"Origins Award Nominees announced" Topic

link

Thanks for the link!

Huh.

I'm always surprised at what does and does not make the cut.

Kudos to Warlord for their Celts!

FFG gets no love for its fabulous line of WWI aircraft? (Surely some of them were released last year?)

Wargames Factory gets no love for its 20mm Zulu War releases?

I will say I've enjoyed the Monty Python Fluxx card game. And I did pick up both the new Volley and Bayonet and Stars and Stripes Forever supplement for Command Decision.

I'm not even going to look this year. I suspect that, as ever, less-than-awesome efforts have been recognized (with a Cleo on my bookshelf, I can say this with some confidence), and stellar products have been overlooked--much like many other awards programs in any number of fields of endeavor.

Allen

What a load a crap, reminds me of the crap we get for the Oscars.

Glad that at least Warlord Games got a nomination, but I simply can't understand why anyone would give preference to ver cartoonish 15mm figures over, say, the new Perry plastics.

Somehow I feel quite a few deserving new releases simply never even get considered.

If the company doesn't submit their new releases for consideration, they generally don't get reviewed.

Haven't you ever noticed that its always the consumers that complain about who wins the awards, and never the companies? Its because they know they need to enter in order to win.

Yes, I know, GAMA should be omniscient and know about every gaming related item that was released in the year. But until they fix that little problem its best to encourage your favorite company to enter their new releases for consideration each year rather than just gripe about the results.

And there lies the problem! The "industry" has never kept tabs of who is in "the Industry" (let alone what those companies all do!)

The folks who TRY to work in the Academy really do try to do things right. Unfortunately, they have never been able to agree on criteria for the awards when it comes to sculpting, historical accuracy, fidelity of the castings, etc. After what, 20+ years, the winners seem to remain linked more to sales and publicity than to "quality" issues. It's frustrating because that approach takes away from the awards prestiege.

After winning a few years ago, despite having the best range of Historical Minis for the year, not one distributor picked us up! (Historical minis don't sell, y'know!) Again, GAMA remains linked to sales figures rather than quality of the product (or at least most of their members are saying this with their dollars.) (Missed opportunities?)

Sorry to see this as the Awards could really help the industry, but as some posts here seem to indicate, they are not well received by the general public.

Best
Tom Dye
GFI

I buy because I like the product not because it got some award. It seems this award is only good for those 'in the industry' (it has little effect on the public) and for advertising benefits via the articles the journalists write.

But the award can often be enough to turn your head, when otherwise you might not have. But I agree, more uniformity needs to be applied for judging and entries.

I considered submitting our first game, even filled out the online form for the Origins awards-- declined at the last minute. I decided 8 copies of my game for free to the review board was a bit more than I could afford.

Best of luck to those who were nominated, but the above comments are correct- companies must send in 8 copies of anything for consideration.

It seems a strange way to choose a game, unless 8 people are hoping to get a freebie!

The best game should be awarded on merit. Not on the basis of who game away the most free copies! Its almost like buying votes and you know that unless you pay up the eight copies, your game wont even be considered. Surely that is not a very genuine result.

HMGS-East is I think trying to do something along the lines for Historical Miniatures related projects. But I have seen zero on the idea outside of one posting on the HMGS-East yahoo group. Shame but the bottom line it requires work year round to keep up with what is new during the year. Few have the time or passion to do it beyond the first year.

IMHO
VR
James Mattes

When TooFatLardies was a new business the financial side of things was VERY tight. We were approached by the Origins organisers and asked to submit eight copies of I Ain't Been Shot Mum for the judges. That would have been over £100.00 GBP worth of stock plus postage, we simply couldn't afford to comply.

We've never been asked since despite producing some very popular rule sets.

I would have thought that a poll of the public, left open all year round might produce a better shortlist, and then allow people to vote on that shortlist in the two months before the show. Eight "great and good" judges can never be as representative as the gaming public at large.

Does the hobby really need awards of this type?

The actual voting is done by the attendees of Origins, not eight panel members. The panel judges the top products of each genre, and there is a different panel for each, and those are the ones that end up on the ballot at origins.

Companies, publishers and authors are all free to submit their products for the Origins Awards, it's not a by invitation only type of judging. So, if a product that you think is great but don't see it on the ballot or the results, it's probably because that manufacturer didn't submit it into the judging. Indeed, GAMA would like a large number of products to be considered, as it gives some advertising to manufacturers and presents games to gamers that they may not have heard of before. This serves the mission of GAMA, to promote game manufacturers and the gaming hobby.

Its just a big con so the organisers can get free figures and rules!

Why would they need eight copies of the rules?

Very self-indulgent!

Games Expo in the UK run some sort of 'Awards' but I don't know how its run.

As there is a whole year in which to judge, one would think that a couple of copies could be passed around for consideration. I agree with TooFatLardies, that it really is not fair on smaller companies.

Indeed its very discriminatory, because if you dont grease the judges palms with free copies, you just dont get on the list. I'd go so far as to say that is seems like a good perk to get free products, rather than a genuine judging. If it was done that way in many fields it would be called corrupt, and I'm inclined to think it is.

I just fail to see the point of it; essentially, a very few people decide which are the "best" products and then allow a limited number of people to rank them.

Who appoints the "panel"?

How do they define "best"?

Are there set objective criteria or do they use their personal judgement (ie their personal bias)?

If a product is not "submitted" how does that make it not one of the "best"?

It seems like a total waste of time and someting of an exercise in personal aggrandisement by the "panel".

Utter crap!

Umm, when you folks vote for something, how do you vote? What you think is "best"? Using your own personal "bias"? I don't know of any other way to vote on something!

10,000 to 15,00 attendees can vote if they wish. I don't know how big the gaming community is, but that's got to be a sizeable portion, at least in the U.S.

If you want on the panel, volunteer for it. GAMA normally has to beg people to participate.

The Members of the panels live all over the States, not just in one city, so they aren't really able to pass them to each other. Also, they are volunteers. And GAMA is a not-for-profit outfit.

One copy of a product is displayed in the voting case at Origins so attendees can see which product they are voting on. So, a producer gets their product showcased for five days before thousands of people who are more likely to purchase their product than the average person. Free targeted advertising is not a bad thing.

In the end, if you want your product considered, send in eight copies. If you don't, don't. If you're at Origins and you want to vote, vote. If you don't, don't.

And no, I am not now, nor have I ever been, on any panel anywhere to judge anything at any time.