GAF'ss Game of the Year will be the same as Game Informer or IGN's (Mordor, Dragon Age).
Hope people cry and stamp their feet enough about the new rule so that I can vote for Pokemon Puzzle Challenge. Nothing else comes close this year.
Are remasters going to count in GAF's GOTY voting?
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GAF'ss Game of the Year will be the same as Game Informer or IGN's (Mordor, Dragon Age).
Hope people cry and stamp their feet enough about the new rule so that I can vote for Pokemon Puzzle Challenge. Nothing else comes close this year.
Why?
My definition of GotY only considers original games released in that year. GotY should be about opening up healthy discussions about the best (original) ideas and executions that were achieved by developers that year. It's an opportunity to celebrate and deliberate on those achievements.
Having GTA V and The Last of Us in that discussion is boring, because those games already enjoyed that privilege last year. If you only just played them this year you can always post a lttp to share your thoughts. I'd just prefer these games don't 'dilute' the current discussion.
I actually went ahead and looked up if remasters where eligible for Oscars. I couldn't find a rule that makes them non-eligible. As long as the movie was released in a Los Angeles theater that year and submitted for consideration it's eligible. But yeah, as far as I know a remaster has never been nominated (the creators probably don't even submit them).
Portugeezer
Member
What are the rules? I missed it.
Doctoglethorpe
Member
If we're to count rereleases (true remakes are another matter), we may as well count all games and it just be "whats your favorite game that you played this year" polling regardless of how old they are.
Now or previously?
Previously, outside of the grey area relating to ports with significant changes, if a game was ported to a platform the year after its release, if the poster had not previously voted for it, they could that year.
Now, not.
mrmickfran
Member
Give Bayonetta 2 a chance pls.
Dragon Age, Bayonetta, Smash Bros. or Mordor.
GAF aggregate taste is no different than the taste of any other major outlet. The GAF GOTY has been identical to IGN's for almost 7 years in a row. The value the voting thread provides is in the individual ballots of people who take the time to come up with interesting or well written lists, that's why people should feel free to vote however they want and not worry about what the final result will be, since there's nothing interesting going on there.
Reading the ballots each year is one of my favorite things to do on this forum.
Haunted
Member
Just trying to make an example.
Hence why it's important to be able to decide on a case by case basis if the changes made by a free patch/new release/remaster/remake are substantial enough to warrant eligibility.
Though I think being a new commercial release in the calendar year in question is one of the absolute eligibility rules, so while a substantial free patch might make just as many changes as a remaster, the former cannot possibly count for eligibility if the game released in 2013.
Dota 2 has gotten more updates this year than most other games get in their lifetime, has evolved and changed more than some games have for their "remaster" - yet it's ineligible. But if Valve calls the latest patch "Dota 3" and charges 4,99 for it, it becomes eligible.
Technicalities...
Timetokill already clarified that the rule change was a long time coming. I guess you're skeptical of that. Does it really matter though? The rule change will benefit the GotY discussion.
AuthenticM
Member
They are games that were released, so they should.
Remakes should be allowed, Remasters or games that were just ported with no real extra content I don't feel should be eligible. It robs a spot away from a game that should deserve recognition instead of a game that could have come out the year previously. There were so many ports/remasters released this year that it would be silly to allow them to be eligible. I know people want to push some agenda that 2014 sucked or something, but there was actually a crap ton of great ORIGINAL games that were released this year that deserve way more recognition that games that were released last year and the only difference being that the resolution got upped.
Hero of Canton
Member
Setting aside questions of eligibility, why would you want to vote for the same game two years in a row? That's just boring. There have been plenty of great games released in 2014 that are worthy of nominating. It'd be like putting Apocalypse Now Redux or the Director's Cut of Blade Runner down on your Academy Award ballot. Reward something new.
Effigenius
Member
They should definitely not count. These games came out last year, let it go. For god's sake, the PC version of GTA5 comes out next year. Are we STILL going to be voting for it a year from now? Please no. That was a 2013 game. Let's leave it in 2013.
Closest movie analogue is probably the Star Wars Special Editions. Would have been funny if any of them got nominated in 1997.
I disagree it would or wouldn't benefit GotY discussion.
Does it matter? I'm not sure. I guess the question is matter on what scale? Does GotY even matter? Not particularly, it's just a cool little thing that results in a bunch of interesting data.
And yes, I'm extremely skeptical of his claim. In fact, even last year I would have been, considering everyone knew TLoU and GTA were coming to next-gen this year, and everyone knew they were going to do very well in the GotY awards last year.
It was always going to be the first time a game meeting the criteria for GotY from the previous year had serious potential to break the top ten, so the first time the rule needed to be rethought.
charlequin
Banned
Out of curiosity, what are this year's tentative rules looking like at the moment? I care way less about this remaster stuff (which won't affect my vote either way) than my own personal hobbyhorse, the fan translation rule.
TheRedSnifit
Member
Probably not. If remasters were allowed, RE4 would have half the GOTYs.
First, you are mistaken; yes, it's true.
Second: I don't follow. I like an old game, therefore I don't appreciate originality?
Third: Lots of interesting things came out this year.
Your protests and arguments are just as 'convenient' as those with opposing opinions, then.
Highly doubt you'd have half the issue you do with this if Metro and Tomb Raider were the biggest remasters of the year.
JohnnyFootball
GerAlt-Right. Ciriously.
This makes no sense.
Great original non-remaster/non-remake/non-port games that came out this year, IN MY OPINION.
-Far Cry 4
-Bayonetta 2
-Dark Souls 2
-Driveclub (IMO)
-Wolfenstein
-Kirby Triple Deluxe
-Smash Bros U
-Mario Kart 8
-Donkey Kong Tropical Freeze
-Persona Q
-Crypt of the Necrodancer
-Shovel Knight
-Lovely Planet
-Bravely Default
-Transistor
-Sunset Overdrive
-Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare
And this is just off the top of my head right now. 2014 was insane for games with tons of original titles, it would be silly to count remasters of games that came out just 1-2 years ago with no real changes when tons of great original games came out this year. 2014 was amazing to me contray to popular belief.
-Far Cry 4
-Bayonetta 2
-Dark Souls 2
-Driveclub (IMO)
-Wolfenstein
-Kirby Triple Deluxe
-Smash Bros U
-Mario Kart 8
-Donkey Kong Tropical Freeze
-Persona Q
-Crypt of the Necrodancer
-Shovel Knight
-Lovely Planet
-Bravely Default
-Transistor
-Sunset Overdrive
-Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare
And this is just off the top of my head right now. 2014 was insane for games with tons of original titles, it would be silly to count remasters of games that came out just 1-2 years ago with no real changes when tons of great original games came out this year. 2014 was amazing to me contray to popular belief.
First: According to Rules 2 and 3 of the official Academy Awards Rules, a film must open in the previous calendar year, from midnight at the start of 1 January to midnight at the end of 31 December... So, no.
Second: How is your appreciation of an old game not play into the perception of gamers you suggested we should avoid?
Third: And being interesting is nothing to do with being the best. GotY is about the best game, not most interesting, or most original, etc.
And I don't think I am superficial, but even if I am, I completely fail to see what this has to do with the rule change. I don't want TLoU or GTA to win, I wouldn't vote for them even if they were allowed, that's not the point.
I didn't deny TLoU and GTA being the reasons I think the change is bad though, so I don't see your point.
Winterfang
Banned
No way, we are in a new gen.
D1renegade
Member
I agree with this
Don't forget Valiant Hearts, Captain Toad and Child of Light. 2014 was just fine!
TheRedSnifit
Member
What would be gained from limiting it to 2014, then? If games from 1998 can win GOTY 2014, the entire point of the exercise is lost, and it becomes little more than a yearly GOAT vote with an arbitrary, meaningless limitation.
charlequin
Banned
We already have this exact principle in place with both the regional release (where you can vote for a game when it's released in your region, as long as you didn't when it came out in other regions in previous years) and the late-to-the-port exception (where you can vote for a game that came out the previous year if it came out on another platform this year, as long as you didn't vote for it on the previous platform last year.)
It makes perfect sense: GOTY voting represents someone's categorization of games that they've experienced for the first time within a specific time window. The rules have some flexibility around the way that releases work in this industry, but ultimately the fact that a game is someone's 20XX GOTY by definition means it can't be their 20XX+1 GOTY.
This has always been possible and will always be possible because of localization and timed-exclusive windows. Xenoblade was eligible for three consecutive years and hit top-15 in two of them.
Jeez that's right! Valiant Hearts surprised the hell outta me! I still haven't gotten a chance to play Child of Light, I think I need to change that soon. Captain Toad is pretty damn amazing as well, only like 20 stages in so far though hehe.
I'd rather list the games I thought were the best this year (commercially released this year no less), rather than concoct some artificial list for the sake of looking 'original' (which is a joke when you see how many sequels will be in the top 20).
It's not some sort of unassailable truth at the best of times.
I think it's daft to disqualify a title commercially released in 2014. Simple as. Obviously it's going to happen though, so that's that.
So why does it matter if its Tomb Raider or The Last of Us? What is it about The Last of Us that makes you care so much whether it gets excluded or not? Yet you wouldn't have a problem with Tomb Raider being excluded?
Moral Panic
Member
This is also my thinking.
charlequin
Banned
It seems fine to me if it's people who skipped these games for platform reasons last year and got to play them this year. (And the rules already make them eligible for that purpose.) I only see an issue if people are trying to vote for the same game consecutively.
ShockingAlberto
Member
Hm. If a game comes out in December on PS4 and then in January on Xbox One, is it eligible for both years?
Fuck, forgot about TR
E. Easily one of the best games I played this year, and I'd never played it before.Yeah, my top ten is a top four or five.
No, not at all, of course Tomb Raider shouldn't be excluded. I just wouldn't have thought about it if TLoU and GTA hadn't come out, because I didn't play TR Remaster, and Metros didn't come out last year, so wouldn't count anyway.
If someone brought it up, if this thread had been made, I might not have cared still though, because I wouldn't have thought the rule change was to exclude Tomb Raider, because no one would have voted for it.
EDIT: Appropriately Metro Last Light did come out in 2013, I thought it was '12.
No?
Fuck, forgot about TR
charlequin
Banned
Under the <= 2013 rules, yes.
Not literally no one, of course, but it wouldn't be a contender.
Savantcore
Unconfirmed Member
OlliOlli for GOTY.
Trigonometrize.
Member
So, does Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair qualify then? It doesn't follow the port rule, but the port rule would ostensibly apply only when the original game was also localized. A bit of a weird situation, so just looking for some confirmation. With a gun to my head I would assume it qualifies.
For the unititated: Danganronpa 2 for PSP was released in Japan (never came to NA) in 2012, then Danganronpa 2 was rereleased in Japan as well as NA for Vita in 2014 that would be considered an upscale/port of the original game.
ShockingAlberto
Member
Then I can't say it's a bad thing we're exercising some judgment instead of merely sticking to the letter.
This is one of those situations where the pornography argument applies. If I vehemently disagreed with the rules here, which I don't, I'd just not vote.
GotY is not about the best game, that's just the end result of what GotY is really about. It's about the discussion, which goes on for weeks. From what I've read you seem to see GotY mainly as a list containing interesting data. The list is indeed interesting, but the heart of GotY is all about those ballots that deliberate on their favorite games.
I know you mostly disagree with the timing of the rule change instead of the rule itself, but I'm just trying to change your perception of what GotY is about.
Having GTA V and Last of Us in there is not very interesting from my perspective because I want to read about new games. The only appeal it might have is that it could possibly illustrate that 2014 was not the best year in gaming. So yeah, I'd rather they make the thread as interesting as possible by limiting the eligibility.
Visualante2
Member
I don't think remasters deserve awards.
I didn't play The Last of Us or GTA V in 2013.
They were released as new on a platform I did actually own in 2014, I bought them as new in 2014, and played them for the first time in 2014.
Why shouldn't I be allowed to vote for them? They were 2 of the best games I played this year.
They were released as new on a platform I did actually own in 2014, I bought them as new in 2014, and played them for the first time in 2014.
Why shouldn't I be allowed to vote for them? They were 2 of the best games I played this year.
theprodigy
Member
that's why the LTTP award exists
seriously people, this isn't a new concept
:jnc
Diprosalic
Banned
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