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[bryant]

The 2005 Origins Awards nominees have been announced. The nomination process was very different this year; in each category, a jury voted on the nominated products in order to select five nominees. Some of the results are fairly interesting. At first glance, I can't say I think the process was a success.

The Best Role-Playing Game category is fairly heavy on the retreads. In particular, Dungeons & Dragons Basic Game is not a new role-playing game by any definition. The Authority RPG is borderline. A new edition of GURPS seems reasonable -- oh, but of the five jury members for this category, two of them were Steve Jackson Games staffers last year. Well, OK, then.

And there's no wholly new product among the nominees. Surely at least one of the five top products from last year was fresh and new?

Best Role-Playing Game Supplement, which shares the same jury as Best Role-Playing Game, has two GURPS supplements on the list of nominees. Gotcha. I will say that I agree that all the nominees I've read on the list are very good. Um, but there are six nominees listed, and the rules say there should be five.

I can't really claim expertise on the other categories, so I won't comment on them. The full list of nominees is in the extended portion of this post, for the curious.

More...

Comments

[sebastian-tombs.livejournal.com]

I can vouch for Ticket to Ride, nominated for best board game/expansion.

Its a railroad game where you claim predefined track segments in a totally new way, using cards of various colors - you need more of the cards of that color to claim a longer track segment. You get VP both my claiming track and by being able to deliver contract cards that you draw seperately.

A fine game, and very much worth looking into if you do board games at all.

[multiplexer.livejournal.com]

Steve Jackson Game staffers chose, out of all the millions of games and supplements last year, Steve Jackson Games RPG supplements and games?

You're kidding.

[chadu.livejournal.com]

FYI, the Jury didn't pick the games out of a hat, they selected the top five from amongst the ones submitted for consideration.

For example, I, as an Academy member, submitted GURPS Fantasy for consideration.

(I also submitted Nine Worlds, Lacuna, and numerous other RPGs and supplements that I thought were good and published in 2004 for consideration, and passed along the request for jury copies to the product publishers.)

CU

[multiplexer.livejournal.com]

It's a damn shame they aren't letting anyone but their buddies join the acadamy, or else maybe there would have been better choices.

[chadu.livejournal.com]

If you look at

http://www.aagad.originsgames.com/index.pl/2004_submissions

which should be publicly viewable, you'll see all of the games submitted for consideration by the various College juries.

CU

[jeregenest.livejournal.com]

What an uninspired list of nominees. There has to be something a little more new than that list.

Geesh.