GDC Awards shut out Nintendo, celebrate Sony
The biggest business story of 2008 in the world of vidoegames was, without a doubt, the success of Nintendo. Followed closely by the struggles of Sony. The Wii and DS beat the PS3 and PSP, respectively, by a factor of nearly three in unit sales last year. Games published by the house of Mario took five of the spots on NPD's year end top ten sales chart, while nothing published by Sony, or for its consoles, made the list.
Which is why it's so striking to look at the nominees for the Game Developers Choice Awards today and see Nintendo completely and utterly shut out. Sony, meanwhile, had the most nominations of any publisher (12), the most nominations for games exclusive to its consoles (14), and tied for the most games nominated available for its consoles (25).
Apparently the people who make games do not agree with the public about who's leading the industry. (Which, I think, adds credence to my arguments that Sony is getting too artsy for its own good and Nintendo games are like "Paul Blart: Mall Cop").
Looking through the 50 GDC nominations (ten categories, five picks each), it's amazing that there's only one game developed or published by Nintendo ("Advance Wars: Day of Ruin"). In fact, just seven of the 50 nods went to games that are even available on the DS or Wii. 25 are available on PS3, 25 for Xbox 360 (how convenient), 19 for PC, three for DS and three for PSP.
The Best Handheld Game category is particularly revealing. Even though the DS handily outsells the PSP and has significantly more software, three of the five nominated games are for PSP, two for DS.
The story's the same when it comes to exclusives. Only four nods, one each for "Boom Blox," "Soul Bubbles," "Advance Wars: Days of Ruin" and "The World Ends with You," went to games exclusive to Nintendo consoles. By contrast, there were eight nods for Xbox 360 exclusives ("Gears 2," "Fable 2" and "Braid") and 14 for PS3 or PSP ("LittleBigPlanet," "MGS 4," "Patapon," "God of War: Chains of Olympus," "Echochrome," and "PixelJunk Eden").
The three best selling games released in 2008, "Wii Fit," "Mario Kart Wii," and "Super Smash Bros. Brawl," all of which were published by Nintendo, were completely shut out.
It's not that the GDC nominees are a bunch of obscure indie titles. Game of the Year picks "Grand Theft Auto IV," "Fable 2," "Fallout 3," "Left 4 Dead" and "LittleBigPlanet" are all heavily hyped and, with the exception of "LBP," solid or exceptional sellers. This is hardly like the Oscars, overloaded as it is with movies like "The Reader," "Milk," "Frozen River," and "Doubt," that few people have even heard of, let alone seen.
But still, there's an evident divergence between what's selling and what's being celebrated. Is it a bad thing? I don't personally think so. I would quibble with plenty of particular nominations, but overall the GDC nominators made very respectable -- if somewhat safe -- choices. The simple fact is that Nintendo didn't do particularly innovative or exciting work last year. And third party publishers, with a few
exceptions, didn't do their best work for the DS or Wii. In part because the industry has been slow to adjust the the success of the
Wii. And in part because you can simply do more on the PS3 and 360.
And we can't forget the impact of one game, Sony's PS3 exclusive "LittleBigPlanet," which took seven of the 50 nominations despite being something of a bust commercially (it sold just 611,000 units last year, per NPD).
This could very well be the trend going forward, at least for this console generation. It sure seems to me that the games that hardcore players, the press, and the industry are excited about in 2009 are mostly for PC/PS3/360.
More on some of the specific picks later. For now, here are the nominees (per Gamasutra, which presents the GDC awards):
Best Game Design
Far Cry 2(Ubisoft Montreal)
Braid (Number None)
Fallout 3 (Bethesda Game Studios)
Left 4 Dead (Valve Software)
LittleBigPlanet (Media Molecule)
Best Visual Art
Fallout 3 (Bethesda Game Studios)
Metal Gear Solid 4 (Kojima Productions)
Prince Of Persia (Ubisoft Montreal)
LittleBigPlanet (Media Molecule)
Gears Of War 2 (Epic Games)
Best Technology
Spore (Maxis)
Grand Theft Auto IV (Rockstar North)
Left 4 Dead (Valve Software)
LittleBigPlanet (Media Molecule)
Gears Of War 2 (Epic Games)
Best Writing
Far Cry 2 (Ubisoft Montreal)
Braid (Number None)
Fallout 3 (Bethesda Game Studios)
Grand Theft Auto IV (Rockstar North)
Metal Gear Solid 4 (Kojima Productions)
Best Audio
Dead Space (EA Redwood Shores)
LittleBigPlanet (Media Molecule)
Metal Gear Solid 4 (Kojima Productions)
Left 4 Dead (Valve Software)
Gears Of War 2 (Epic Games)
Best Debut
Braid (Number None)
Sins Of A Solar Empire (Ironclad Games)
LittleBigPlanet (Media Molecule)
World Of Goo (2D Boy)
Soul Bubbles (Mekensleep)
Innovation
Spore (Maxis)
World Of Goo (2D Boy)
Boom Blox (EA Los Angeles)
Braid (Number None)
LittleBigPlanet (Media Molecule)
Best Handheld
Patapon (Pyramid/SCE Japan)
Advance Wars: Days Of Ruin (Intelligent Systems)
God Of War: Chains Of Olympus (Ready At Dawn Studios)
Echochrome (SCE Japan)
The World Ends With You (Jupiter/Square Enix)
Best Downloadable Game
Castle Crashers (The Behemoth)
Braid (Number None)
World Of Goo (2D Boy)
N+ (Metanet/Slick Entertainment)
Pixeljunk Eden (Q-Games)
Game of the Year
Fable 2 (Lionhead Studios)
LittleBigPlanet (Media Molecule)
Fallout 3 (Bethesda Game Studios)
Left 4 Dead (Valve Software)
Grand Theft Auto IV (Rockstar North)
Chris Morris reports on the business and culture of video games and offers analysis of recent events and industry trends.
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BTW LiitleBigPlanet has now sold over 2m.
Nice try Ben lol
Posted by: karlo | February 11, 2009 at 11:16 PM
I know this is a difficult concept for fanboys like Ben Fritz to understand but games sales aren't the most important thing in gaming. The quality of games is. Its pretty telling how he sees success in terms of console sales and NPD charts (lol at using US only charts because they look bad for Sony) while thinking awards have got things wrong in nominating Sony for loads of stuff. The simple fact is that Sony make better games than Nintendo or Microsoft. They may not sell as well but that is no reflection on their quality. Wii sports is a uge selling title. According to Ben Fritz that must mean its better than Halo 3 lol
BTW heres a fact for Ben to think about. Worldwide in 2008 the 360 sold 11m units compared to 10.5m PS3's despite the fact that the 360 is being sold at half the price and the biggest selling console in Japan was the PSP. Only the most blinkered and ignorant fanboy would think 2008 was a bad year for Sony especially when the 2 highest rated PS3 or 360 exclusives of the year (LittleBigPlanet & MGS4) were both PS3 titles.
Posted by: karlo | February 11, 2009 at 11:14 PM
@Carol Swaser: Is just a sign of how poorly 3rd party support for new games on the Wii has gone.
In neihter of those categories Nintendo first party titles can go in cuz mostly are sequels or rehashes and doesn't bring anything new
Hopefully, this years is looking better on the third party part and this years will see more chances to be on those nominations. But really, Nintendo really neeeeeeeds to put something better out there
Posted by: CJLopez | February 11, 2009 at 08:33 AM
I have no problem with the lack of a Wii showing here (since these things hold clout equivalent to the SAG awards), but the bigger issue here is the celebration of those in the industry who have a very narrow vision of what makes a game noteworthy.
And I also respect the author's opinion (especially after the excellent best-of-2008 list a month or so back) - but how can the premise of "...Nintendo didn't do particularly innovative or exciting work last year" justify the inclusion of Fallout 3, Left 4 Dead and Far Cry 2 over something like Wii Fit, de Blob or even a No More Heroes for that matter. By that sequel-rich logic, Smash Bros Brawl should be up there too.
The sad truth is that the games industry has grown into an exclusionary hardcore gamers club, where anything that tries to breaks the norm is seen as a coup on their little overprotected niche.
Posted by: Joe | February 11, 2009 at 07:40 AM
mister slim, youre kind of a idiot. you clearly dont know what the hell a fad is. the wii is far from that and it exceeds all the doubters expectations. The problem is people doubted nintendo and the wii. The wii is doing something thats in my opinion is highly beneficial, since hd gaming is clearly breaking these developers. Hd gaming is clearly not ready for this gen, with the recession and all..
the wii is far from a fad. if you can't craft a beautiful game from what you have, which is the wii. then maybe developers aren't as talented as they think or say they are.
Posted by: rahnyc4 | February 11, 2009 at 07:07 AM
D'oh. Thanks for the correction, Slim. I updated the post.
Posted by: Ben Fritz | February 10, 2009 at 11:15 PM
GDC awards are made by game developers, for game developers.
These people are, by definition, hardcore gamers. They are passionate about games, about playing them, and about making them.
Wii Fit might be the talk of the local yoga class - but game developers could care less about it as a game. It makes money - so that's impressive. But it isn't an impressive *game*, and it does not advance the art of games. And no sales $$ on NPD chart ratings is going to change that. Nor should it.
That's true straight on down the line for nearly every category when it comes to the Wii. The Wii is not a serious game platform targeted at serious gamers. It is fluff targeted at kids and casual players. It's games for people who generally don't like games.
And that's is not who game developers are. They may be many things, but casual game players is not one of them.
Blue Ocean might be a fine marketing approach, but it does not make for a game which advances the art of game design or game technology.
Wondering why game developers would virtually shut out Nintendo is *not* like wondering why Mall Cop won't be nominated for an Academy Award. It's far worse than that. It's wondering out loud why your local Triple A baseball team can't win the World Series.
The answer is simple: it's beacuse they don't play in the right league.
Posted by: Robert Trifts | February 10, 2009 at 04:05 PM
A small correction: Advance Wars is published by Nintendo, and the studio responsible, Intelligent Systems, is owned by Nintendo.
Posted by: mister slim | February 10, 2009 at 02:51 PM
If this isn't the definitive sign that the Wii is just a lame fad that will suddenly die off then I don't know what is. Sales numbers only indicate what the sheeple of the world do.
Posted by: Carol Swaser | February 10, 2009 at 02:47 PM