@judaspete: Reviewing a video game is weird. Sometimes, the question of whether or not a game should be fun also comes into question with a review. Your Dirt Rally and Gravel point is a great example of the subjective vs objective question, but I also think it brings up an interesting point about triple-a versus smaller budget titles. Often times, triple-a titles are well made and whatnot, but they also tend to be formulaic, safe, and bland. Indies aren't usually as polished as triple-a, but they can be way more exciting because they feel more experimental with new ideas. Do you give props for shooting for these new ideas even if they don't stick? How far do you go with praising a triple-a game's polish before you critique it for its formulaicness? These questions aren't as hard to answer as the others, but they still come up nonetheless.
@chaser324: I definitely had to stew on this blog for a couple days before writing it. I don't see myself going back to the higher level of output, so I knew that this blog would be a point of no return. At the very least, I don't see myself ever quitting video games. Everyone needs a hobby, and I would much rather be a part of this one than watch TV or read books. Thank you for reading and commenting on my stuff over the time I've been writing here.
@eccentrix: Thanks. It's gonna be a bit weird to not instantly want to go to a notebook and start writing notes, though I might just take notes for note-taking sakes.
@onemanarmyy: And that's the frustrating part about all of this. I mentioned this earlier with someone else's post, but it seems a lot of people watch this show for the announcements, but its high viewership gives "legitimacy" to the awards being handed. It's not the prestige of the awards that makes it important, but the announcements that surround it that makes it important. I don't doubt that developers still care about winning this award. Where I have trouble with this is that many people who only really watch TGAs on a surface level either don't care about the awards or think this is the Oscars of video games when it's actually just Geoff wanting his own little E3 press conference.
@franzlska: I think your line about wanting prestige without wanting to treat games with prestige is a great quote for this. I think we all want to have prestige with this medium, but we aren't going to get it through dew-rito sponsorships and turning the show into some Marvel-esque spectacle (it's an exaggeration but it gets the point across). I agree that they are trying to cram too much into a three hour time window, and I sadly think the awards are the first thing they choose to cut. In my 2020 blog, I proposed either treating sponsors and announcements as their ad breaks or just cramming the announcements into the pre-show. Either way, I think it's a way of raising enough money to make the show happen and make it fun while not compromising its integrity. I also said in my previous blog how it's currently the opposite and the awards act as the ad break, as I remember counting up-to twenty minutes of announcements between some of the awards. I wish Keighley would just separate the two, because it seems like he just wants to create a E3: Winter Edition more than run an award ceremony.
@merxworx01: Money doesn't grow on trees, so of course these shows need to find a way to make money. Where this argument comes to a fault, however, is with these two game award ceremonies. The D.I.C.E. Awards didn't have any advertisements, sponsors, etc., and yet they still had a show with stage presences and all. On the flip side of things, The Game Awards puts into question just how much they need to do to make the show happen. I don't have the numbers, but I'm guessing a large percentage of their revenue goes into their spectacle (A-list actors presenting awards, music performances, grandiose mise en scene, etc.). This isn't a matter of throwing in a few advertisements and sponsors to make enough money to have a show, it's a matter of clearly showing that the interest lies in announcements over awards. Also, while awards are certainly great for developers, I bet they don't necessarily appreciate having their achievement read over in a lineup of five awards over the course of thirty seconds or forgotten altogether (TGAs forgot to announce PUBG as best multiplayer game in 2017).
I certainly believe that there is a way to generate income to put on a proper award ceremony without it devolving to The Game Awards. I mean, the D.I.C.E. Awards found a way. Ultimately, it shouldn't matter how the audience or media perceives the event. What matters is that a ceremony properly celebrates the work put into video games, and if that is boring to some then so be it.
@mindbullet: I can see this as an approach to legitimizing the games industry. The problem I have with that though is the thing that we are trying to spread to as many eyeballs as possible are The Game Awards, and I personally do not want that to be the representation of the games industry. On the movie side of things, I could see someone making a similar argument for the MCU. It's getting a lot of eyeballs back into theaters, but I don't believe that is what should represent cinema (but I'm a bit of a film snob, so take that as you will).
I do think your question of whether or not we even need to care about legitimizing games is an interesting one. I personally think we should as I think doing so will help with the public perception and acceptance of games as an artform and meritable pastime, and I think we could see some neat outcomes with more legitimization. At the same time though, trying to legitimize it is ultimately about trying to appeal to an older generation, as I think the younger generation already accept gaming. I don't think that older generation is really changing their minds about video games (outside of seeing their economic benefits in the stock market), so I could see people not caring about this topic because it's a matter of time more than anything else.
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