Hiya!

Well, we had the Game Awards last week and, in all honesty, there weren’t any big surprises when it came to the actual awards. I mean, there weren’t any real head-scratching winners like Star Wars: Outlaws bagging the Most Anticipated Game award or Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2 sneaking in and winning Best Fighting Game. You can debate things like Spider-Man 2 should’ve won Game of the Year over Baldur’s Gate 3 or Hi-Fi Rush was robbed since Armored Core VI: Fires of Rubicon was awarded Best Action Game. Even so, all of the winners felt like they deserved it.

However, I do think the winners of The Game Awards isn’t the big news to come out of the show. No, what seems to steal the show each and every year are the “World Premieres,” where Geoff Keighley’s awards show gets sidetracked to reveal upcoming games which may show up even years later.

While it does seem like the World Premieres are a big deal, a part of me does believe they are detracting for the awards, which should be the focus of The Game Awards, if I’m not mistaken. However, at the same time, I do think the World Premieres serve an important purpose for The Game Awards as a whole. So, let me go debate with myself if The Game Awards should tone down the focus on showing more World Premieres in the future.

For one thing, if they do reduce the amount of time devoted to the World Premieres, they could actually show more categories and winners. One of the things which grinds my gears each and every time I watch The Game Awards is how a lot of awards feel like afterthoughts. Take Best Fighting Game for example. Street Fighter 6 is one of my favorite games and I’m so glad it won. However, the game winning was something like a mention. No one went on stage to accept the award. No grand gesture of getting a winged trophy. Nope, Geoff Keighley just said congrats to Capcom and Street Fighter 6 and that was it! They moved on to the next award without more than a seconds pause to revel in the win.

On the other hand, unfortunately, the World Premieres do attract more viewers than the actual awards themselves. Ever since The Game Awards was “rebooted” with Geoff Keighley at the helm, he was able to utilize his industry connections to get developers and publishers to show off their upcoming games and I can’t deny The Game Awards does feel like a good place to show off what’s on the horizon.

Take the latest Sega trailer which did a World Premiere during The Game Awards this year. Sure, they could’ve dropped the trailer onto YouTube today and it would still be big news. However, Sega announcing they are making new versions of their classic franchises like Shinobi, Crazy Taxi, Streets of Rage, Jet Set Radio and Golden Axe with a lot more to come in the future on The Game Awards definitely made it feel like a big event.

At the same time, though, some World Premieres are too far off to be of any real interest. I’m excited for the new Sega games and they may be ready by next year as they don’t really feel like triple-A games. Don’t get me wrong! Shinobi looks great but it does have an art style which a small indie developer could put together. What I’m talking about are the World Premieres where they don’t really have anything to show but they get a lot of airtime on The Game Awards.

A good example of this would be Hideo Kojima’s upcoming OD. Yes, it was a hype moment to see the man walk on stage and talk about his upcoming project. It was cool to learn Hideo Kojima partnering with Jordan Peele for the game. However, what did they actually reveal for OD? They have Sophia Lillis, Hunther Schafer and Udo Kier doing motion capture for the game and… that’s it. How long did The Game Awards devote to saying Hideo Kojima is making a new game without revealing any solid details on what it’s about, how will it play and why it’s supposed to be revolutionary? A little over 8 minutes!

Did they really have to spend 8 minutes on this? I get Hideo Kojima is a big deal and Geoff Keighley and he are friends. I get this is big news. I still don’t think the entire presentation was a sufficient use of the show’s time! If it was something like 5 minutes? I would’ve been okay with it. However, at a certain point, it just became a portion of a show where people were just telling us we don’t have anything concrete to tell or show right now… but we will see you when we do!

I also do have to acknowledge how some World Premieres do help out the little guy. We still live in a world where most of the games which get noticed are the ones from big publishers. The huge triple-A developers and publishers still get most of the glory in the world of video games. Thankfully, Geoff Keighley does use his influence and World Premieres to show off titles which don’t come from indie developers or ones who don’t have a major budget so they can’t afford promoting their games to a wide audience.

This year, The Games Awards show gave us a glimpse of such indie titles like Thrasher, World of Goo 2, Big Walk and Harmonium: The Musical. I don’t think I would’ve given Harmonium: The Musical a second look but, based on the trailer, I do think it’s interesting enough to check out in the future when it’s further along development. The Game Awards managed to put it on my radar because of the entire World Premiere thing.

However, I do understand the hidden purpose for all of these World Premieres. Some might be there because Geoff Keighley just wants to help some indie developers get their game noticed. However, a lot of them are basically included because the big name publishers and developers want to get their upcoming titles noticed as well. So, I’m betting a lot of these World Premieres are the companies paying Geoff Keighley to get some airtime during his big awards show. It’s just how the gaming world operates and I get that. However, that does mean the awards do come second and the World Premieres are given the priority. After all, they’re the ones who generate the money to get The Game Awards aired in the first place.

This is why, in conclusion, while I do want there to be less World Premieres and more focus on the awards during The Game Awards, I just don’t think it’ll happen as the World Premieres do pay the bills. What would be the alternative? Well, the alternative would be there would be no Game Awards! I honestly wouldn’t want that. So, yeah. I guess I’ll just swallow my dislike for the numerous World Premieres and accept they are a necessary evil that’s there for The Game Awards to even exist. I do hope they find a little more balance next time. I mean, give the winners of the Game of the Year more than 30 seconds in 2023, will ya?

Byee!

What was your favorite World Premiere this year? Do you think The Game Awards should have less World Premieres? Let me know in the comments section below!