Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Fast Learner" data-source="post: 984523" data-attributes="member: 649">I don't think your analogy works in gaming, though. Do you really buy a gaming product that you think might be inferior to another because you'll buy the other one... when?It is true, certainly, that people buy products -- including games -- for all sorts of reasons not related to quality including pretty packaging, cool names, recognizable brands, release timing, advertising, the physical weight of the product (heavier usually seems more valuable), and probably a dozen other things that have absolutely nothing to do with whether or not the product is actually better or worse than another in terms of its core or "real" purpose.But: what is the "best" item in a category? For example, in popular music I would argue that the best song is the one that people most like to buy, regardless of any music critic's perspective. It's the best simply because it's the most popular. If you're the average 14 year old then you want it because other people want it. It likely became the most popular due to all kinds of reasons, mostly good marketing, but that is how popular music is measured: its popularity.Both popularity and awards are limited by exposure: if you never saw it you're certainly not going to buy it and you're probably not going to vote for it. As such it's highly likely that the most popular item in a category isn't necessarily the best, and the most highly awarded item isn't the best: at least not the best in some theoretical objective comparison of quality for the item's purpose.When it comes to games, then, should popularity apply when determining the "best" product? Why not? Does anyone believe that those who nominate and award the Pulitzers have read and evaluated every possible piece of published writing that might apply, or that those who nominate and award the Nobel prizes have examined every potential winner? And even if they did, why would anyone believe that they're being even remotely "objective"?As far as I'm concerned industry awards are and will always be about popularity and highly subjective judgement. To pretend that they're not is, in my opinion, idealism of the most unfortunate kind. Revamping the Origins awards so they more accurately reflect the state of the industry and admit that popularity and subjectivity are the core of any award system makes perfect sense in my book.</blockquote>

Verification