General RPG DiscussionDiscussion of all RPGs and non-system-specific topics. DM/GM/player issues, settings, etc. Rules discussion belongs in one the forums below.
I had a really great time judging this year. It was difficult to choose the best amongst the products, but I must say that this year's team of judges pulled together amazingly well, and it turns out we make a really great team.
As Rodrigo mentioned up-thread, it was a pleasure to judge this year, and it's my pleasure to congratulate all the well-deserving nominees. Almost every entry we received was a high-quality item, so paring the lists down was difficult for all of us.
Thank you to all entrants for your efforts; if the products we received are any indication of the state of the RPG industry, things are looking up.
Kudos.
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This year was a slug fest. Most years there is a few things that just stand head and shoulders above the rest. This year while we had the huge realese of 4e I didn't really see anything that was obviously clearly better then the compitition. What we had was a lot of really good products and that makes for some tough categories and for judges argueing back and forth as we each pull for the one we like.
A hearty congradualtions to everyone nominated and to everyone that entered. I'm going to be posting specifics about many of the categories to my blog (see sig ) hopefully starting tomorrow. I try to help educate people about some of the products they might not be aware of.
Wow. Game of the Year looks to be some tough competition. Glad to see Song of Ice and Fire up there though: The system is utterly fantastic. Flavorful, easily groked, yet possessed of startling depth for its simplicity. At the moment I'm using it to run a game set in Three Kingdoms era China. (I.E. The historical fiction novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms, which also spawned Koei's strategy game series of the same names, and the very redundant but mindlessly enjoyable Dynasty Warriors games, the latter of which horribly muck up the story, but I digress...)
I'm a little annoyed by the presence of Dark Heresy given its previous release, but that's part of my anti-FFG bias since they are at present massively mishandling the Anima RPG line.
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Congratulations to all the nominees. Some really great looking games on the list that I'm looking forward to checking out.
Some RPG Bloggers / Twitterers are talking about free products vs. preview products, and whether it makes sense to include them together. They might be something to consider putting into separate categories for next year.
Some RPG Bloggers / Twitterers are talking about free products vs. preview products, and whether it makes sense to include them together. They might be something to consider putting into separate categories for next year.
We didn't get a lot of free material submitted this year. It really depends on how much of a certain type of thing we get.
The problem I think would be enough of what you are calling preview products. I'm not even sure there were enough made this year for it to be its own category let alone just what was entered.
Was there a reason there were no "honorable mentions" this year?
We decided to get rid of them. The pros of mentioning another product in each category I think is out weighed by not everyone understanding what it means (including us) and it was seen as a negative by some people. It was the product we mentioned that just wasn't good enough to be voted on. I will go on the record and say I was in favor of not having honorable mentions.
We decided to get rid of them. The pros of mentioning another product in each category I think is out weighed by not everyone understanding what it means (including us) and it was seen as a negative by some people. It was the product we mentioned that just wasn't good enough to be voted on. I will go on the record and say I was in favor of not having honorable mentions.
I think it was pretty much the general consensus from way back this year that unless we absolutely couldn't agree on 5, there'd be no honorbale mentions.
I'd still like to see each judge get a 'Judge's Award' to highlight the product they really liked that maybe no one else did.
I think it was pretty much the general consensus from way back this year that unless we absolutely couldn't agree on 5, there'd be no honorbale mentions.
I'd still like to see each judge get a 'Judge's Award' to highlight the product they really liked that maybe no one else did.
I'm all for that. There are some things that are sadly missing from this year's list, but I'm extremely pleased with what we came up with. Everything on that list deserves its place.
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Today in my blog (see sig) I talk about my favorite category: Best Writing.
I think it's sort of a shame that you're not going to write about the Free Product category - although I can understand the idea that people can simply go and get the free products ... for free. The other side of that coin, though, is that most people don't go and look at things without some kind of spur to do so, like a comment or two in your blog.
Obviously, this is a self-interested post, since Swords & Wizardry is my entry, but since I'm up against a lot of quick-start rules it would be nice, for example, to have a comment out there that S&W is a full-scale complete game. Or that it's a retro-clone. Some sort of nugget, even "Crothian hated this so much it hurt." That would get people looking to see if they agree. ... Something ...
People aren't going to go out and research their votes very much, even in the free category. Some will, of course, but even a nugget of information makes it more likely that someone will go and look at a product rather than just voting for the big names (and I've got big, known-for-quality names up against me that will have lots of automatic votes).
Especially since there's a slight teapot-tempest about the quick-start rules in that category, it would be nice to hear the scoop on the nomination process.
Especially since there's a slight teapot-tempest about the quick-start rules in that category, it would be nice to hear the scoop on the nomination process.
Jeramay Ware (Master of the Game here on ENW) was a judge this year and posted his commentary on the Best Free Product category.
) hopefully starting tomorrow. I try to help educate people about some of the products they might not be aware of.
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