I never said that the one-person-run AGS Award process was rigged in terms of votes not being counted, etc. When I say that I believe the Awards are a "sham" I am talking about the impression given on their award announcement page, for example. One gets the impression that the awards represent some kind of general consensus among adventure gamers, or at least among more people than just a few registered users on a particular message board. That's why I wanted to know exactly how many people voted for particular nominees during the nomination process, for the winners, etc. If the nominees and winners are being decided by a few people on some message board almost no one has ever visited (let alone heard of), then I think that fact ought to be considered when judging the value of these awards. I don't want to overlook or not appreciate any work that someone might have put into organizing an awards process, but I think that, in the future, people like SSH (who apparently is the person behind the AGS awards) should be more clear about EXACTLY how nominees were decided (YES, that includes giving us nominee process and final vote counts on the pages that announce winners). To say that such and such game won "'Best of the Year!' according to the AGS community" might be technically accurate, but it is also somewhat misleading for someone unfamiliar with the AGS forum because it leaves the impression of a larger, community-wide consensus. People like SSH might not care about people who don't participate in that other online forum, and he might choose to take an insular view when deciding whether to share information, with comments like, "everyone on the AGS forum knew the procedure, so why should I have to be transparent now when announcing the results for everyone else to see." (i'm paraphrasing) Fine, that's his right. But SSH should NOT then be surprised when people do not take the awards at all seriously.
I do get the sense that SSH isn't the biggest fan of AGDI, and I also get the sense that some over at some other forums have anti-AGDI tendencies, possibly because of AGDI's commercial aspirations. This is unfortunate. I believe AGDI has done amazing work, and they deserve a lot more recognition for it. Their dedication, talent and passion is really obvious. I also think it's
outrageous and an embarrassment to the AGS Awards that QFG2VGA wasn't nominated for more than one measly award.
Klytos wrote:To me, and not wanting to reignite the argument here but I just read this thread, but the AGS awards (and the AGS community in general) always lean towards games that are art, not popular games. It's the same thing with the Oscars, look at 2000 best movie - A Beautiful Mind. A great movie no doubt, but most popular? Not likely. Fellowship of the Ring came out in the same year. I think that those who do take the voting in the AGS awards seriously look for a game that they consider a worthwhile art exercise. This years best game, "A Second Face - The Eye of Geltz is watching us" is a good example, in my opinion. It's not been the most "popular" game out there, but the art of it is exceptional. It's a great concept. Whereas QFG2VGA is just a great solid game that a lot more people enjoyed.
I'm not saying that the AGS awards are bad, evil, or satanic. Or even that they're rigged like some people here have postulated. I don't think they are at all. I do think that they're an interesting diversion, and they usually reveal a new game that I haven't played yet.
On a different note, to those who complain about the voting, it's your fault that QFG2VGA didn't win more categories. Why not campaign for the game, get this community at AGDI to vote for it's own games. If most popular game won with 37 votes, that shouldn't be too hard to get 38 people here to vote for QFG2VGA. I'll be honest, I didn't vote because I don't visit the AGS community much and I just always forget to do it. If someone here had told me I needed to vote, I would have. I'm sure there's a lot of other people around here like that too!