this venture around. God of War, Spider-Min, Red Dead all better than the average game even if they also had flaws. They made sequels to my personal GOTYs from recent past in Hitman and Just Cause.

Yet, and perhaps only in contrast to last year, we are faced with a Tetris game being the one the staff is most likely to agree upon, and another Call of Duty sequel the one the whole staff can agree not to fight against. Hitman 2 did nothing wrong, it’s just more of the same, which is what everybody asked for, but it’s feeling like the drop from Uncharted 2 to 3 as far as GOTY interest goes. God of War feels like it came out last year, it’s goodwill seems to have faded the same way Horizon’s did in hindsight.

Because last years games were built to last, because of the rise of free to play, because of the huge increase in quality and practically of budget, alternative gameplay titles like Jackbox, 2018 felt like a great, busy year in gaming.

But looking at Tetris and Not Another Teen Call of Duty, the lack of long term lasting impact for GOW, the passed-over, eh-not-for-mereaction by half the staff to Spidey, the absolute hatred of parts of the staff for “Red Dead 76”, GOTY makes 2018 in gaming look like the type of years when next gen consoles launch.

@andythemez: This was such a strong year for games that I'm having serious trouble narrowing my top 5 this year. The big titles are always gonna be what you expect them to be but that doesn't mean they aren't great. God of War brought me back to a series I thought I'd never care about again and Spider-Man was one of the greatest (if not the best) superhero games of all time. The story in both were fantastic and in the case of Spider-Man, better than any movie has had to offer yet. Outside of the giant AAA titles, there was a huge amount of incredibly fun games across pretty much all platforms including mobile. How good a game is will always be a very personal thing but for me, this was a fantastic year and I'm looking forward to seeing where everyone landed on some of my favorites.

I feel like Spider-Man and God of War have strong chances of consensus vote but I'm not sure how many die-hard defenders they have. I feel like a lot of people never finished God of War (including Jeff?) and Spider-Man has a lot of underwhelming open world bloat that hurt the overall experience. I think the fight to the death is really going to come down to Tetris vs. Red Dead (can't wait to hear Brad say something along the lines of "If you think another Tetris is better than Red Dead Redemption YOU ARE OUT OF YOUR MINDS"), and I don't think there's enough negative feelings on Tetris to kill it. Plus it'll kill in best style, best music, best moment or sequence and on guest lists. Everyone in the industry will have played enough Tetris Effect to give it props, I feel.

@njdohert: Exactly. I feel like he's going to fight hard for it, the rest of the crew will be fairly indifferent, and he'll settle for slot 5 and be not to happy about it.

OK, I think I might have screwed up with my list. I put down my top personal 8 games at the moment, but I don't think any of the games I listed have a great shot at GB's top 5 except for Dead Cells. There are a couple of game I loved but clearly won’t be on the site list like Octopath Traveler and Wandersong. Hopefully those games make it onto the guests lists. Was I suppose to post what I think will be GB's Game of the Year list or post my top 8 and see how close the staff and guest lists matched up with mine? I thought the latter was the right way to go. Could I also edit my list or is it too little too late? I’m sorry for the confusion.

Unavowed and Battletech getting SNUBBED in here.

What an awesome year for games, makes predicting the GB teams top ten pretty tough, though perhaps not for the most obvious reasons. I feel (up till a month or so ago) everyone just assumed Red Dead 2 was a shoo-in, even with Jeff being so down on the prospect of it. Having seen the backlash against the game from Dan, and the (so far) luke warm response from Vinny, we're primed for a compromise style number one. The obvious choice (and the one I subsequently went with) is God of War, but I honestly wouldn't be shocked to see a few different games at one. I feel its pretty likely to be one of God of War, Spider-Man, or ultimately RDR2 pulling through. Would be awesome to see a real dark horse pull it out the bag, for this I am looking at Dead Cells, Tetris Effect, or maybe Monster Hunter World.

Submissions are closed! Please check the status google sheet page for updates! I will post them both there and here! There will be some interactive actions you can take to increase your chances of winning but you'll have to pay attention to know when it's happening and what you can do! For now, please make sure you are both on the draft page and that your submissions are correct! Once we begin, there will be no changes/corrections made!

I went ahead and made a Discord that I can put updates on as well if that's more your speed =D

Discord Link

@fobwashed: Ah bummer it’s too late! I did post a list but like I said, I totally misread the instructions. I thought I had to put my personal top 8 games in the submissions and see how well it lines up with the different lists. Not actually predict the top 8 of the staff site. I’m sorry. Well best of luck to everyone else.

I hear a lot of folks talking about GoW as being a possible No. 1 pick, but I just can't see it. Both East and West barely talk about it, it's hardly ever been in the regular conversations of both teams. So, I just don't see it. It may be in the top 10, but number 1? I just don't see it. And yes, I also don't think RDR2 has a chance either.

So what game will take it this year? Unlike past years, I truly don't know. Maybe Tetris Effect?

Jeff is being real cagey and I like it.

I think it's been a very good year for stellar indies and I'm looking forward to fights over games like Dead Cells, Celeste, Obra Dinn with giant AAA studio games like God of War, Call of Duty, Red Dead.

I'm very interested in how both Monster Hunter World and Hitman 2 end up doing. I love both of them, and Hitman 2 is definitely "more of a good thing" but... damn that last level in Hitman 2 is SO good.

Also Steve, a side bet on how long this year's GOTY cast ends up being would be fun.

To my mind, the only possible winners are Hitman, Tetris, and Dead Cells. Everything else will have too many detractors, whereas this group of games has had nary a bad word said about them on GB. The first two feel like far too much of a known quantity (as much as I'd love Hitman to take it again), so I give it to Dead Cells. There has been an absurd amount of positivity around that game for such an extremely long time... I think it's time for an indie.

@sirpsychosexy: I can see this list happening almost to a T. I can already hear the argument of Spider-Man vs Red Dead. Although, I think Dragon Ball will end up higher.

I think this year will be even more hotly contested than last year, just because there's no one game that everyone (or almost everyone) played and loved through the whole year. Abby and Jeff seemed pretty cold on God of War (and no one seems super hot on it); the East Coast is much less enthused about Dead Cells and Tetris Effect than the West Coast; RDR2 ended up being far more divisive than intended; Hitman 2 seems to have come and gone with much less fanfare than Hitman; Spider-Man has received fairly lukewarm reception from everyone; Into the Breach, Celeste, and Obra Dinn will get some love, but I can't see them really fighting into the top 3 (though they all deserve it); and the mere suggestion of Black Ops 4: Blackest Ops taking the 1 spot is going to be hotly contested by everyone but Jeff, who's going to defend it with his life if necessary.

Ultimately, there were a lot of great games this year, but there weren't a lot of unilaterally loved games for the Giant Bomb crew. I think the Best Game discussion is going to be a real knife-vs-bat fight, where everyone secretly packed a machete.

Submissions are closed again! We are at 300 entrants and ready to roll! I'll be posting the first "interactive" element to the Fantasy League this week!

Choo choo!

Thanks for taking the time and effort, Steve. I honestly can't imagine.

@fobwashed: "For now, please make sure you are both on the draft page and that your submissions are correct! Once we begin, there will be no changes/corrections made!"

What's the best way to make a change? I know you didn't want us to edit our original posts. Do I need to send it to you?

Also, I would have messaged in the Discord, but it's telling me the link has expired.

Didn't realize Discord links expired. Just DM me on the site the changes you need made. I'm prob gonna start the interactive thing today at which point choices will be locked.

~ UPDATE~

Since we can't change our picks, we will be doing the next best thing: Attempting to drag down your opponent's scores! On your original submission add at the TOP of your list the following:

ROUND 1: [Game Name]

See the first response post (mine) on the submission page if you are confused.

The listed game will then be given a -1 to its score. Be aware that it may be worthwhile to dock a game that you also have on your list as long as it isn't in your "Game 1" slot. Docking a game 1 point will result in the following:

Game 1: -1

Game 2: -0.8

Game 3: -0.6

Game 4: -0.4

Game 5: -0.2

So if you have a "Game 5" that a lot of people have as "Game 1", docking it will give you a net 0.8 point advantage against people who have it in "Game 1".

I have updated the "Games" tab of the spreadsheet with a breakdown of how many times each game was selected and in which slot they were selected to help you work out what you want to do. Round 1 point totals will be tallied on Monday Dec 10th so please edit your original submission post by then.

Someone please explain what I’m missing about God of War if they can. I haven’t been listening to the bombcast as much as the beastcast, but the love it’s getting in this draft is just overwhelming and I honestly can’t remember the crew being that excited about it.

Have they been drooling over it on the bombcast this much? I put it up for my round 1 pick just because of the numbers here, other than that it doesnt really strike me as the number one contender.

Or is the game itself actually this amazing? I follow the site pretty closely and I never really got away feeling this is a must play...

I haven’t played it so I’m not hating, just to me it really comes out of left field to be considered at all, nevermind this overwhelmingly and unanimously.

So clearly I must be missing something?

I think Jeff and Dan are going to make a BIG FighterZ push (IT GOT US TO WATCH THE ANIME!!!!!!), and I think it's deserved: that game is great and has been VERY well-supported (lackluster inclusion of Android 17 as DLC aside) but other than that, my list is a complete crapshoot. Everything that's got a major upside has some BIG downsides, from a site-perspective. Personally, I adore Spider-Man, but I can see how it didn't "grab" some staffers. Red Dead is going to be the live wire of the debate, but so many Certified Bangers came out early this year that they haven't been getting talked about at all, and I think that's influencing me to underestimate them.

Guest lists are impossible to factor in, I feel like that's where a lot of AAA stuff gets its shine, but there are always left-field indies aplenty.

@andythemez: I felt this way about last year and they still managed to get the knives out over picks like Dream Daddy all the way up to Mario Odyssey VS PUBG. I think it's easy to forget just how passionate the duders can get about things they've just let slide over normal podcast discussions.

I feel like a fool for forgetting Donut County in my picks.

Just gonna give this a little bump because a lot of people are still to announce their round 1 picks.

Check this out.

UPDATE!

ROUND 1 is completed. The scores now reflect the active state of the Fantasy League. RDR2 took the biggest hit followed by God of War and Marvel's Spider-Man. Next round of interaction will begin later this week!

ROUND 2 UPDATE!

This round, you will be picking any one staff member whose scores you will be bringing down by 1 percent.

On your original submission add at the TOP of your list the following:

ROUND 2: [Staff Name]

See the first response post (mine) on the submission page if you are confused.

All scores for that staff member's "Staff List" will be marked down by 1 percent per person that chose them. So their top game would only be worth 99 instead of 100. Their second worth 89.1. etc...

Cutoff for this Round will be December 19th.

@fobwashed: I'm a bit confused by how Round 2 will be calculated. By "1 percent per person that chose them", does that mean if 100 people choose them, their top game is -100% (or worth 0)?

@alphaman said:

Yup. If 101 people choose a specific person it would start giving negative points as well but I highly doubt this will happen because there's only 300 people in the league and only 22 people participated in Round 1. This is primarily a way to let people have a bit more of an active role in trying to better their chances by making some additional educated guesses on which direction they think GB staff will be leaning towards. Also, it gives a slight advantage to people who are paying attention to both GB and the league. Tho I guess it's possible it could backfire if things don't go how you think it's gonna go =]

@fobwashed: Gotcha, thanks! Makes sense with the total and participation numbers. Adds to the spice I guess!

The Round 2 results are in. The top 10 list point deductions will be as follows:

Abby: 8%

Jeff: 5%

Dan: 4%

Brad/Alex: 3%

Ben/Jan: 2%

Vinny/Rorie/Jason: 0%

Which game do you all think will be the most contested? I think it will be Red Dead, and they won’t even be fighting to put it the top half of the list.

I just want to post this in a public forum so that I can be proven right when the time comes. These are going to be the top 10 games, in no specific order:

Hitman 2

God of War

Spider-Man

Red Dead Redemption 2

Dead Cells

Into the Breach

Tetris Effect

Black Ops 4

Astro Bot

Celeste

Book it.

Update 8 and Round 3 rules have been posted. Please check the spreadsheet for details! https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1dLGAw959vYN9p3FiXv7UIgjj20X7ebd9vwPFyt0EHdI/edit?usp=sharing

Looks like God of war will be an easy landslide #1 at this point. It’s vinny and Dan’s Goty and it’s high on ben’s and Jan’s lists. We haven’t seen Jason’s but we know he liked it too. That should be more than enough.