Snubs and awards season go hand and hand together, so it’s only natural we discuss some of the biggest snubs for The Game Awards.
Whether it’s games that didn’t receive the nominations they should have or titles that won’t hear their name called due to their release date, we’re going to list six games that should have been nominated for The Game Awards.
Naturally, with any awards show, the results for nominations and awards are purely subjective. Having a different opinion doesn’t make us right or wrong. Still, it’s hard to understand why these listed games didn’t receive love from The Game Awards.
Three of the listed titles were released before the nominations were announced. The other three will be released later in 2022, which means these particular Game Awards snubs are due to not being eligible. When one of these games may be the biggest release of the calendar year, you can’t help but scratch your head.
Vampire Survivors May Be the Biggest Game Awards Snub of Them All
Few games have taken the gaming world by storm like Vampire Survivors. To demonstrate its impact on the gaming landscape, consider that it has invented a new gaming genre.
Combining aspects from roguelike, survival, bullet hell, retro pixel art, and twin-stick shooters, Vampire Survivors is the breakout hit of the year. While it did receive one nomination for “Best Debut Indie,” the fact that it’s not mentioned anywhere else is an absolute travesty.
You’ll see Vampire Survivors appear on many Game of the Year lists. I bet it will top a decent number of those lists, too. When it comes to The Game Awards, though, its single nomination is inexplicable.
Immortality’s Three Nominations Don’t Do the Game Justice
On the plus side, Immortality received three nominations for the 2022 Game Awards. Somehow, it drew blank for the Best Indie category.
To quote our review, “Sam Barlow and his team have set a new bar for interactive cinema.” Immortality is an experience that is unlike anything else in gaming. It sets the bar for artistic expression in all interactive media,
There is nothing quite like Immortality because Immortality is, in many ways, unmatched in its quality.
Citizen Sleeper’s One Nomination Is a Travesty
The biggest knock against Citizen Sleeper is the lack of publicity it’s garnered. This is a shame because it is an amazing title and one of the best games you can play on Xbox Game Pass.
Citizen Sleeper’s sole nomination is under the Games for Impact category. According to Geoff Keighly, it’s meant to “recognize a thought-provoking game with a profound pro-social meaning.”
Citizen Sleeper does that, but limiting the game to a category that comes off as saying, “we want to talk about these games, but they’re in the shadow of big-budget AAA games,” is disingenuous.
Looking at the six games nominated for Game of the Year, Citizen Sleeper can stand toe to toe with every one of them. The same is true for the Best Indie Games category.
Sports Story Is Big Enough To Be Nintendo’s “One More Thing” on Their Indie World, Yet Is One of the Biggest Game Awards Snubs
The follow-up to 2017’s Golf Story has been a long time coming.
During the recent Indie World Nintendo Direct, we saw what’s in the pipeline for Sports Story, releasing on Nintendo Switch this December. Between new sports, gameplay additions, and an expansive world, there’s a lot to love here. This is our most anticipated game of the year for my wife and me.
Yet nothing from the jury; we’re seeing Tears of the Kingdom appear on the most anticipated games list for the second year in a row. Sports Story, however? Not a peep. It’s a shame that what may be the best indie game of 2022 won’t have its name called.
Don’t get me started on Hollow Knight: Silkson’s exclusion from most anticipated games, either.
Pokémon Scarlet and Pokémon Violet May Be the Biggest Game of the Year, and It Didn’t Receive a Single Nomination
Part of what makes Pokémon Scarlet and Pokémon Violet awkward is that the game, and review embargo, are ten days after the nominations have been announced.
At this time, I can’t say whether Scarlet and Violet will be good Pokémon games. I am confident, however, saying that they’ll be better than Pokémon Legends: Arceus, which was nominated for Best RPG.
I can also say, however, that announcing your nominees with seven weeks left in the calendar year is a bit, well, odd. Pokémon Scarlet and Pokémon Violet are eligible for the 2023 show, as is the next game on our list, but it’ll be weird to play both of them during the show’s broadcast.
The Callisto Protocol Was Announced During the 2020 Game Awards but Won’t Appear Anywhere During the 2022 Game Awards
As I mentioned earlier, The Callisto Protocol will release on December 2nd, just under a full week before the broadcast of The Game Awards. Despite this, it doesn’t fall into eligibility for the 2022 show; The Callisto Protocol will be eligible for the 2023 Game Awards.
Confused? Me too.
In all honesty, these eligibility rules aren’t exclusive to The Game Awards; it’s something the Grammy’s and Emmy’s deal with all the time, but it’s a problem there, just as it is a problem here.
The Callisto Protocol could have been a great way to celebrate the game’s release. It has been a mainstay during Keighley’s events: The Game Awards, Summer Game Fest, and Opening Night Live.
I imagine we’ll see it receive nominations for next year’s show, but why do we have to wait that long? Why does the show need to air in December? We don’t think you should blame us for this; we’re just trying to show love for one of our most anticipated upcoming games.
