Didn’t see any mention of this on the forum but it seemed like a pretty interesting development.
It would be more accurate to say that the Hugos are getting a gaming category, since only fantasy and scifi games will be eligible.
Yeah but really, all that rules out is sports and WW2 games.
But anyway, on a serious note, it’ll be interesting to see if they move past big budget titles, and evaluate everything available rather than just the games with the biggest marketing pushes. I’m also curious if they’ll see past technical issues to see any real artistic merit. And as a final thing, I wonder if they’ll be evaluating the game as a whole, or just its fiction. For instance, will they pick a game simply because of a good story? Or will they pick the game because it was well received by critics? Will they approach from the angle of a hardcore gamer, or a mainstream person with little experience?
I’m just hoping they are really discerning with these awards, rather than turning in to spiketv awards. I know that they aren’t likely to be that shallow, but jumping from books to games is a leap, and there are plenty of pitfalls.
Charles- The Hugo Awards are fan-voted, and they don’t tend to be terribly discerning these days. Sorry to disappoint, but it’ll most likely be mainstream stuff.
The Hugos aren’t exactly discerning about books; I wouldn’t get your hopes up.
The Hugo awards are voted on each year by the members of WorldCon (the World Science Fiction Convention). Since that’s just a semi-random collection of SF fans, the award tends to be as much a popularity contest as anything else. (For example, the 1972 Best Novel Hugo went to The Gods Themselves, mainly because it was by Asimov. In hindsight, Brunner’s The Sheep Look Up would be a far better choice for that year.
[edit: Hit ‘submit’ too early by accident.]
Ah. I didn’t know much about the Hugo awards other than seeing it slapped on the cover of various books I’ve read.
Sigh. So much for hoping for it being important for gaming!
Fan voted is about the worst metric I can think of.
My evangelism continues: If SoTC doesn’t win this, then the award is an obvious and irredeemable sham.
Edit: Fan voted? I guess World of Warcraft’s expansion pack will get it then.
A mainstream sci-fi award that appeals to mainstream sci-fi fans, outrageous!
My post was based on the idea that it wasn’t so much of a mainstream award. Now that I know it is, you can safely reply with tl;dr.
At least it’ll be better than IGN’s 360 Sports Game of the Year.
However, The Gods Themselves also won the 1972 Nebula award, which is the Science Fiction Writers Association award. So its acclaim went beyond that of mere fan popularity. Of course, peer popularity could have had something to do with it, because it was, after all, Asimov.