Submitted 3 weeks ago by HarkMahlberg@kbin.earth to games@lemmy.world
https://media.kbin.earth/f7/2b/f72b5143cac6c904ad5381feb8081b8b5d76d43f12484633b265d3d87008779d.jpg
Normally the steam awards winners are real stinkers, but the voters had shockingly good taste this year.
Damn, they did my boy The Alters dirty. Not a single win.
Also, Arc Raiders most innovative? Isn’t it just an (admittedly improved) extraction shooter?
My one issue with Alters was if you make certain decisions with what to produce or work on, at certain points, I had to roll back pretty far to undo them to just survive upcoming events. Really cool game otherwise.
It’s definitely flawed. But I found it to be original if nothing else and a breath of fresh air in a world of extraction shooters, rogueliles and soulslikes. Rather reminded me of Death Stranding when it came out.
I love the story of that game, too, but being unable to progress at those points makes for a good strategy game while also being antithetical to its message, lol.
The arc are ectremely impressive enemies and feel like nothing I’ve ever fought in a game, and the matchmaking system puts you in matvhes with people that have the same level of aggression. So it’s not your regular extraction shooter where NPCs are a sidenote and everyone plays kill on sight and that’s extremely refreshing
April had a content patch, 12 new subclasses and it enabled crossplay I believe.
BG3 got a native steam deck version that has improved the game quite a lot.
Turning an unplayable ripoff game into something that is maybe worth the steam sale price ten years later isn’t a “labor of love” it’s mitigating legal risk from it’s investors.
BG3 added a ton of content since release, to the point where they even brought in the entire voice cast to record additional dialogue.
Unplayable? I bought the game at launch and it played absolutely fine.
Was it a barren wasteland with fuck all to do? Sure, but it worked perfectly fine, the last decade has seen HG turn NMS into one of if not the most comprehensive space adventure game.
Since 2016 they have added various additional stuff like VR support, alongside gameplay enhancements (IE: content like building your own fleet, bases, settlements, expeditions, animal taming etc). All for free.
Conversely, larian has repeatedly stated that they do not want to do additional content for BG3; with every patch release it’s “this is it, we’re done with this now”, and whenever quizzed on additional content, such as dlc, The studio claims the Devs were elated to cancel BG3 dlc in favour of making a different game entirely.
Personally, I don’t consider the latter to be an indication of a labour of love, but rather an obligation to their fans (because larian are a very good studio, who care for their fans).
I love both games, but BG3 absolutely did not deserve the labour of love category imo, there are simply far more obvious alternatives.
Hasn’t No Man’s Sky won before? I don’t think you could vote for ones that had won before
I was one of the runners-up, and I definitely voted for it… so, either it can win more than once or it didn’t win previously.
NMS has too many bugs, incoherent game design choices, broken promises, broken game mechanics, half-baked mechanics, terrible UI, an unrelatable story, a cardboard universe…
The awards are fun when I compare my vote list with my friends’ vote list, but the actual awards are just annoyingly pointless.
The winner of each category is predictable immediatelt. It will only ever be the game with the highest number of players and the category doesn’t matter.
If GTA6 comes out in 2026 and posts “we are hoping to win the Emotional Indie Platformer Award”, it’s going to win the Emotional Indie Platformer Award.
RV There Yet isn’t really that chill. It’s also highly frustrating at times.
It’s also trying to ride the success of Peak
I am very disappointed that this game promotes smoking. So it’s an instant non-starter for me.
It winning was really surprising to me. It was fun for like 15 minutes. I guess… people like it? It’s a meme? Idk.
It’s refreshing to see Expedition 33 winning a category it deserves, and only that category.
That would be your opinion. It deserved game of the year in my personal opinion, in addition to the music award.
Give it all the awards
The difference between awards chosen purely by people who play video games and awards chosen primarily by people who make their pay cheques in the industry
Silksong winning GOTY and BGYSA is great. Seeing Peak up there was nice too. I was a little surprised to see BG3- great game, but I thought it was EOLed in 2024 after native steam deck support.
Screw Silksong, Abiotic Factor should’ve won game of the year! I had a lot of fun with it and it really felt like the devs put a lot of heart into it.
What kind of game is it? What's it about?
It’s a first person survival crafter with very strange science vibes.
Imagine you were a scientist on your first day at Black Mesa when Gordon caused the Lambda Incident (this is a Half-Life reference for those uninitiated) and in a kind of Subnautica style need to scrounge the environment for resources to research and crafted supplies and equipment to use to survive and explore further while encountering invaders as well as what are essentially SCPs or Objects of Power (Control/Alan Wake) throughout the facility and other environment all in the hopes of trying to escape with your life.
I haven’t played it, but the same elevator pitch is given every time someone describes it on a podcast: it’s like someone made off-brand Half-Life and merged it with the survival genre. I’ve heard a lot of good things.
Honestly, this whole debate feels familiar. Arc Raiders looks like yet another extraction shooter riding hype, while Blue Prince actually tried something weird and different. Sure, you can compare it to Betrayal at House on the Hill, but remixing that idea into a roguelite puzzle experience is bold. Steam Awards almost always crown popularity, not real innovation. Still, Blue Prince suddenly sounds way more tempting.
I’ve been having a blast with Arc, especially as a newcomer to the genre. The PvE aspects (where you work together to defeat massive robots) is incredibly fun. My only complaint so far is that the inventory system can be a bit of a pain.
Blue Prince is way deeper than I was expecting… It seems beating the game is only scratching the surface.
Main thing I’m sad about is deltarune not winning the soundtrack category.
I only just started Silent Hill F and the coolest visual I have seen was the very first “everything dissolves into the hellish world” scene.
It’s always been a staple of the series, but this time is looks so fucking cool with how it dissolves everything, not just the surface textures.
Kinda wonder if having a newer RTX GPU would make it look better; the settings for Lumen don’t really change how it looks, it just massively drops my framerate 🤷♂️
You weren‘t kidding. These are all real winners for the players. And I wouldn‘t say last year was totally packed. At least not for me but this is a great list of games to add to your pile of shame.
I was a little sad that Kingdom Come Deliverance 2 didn’t win anything. That was my personal GOTY
Wow, how predictable, the game everyone has waited on for so long is GOTY.
Were you hoping for expedition 33?
No I was hoping for the dinosaur browser game.
I really wish Baby Steps had won something.
I got three right.
The fuck is the VR winner.
They’re hasn’t really been that many VR games lately.
Coelacanth@feddit.nu 3 weeks ago
Okay listen. I know I haven’t played it myself but… Isn’t Arc Raiders just another fucking extraction shooter? How the fuck does it beat Blue Prince for most innovative gameplay?
warm@kbin.earth 3 weeks ago
Steam Awards is a popularity contest.
HarkMahlberg@kbin.earth 3 weeks ago
Arc is definitely the "yep, steam voters have shit taste" one of the bunch.
P1nkman@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Because people have no idea what innovative means. Nor does Valve, since Arc Raiders was in the category.
popcar2@piefed.ca 3 weeks ago
Valve doesn’t decide anything, the whole Steam awards are voted by the community. It’s a popularity contest.
PlzGivHugs@sh.itjust.works 3 weeks ago
While I don’t think it deserves the win over Blue Prince, it does have some interesting gameplay innovations compared to others in the genre, as well as some interesting tech.
In particular, the included PvE element, as well as the sorter session and decreased death penalty makes the game much more accessible. It also helps offer an incentive to not shoot-on-sight, as the bots serve as a common enemy and shared threat. Its a difference between games like PUBG where games are tense, hour-long affair, and something like Fortnite where its colourful, easy to get into, and despite still being competitve, filled with other diversions for those who won’t win.
jonathan@piefed.social 3 weeks ago
It also sold way better than Blue Prince did. The Steam awards are always going to be weighed heavily in favour of the better selling games.
AnUnusualRelic@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
“Innovative” means “hey, I think I’ve heard of this title!”.
JakoJakoJako13@piefed.social 3 weeks ago
Isn’t Blue Prince just Betrayal at House on the Hill the video game?
Coelacanth@feddit.nu 3 weeks ago
Well… kinda but not really. The room-placement is only a small part of Blue Prince though and I think turning it into a roguelite was pretty innovative.
Funny story, Tonda Ros actually hadn’t heard of Betrayal until Blue Prince was well into beta testing. These things happen. The true inspiration for it was a choose-your-own-adventure/puzzle book by Christopher Manson called “The Maze”. Manson actually contributed with the art for the paintings in the Gallery in Blue Prince.
HarkMahlberg@kbin.earth 3 weeks ago
This is the first time anyone has described Blue Prince in a way that made me want to play it lol. Not knocking the game, I just figured it would never be up my alley. But I'm a big fan of Betrayal.
LettyWhiterock@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Steam awards are pretty much always like this. Popularity over the actual category itself.