The Video Game Awards – Nominations Announced, But Are They Earnest Choices?

Every year concludes with a grand awards show celebrating accomplishments in the gaming industry—or rather, it should be one. Following up last year’s show, where developers were actively told to ‘please wrap it up’ when making their speeches, this year’s nominations continue to highlight the failings of it being an actual awards show.

Nominations for the 2024 Game Awards

The full list of nominations can be found on the official Game Awards site, but major games this year were featured in various categories.

Nintendo’s lineup dominated the Family Game section, with Princess Peach: Showtime! and Zelda: Echos of Wisdom getting nominations. Meanwhile, Shift Up’s Stellar Blade secured the Best Action and Music/Score sections. The biggest surprise was Bandai-Namco’s Elden Ring: Shadow of Erdtree Expansion getting four nominations, two of them being Best Direction and Game of the Year.

However, games like Team Asobi’s Astro Bot and ATLUS’ Metaphor: ReFantazio got multiple nominations across many categories. I’m a big fan of both games, both being highlights of the year for me, very happy to see them getting the respect they deserve.

Setting Expectations or Pre-emptive Damage Control?- DLC and Expansions

The official Game Awards account shared before the nomination reveals that DLC and Expansions could stand alongside new IP and sequels for nominations. Many read this as Elden Ring getting another wave of rewards following its domination at the 2022 Game Awards.

And sure enough, the Shadow of the Erdtree Expansion took four award nominations, two being Best Direction and Game of the Year. The Expansion is one of the best-reviewed experiences this year, so while getting nominated for Best RPG or Best Art Direction seems ‘fair’, the game should’ve been part of a ‘Best DLC/Expansions’ category.

One already exists, called ‘Best Ongoing Game’. That’s where Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty won its award in 2023. So why not put Elden Ring’s DLC there?

This year had great video game expansions, with Diablo IV and Final Fantasy XIV getting expansions that many enjoyed. In addition, experiences like Sonic X Shadow Generations could also fit in this category, considering Shadow Generations is a great complement to the Sonic Generations remaster.

Is it the Nintendo Category or Not? – Best Family Game

At this point, we can all agree that the ‘Best Family Game’ Category is the Game Awards committee throwing their hands up in the air and saying ‘…here’s where the Switch games go’. For years now, Nintendo’s offerings have taken up more than half the nominations.

In prior years, I didn’t mind this all that much. But this year, it’s particularly bothersome when the Nintendo selection seems a tad forced. I enjoyed Princess Peach: Showtime! a fair amount, but the experience was not Nintendo’s best this year. Other games like Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door Remake or Mario & Luigi: Brothership could’ve easily taken that slot, considering its higher Metacritic rating.

And if I want to bring up Sonic X Shadow Generations again, that title currently sits at 80% on Metacritic. Six points higher than Princess Peach: Showtimes! 74% on Metacritic. And if remakes and remasters can be part of the nominations, like Silent Hill 2 and Final Fantasy VII: Rebirth prove this year, why can’t Sonic and Shadow be in on the fun?

The Player’s Choice Award

Every year, the Game Awards offer viewers an option to make their voice heard, having three rounds of voting for a selection of games from that given year. It’s a fantastic idea and one I’m happy exists, but I feel it isn’t enough.

There should be more than one ‘Player’s Choice’ Award, considering how many games are released in a given year. And you have games with massive communities, like the Genshin Impact. In 2022, that game swept the Player’s Choice award, when other games that year could’ve gotten that honor instead.

As someone who gave Sonic Frontiers its roses, I felt that the game got snubbed during the 2022 awards cycle. Seeing the Sonic community rally together to get it in the Game Awards through the Players Choice Award was awesome. But Sonic Frontiers losing to a game with a much larger community and fan base? It stung.

How Can We Better Honor Indies Games?

2024 offered great indie games like Beserk Boy, Penny’s Big Breakaway, and Grapple Dogs: Cosmic Canines were released. And those are the ones I either beat or put a sizable amount of time into. Other highlights include Little Kitty, Big City, Another Crabs Treasure, and many more.

To the Game Awards credit, this year honored many Indies and one got nominated for Game of the Year through Balotro. As someone who feels smaller titles and AA releases offer more engaging experiences than AAA titles, seeing further respect for indies would be ideal.

An indie game being at one of these shows has power, as seen with the explosive sales of Balotro on mobile platforms since it was revealed as a GOTY nomination. And in an industry where game developers, large and small, need that support, helping them get it is important.

Thoughts from the Lords

While my thoughts on this entire situation should be clear from my comments thus far, I wanted to reach out to my fellow Lords, Scribes, and Editors at Lords of Gaming, as most of us have thoughts on Jeff’s show.

Lord Cognito – CEO of Lords of Gaming

You can make the argument for Helldivers 2 being snubbed and look, Elden Ring is amazing and it’s a transformative DLC. But I completely disgree being in the GOTY category and it makes you ask ‘why now?’. Part of a game or an expansion of a game should never be nomiated over a new experience.

Even if the DLC can be expeptional content, I will never agree that DLC or Remakes being Game of the Year, it convalutes the space. For the most part though, I liked a lot of the nommines. Very happy to see games like Tales of Kenzara: Zau, Kunitsu-Gami: Path of the Goddess and Tekken 8 get nomations.

Content creator of the year felt lacking, when Kai Ceant’s impact on the Souls community was a major highlight of the year. I feel a major sticking point is the Elden Ring DLC nomination for GOTY, when you could make the argument other DLC’s that released this year like Destiny 2: The Final Shape that is as strong as a stand alone game.

Digital – Writer

Geoff Keighley has officially announced the nominees for the 2024 Game of the Year, and the list has left some of us scratching our heads. One consistent topic of discussion revolves around Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree and whether it should be included. Some argue that it’s better than many games released this year, while others question its eligibility since it requires the base game to play and significant progress within to access.

If you’ve read most of my writings, you know I love FromSoftware to the core. However, including Shadow of the Erdtree on a Game of the Year list doesn’t make much sense to me. My opinion would be different if the DLC were standalone or if there were a category specifically for “Best DLC of 2024.” This discussion reminds me of last year when Cyberpunk 2077 was awarded Best Ongoing Game due to the release of the Phantom Liberty DLC. That also didn’t sit well with me—a DLC release doesn’t suddenly make a game “ongoing” in the same way as a Destiny 2 or Final Fantasy XIV.

All of this highlights the need for changes in how selections are made, along with the creation of new categories to better reflect the variety of gaming experiences.

Mahmood aka Wayhik – Editor-in-Chief

Every year, the Game Awards always has some controversy that the internet loses its mind over and this year is no exception. This year, the elephant in the room is the inclusion of Shadow of the Erdtree expansion finding its way into Game of the Year nominees. In previous years, some outstanding DLCs/expansions (Phantom Liberty comes recently to mind) were always nominated in the Ongoing Games category and to make an exception is inconsistent.

Also, the question of remakes being nominated for Game of the Year is always a contentious issue. With Silent Hill 2 being nominated, this question was raised once again. Personally, as long as the remake is substantially improved from the original version, I have no qualms with their inclusion.

Not to mention that Persona 3 Reload was also snubbed in the Best Narrative category is also baffling. But in the end, the TGAs have come a long way and are a massive showcase that garners hundreds of millions of viewers. However, they are more about the ads and announcements than the hard-working developers, content creators, and esports competitors who pour their hearts and souls into their craft.

Cerebral Paul – Editor

Every December, the year concludes with The Game Awards a grand intended to be a celebration of the accomplishments in the gaming industry. In the eyes of many it often falls short of, or distracts from those lofty goals. Such as last year where developers were actively told to ‘please wrap it up’ when making their speeches. This year’s has been no different.

Closing Thoughts

The Game Awards has its place in the gaming industry as night everyone can celebrate, developers and fans alike. But celebrating such an event is hard when odd decisions like the ones made this year dampen things.

What do you all think about the nominations? And do you think Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree ‘belongs’ in the GOTY category? Let us know in the comments below!