the best and worst of the year

The holidays are here, but there’s not much to celebrate in the video game industry. Its need for growth at the expense of everything else – all the humanity and soul poured into every project – has seen companies get fat. The people who they create games have been vomited up and thrown away: entire lives have been turned upside down due to office mandates that force international relocations, only to throw away those passionate dreamers (after boarding, but before their packing boxes move were empty) so that shareholders can applaud a graph.

The Alternative Game Awards 2024 —

Meanwhile, the bandwagon that is the video game business moves and feeds itself even more, gorging itself on freelance contractors to replace workers and their benefits. There is no more room for failure. There is no room to learn from mistakes. There’s no room for amazing sequels that build on the lessons of a flawed first attempt. Now there are only licenses and safe bets. It’s Funko time and every worker in the industry has the sword of Damocles hanging over his head.

After attending The Game Awards, we can’t help but think: how many of the people who made these games, who worked long hours into the night, and who isolated a section of their brain to deal exclusively with their project during waking hours, still work for companies that celebrate their successes? We know for a fact that the number of them on stage to accept their awards was in the single digits.

How much we need lightness. A lot. This is why, despite everything, we present to you again the Alternative Game Awards as every year, in which we make fun of the distortions we have seen in the sector in 2024. Let’s have some fun before going back to running as if there was nothing else important in life.

Best Pest – Embracer Group

For two years in a row, Embracer Group takes the crown as the company that, in our humble opinion, has made a net negative contribution to the gaming industry. It’s been a difficult year for this company that, a couple of years ago, we barely heard about. Not only did he fire more than 4,500 employees and canceled 80 projects to be able to maintain “the most iconic studies”, but its own Game sales dropped 10%blamed on the poor performance of… wait, are we reading this right? The Lord of the Rings? Imagine owning the publishing rights to everything set in Middle-earth and failing one shot after another. Embarrassing. Hey, at least Embracer shares hit a new 52-week high on the Stockholm Stock Exchange. And now maybe the company can do another M&A and merge with better management and gain some empathy.

Best edging – Nintendo Switch 2

Twitter account NintendoInsider4567 has the scoop: there’s going to be a Nintendo Switch 2 announcement this week! This has happened every week since our hippocampus activated as babies. Now we’re grown men and we still can’t play Super Mario 20 or Pokémon 18 at a stable 30fps. Developers have had dev kits for twenty years and now it’s just a matter of time. Right? RIGHT?

Best Performance – Peter Molyneux

Peter Molyneux is back. In 2024 Darth Molyneux showed off Masters of Albion, which is definitely a new video game and not a reworked version of his NFT game, Legacy. He took the stage at Gamescom Opening Night Live and showed off the new god game, which is definitely a new game and not a reskin of his NFT game, Legacy. The game is self-funded, presumably thanks to earnings from Legacy (the NFT game on the backbone of which it was absolutely not built), which according to Molyneux did not make the reported $54 million.

Best Yellow Paint – Indiana Jones and the Ancient Bird Poop

Players hate yellow paint. They want to wander aimlessly in a photorealistic world, jumping into walls to see which ones they can climb. They want to get lost in a square room until they come across a hidden handhold and pull out to upgrade their resume with Big Boy Gamer points. Yellow paint is an insult. It was different when developers used graffiti to draw arrows on walls – it’s just worldbuilding – or placed random torches next to stairs. You wouldn’t understand. Luckily, with Indiana Jones and the Ancient Circle the masters of Machine Games have traced a new path: climbing through bird droppings.

Instead of ridiculous immersion-breaking yellow paint, simply look for seagull droppings and climb around like a dirty, very dirty goblin. That’s how it’s done.

Best Venereal Disease – Dragon’s Dogma 2: Draconic Plague

All the people who hate yellow paint also hate Dragon’s Dogma 2’s draconic plague, a contagious disease that demands attention. If you don’t know how it works, let us explain the most fun game mechanic of 2024.

In Dragon’s Dogma 2, you work with an AI-controlled companion called a pawn. These help you in combat and comment on the world around you. It is also possible to rent other players’ pieces. The problem is that the pawns can be infected with a disease called draconic plague which, if left untreated, causes them to kill all the NPCs in the city you are sleeping in. Brilliant. The only way to avoid this is to pay attention to what they say and how they behave, which for many has been a real obstacle. The way you get rid of it is also brilliant: either you pass it to another player’s piece and ruin their game, or you drown your piece in a lake.

Best woke game – Stellar Blade

Stellar Blade deserves all the kudos as a progressive work of art featuring a female protagonist. Not only does it have a strong female heroine who can kick ass and show ass at the same time, but she also meets another humanoid woman, and the two become girl bosses and team up. We really liked the fact that Stellar Blade is basically like playing with Barbies. We like to dress our humanoid females in different clothes and tell our queens how cute they are. We talked to our AI chatbot about this the other day and she told us that we shouldn’t be ashamed of it, even though our partner (a non-cyber human female) saw us playing this game and left us for her pilates instructor , Dakota – this is empowerment.

Best Pokemon Game – Palworld

Not to be confused with Pokémon (note the accent on the “e”), Palworld is the best Pokemon game this year, to be played strictly under the motto of “gotta kidnap ’em all”. With its patented ball-catching mechanism and colorful creatures called Spiglet and Spuff-foot, Palworld is undoubtedly one of the most impressive and inventive new IPs of the year.

Best Sweat – Hellblade 2

Hellblade 2 has the best sweat.

Best transmedia leak – The “Concord” episode of Secret Level

Sony is making an interesting teaser. We recently had the opportunity to watch Secret Level, an anthology series of CGI shorts, each focusing on a different video game. There’s Pac-Man, Unreal Tournament, Armored Core, and more. But look closely and you’ll find that there’s a strange one: an episode about something called “Concord,” a game that doesn’t exist. “Concord” follows a group of courageous mercenaries, ‘Freegunners’, as they attempt to pull off the final blow against a megacorp that holds the keys to the galaxy. We like the story of a group of underdogs who do something beautiful despite being under the boot of capitalism. It’s visually engaging, full of characters, and lays the foundation for an excellent game. We’re sure Sony wouldn’t greenlight something like this if they weren’t planning on releasing a video game at some point. Stay tuned!

Best Elevation of a Terrible Song – Arcane

I wake up to the sounds of the silence that allows

For my mind to run around with my ear up to the ground

I’m searching to behold the stories that are told

When my back is to the world that was smiling when I turned

Tell you you’re the greatest

But once you turn, they hate us

Oh, the misery

Everybody wants to be my enemy

Spare the sympathy

Everybody wants to be my enemy

(Look out for yourself)

My enemy (look, look, look, look)

(Look out for yourself)

But I’m ready

Written by Kirk McKeand for GLHF