I'm probably reading too much into it, but it's funny to see Dark Souls 2 on 2nd place in 2014, Bloodborne on 4th (2015) and now Dark Souls 3 down to 5th place for this year.
franchise fatigue?
2014 competition was pretty weak, plus it was the sequel to Dark Souls, which everybody loved.
2015 comp was stiffer. UC4 has a HUGE fanbase here, as seen by its back-to-back wins. Hell, it actually increased its point total by several hundred this year! Close to UC4 was MGS5, again, a more bigger, more popular franchise here on GAF, the final MGS game and it looked amazing as shit. Then there's Zelda, which...its point total was very close to? Zelda had 1472 points, Bloodborne had 1464 points. So they were basically tied for second. Not bad for a niche hardcore action rpg. Dark Souls 3/Zelda were basically the same again this year, 1,678 vs 1,666. So its stayed pretty consistent...its just it got more highly anticipated titles ahead of it. UC4 again, Persona 5 hype has grown every single time it shows up on this list, and Horizon: Zero Dawn was
GAF's E3 Game of the Show.
Bloodborne is the favorite to win GAF's GOTY, and the top 5 placement doesn't seem to hint at a lot of franchise fatigue, even in a stacked lookin year like this.