Wow, this really is the year of Nintendo. The Game of the Year contenders were officially announced today, and Nintendo completely dominated the field by having TWO titles nominated for the prestigious award.
Well, it’s pretty clear that Nintendo is the favorites for the Game of the Year.
With the Game of the Year nominees announced today, Nintendo came out as the massive favorites to be the developer and publisher to win the award as TWO of their titles were nominated for the six contender spots. And, to be honest, I think it is completely deserved.
So, truthfully, I think that this year’s full nomination list for the Game of the Year is perhaps one of the best ones in recent memory. For the full list, the Game of the Year contenders are Baldur’s Gate 3, Alan Wake 2, Marvel’s Spider-Man 2, Resident Evil 4 Remake, Super Mario Bros. Wonder, and The Legend Of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom. Pretty great list, right?
Not to take a crap on past Game of the Year lists, but a decent chunk of them only had maybe 1-3 real contenders for the award with the rest simply being on the list to fill out the numbers. I guess it’s not the fault of the Game of the Year awards or the contenders themselves, but rather the developers and publishers not making good enough games on a consistent basis to truly make the Game of the Year awards feel like they were rewarding great games.
Nevertheless, this year is completely different as I could easily see anyone of these games being named the Game of the Year. All of these games were fantastic in their own rights and the best in their, respective, genre field…though that doesn’t mean one of them is the clear favorite. Or, more like two of them as Nintendo’s Tears of the Kingdom and Super Mario Bros. Wonder have to be favored to be the new Game of the Year.
You don’t see two games from the same studio/publisher get nominated for the Game of the Year slot very often, which leads me to believe that the Game of the Year voters are favoriting one of these two titles. Like I said, you just don’t see a developer/publisher get TWO slots (33% of the nominations) for the award given how many games can qualify and how many publishers want their games to be nominated.
And, with there being far more competent and Game of the Year Award-worthy developers out in the gaming world now (though, there is also a lot more crap studios out there too), seeing Nintendo manage to earn two nominations as if we’re back in 1998 when there was only 5 good games released all year is extremely impressive.
Now, if it was up to me, I’d probably go with either Baldur’s Gate 3 or Tears of the Kingdom, though I think Baldur’s Gate is going to win one of the other categories like Best Narrative or Best RPG game.
And, reversely, I think Tears of the Kingdom or Super Mario Bros. Wonder will pip out the rest for the top award.
Images Source: Featured Image: (The Game Awards) (The Game Awards 2023: Live Nomination Announcement – YouTube)
