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[Sakura]

If they still want to include something like Dave the Diver, why not just have a category for low budget games instead?
He's trying to make it sound like it's more difficult to define indie game than it really is.
I feel like the point of a specific indie award section should be to give recognition to actual independent developers. If you are going to allow nominations for anything that looks like it might kinda be indie, even when it's a game from a billion dollar company which has said it's not indie, then maybe the category isn't serving it's purpose and should be renamed or a separate one should be created.

 

[calistan]

If they really want to make this the gaming Oscars, they should do it the same way and have the devs/publishers submit their games to whatever category they feel they're eligible for. Then the judges decide on a shortlist. There are clearly categories in these awards that people didn't want to be considered for.

Maybe limit the number of categories you can submit to - sort of like in the Oscars, if you have a movie with half a dozen brilliant songs, you can only choose one to put forward (e.g. Disney choosing the wrong one for Encanto).

 

[Deft Beck]

Geoff really doesn't want to burn any bridges so he's deferring to the panel. Weak, but it's what I expected from him.

 

[diffusionx]

Keighley answered that the definition of an indie game is hard to define, and that ultimately it’s up to The Game Awards jury to pick nominees.

“Look, it’s a great question,” he replied. “Independent can mean different things to different people, and it’s sort of a broad term.

“You can argue, does independent mean the budget of the game, does independent mean where the source of financing was, does it mean the team size? Is it the kind of independent spirit of the game, meaning a smaller game that’s sort of different?

Yes, Geoff, it can mean different things to different people, so the question is, as the man in charge of this show, what does it mean to YOU? Because that's all that matters for this award show.

He got caught with his pants down, because his award show has no objective criteria for "indie." He should make it, so he can point to it when his voters decide. Now, that's not to say the criteria will be perfect - I know that the Oscars for "Best Foreign Film" and "Best Documentary" were plagued with qualification controversies for years - but at least he will have some.

 

[yet_another_alt]

So GAF, would you prefer term indie-like or indie-lite?

 

[radewagon]

I dunno guys, I see it as a pretty excellent response. He has a point that indie means different things to different people. While it clearly comes from being independent, word meanings are fluid. They change. For a lot of people, simply being 2D makes a game "indie." I think that going forward, they definitely need to come up with some hard criteria to prevent this kind of thing from happening, but the damage is already done. What is he going to do? Rescind the nomination? That would be bad too. Better to just accept what happened and learn from the mistake so that next year, they don't have a similar problem.

 

[Ribi]

What about snubbing Atomic Heart of Art direction nomination and let's be real.. it would have won

 

[diffusionx]

I dunno guys, I see it as a pretty excellent response. He has a point that indie means different things to different people. While it clearly comes from being independent, word meanings are fluid. They change. For a lot of people, simply being 2D makes a game "indie." I think that going forward, they definitely need to come up with some hard criteria to prevent this kind of thing from happening, but the damage is already done. What is he going to do? Rescind the nomination? That would be bad too. Better to just accept what happened and learn from the mistake so that next year, they don't have a similar problem.

what's the point of a category award if the category doesn't mean anything?

agreed, nothing you can do about this now, but he needs to fix it going forward.

 

[newtypepilot]

we all know the tga is a joke anyways, since it's just a 2 hour long commerical. Geoff wants it to be mainstream so he has to suck up to the big publishers.

 

[justiceiro]

I guess indie games is more of a niche or low roi type of game. Yes their owners are gigantic, but this game won't really sustain this company, com.

Besides, there's a lot of "indie publisher" these days. Do we disqualify them as well? Let's not punish devs that decided to work on smaller projects when they are owned by big greedy corporations. I wish more companies did that.

 

[Rhazkul]

Keighley also pointed out that some of the other indie games nominated in this year’s Game Awards have publishers, asking: “If you have a publisher, is that still indepedent or not?”

If you have a publisher, you aren't indie. What do people think "independent" means? Literally?

 

[Robb]

For a lot of people, simply being 2D makes a game "indie."

With all of these extremely broad nonsensical definitions I’m starting to wonder why Super Mario Bros. Wonder wasn’t nominated.

It’s clearly an indie game.

 

[Rhazkul]

Everyone has a different opinion on what an indie game is? What a load of crap.

Pentiment, great indie game from trillion dollar company Microsoft!

People believe facts are opinions and can be debated. Objective truth and etymology doesn't exist anymore in this post-modern world.

What is a woman?

 

[Spukc]

It shouldn’t be in the indie category IMO.

Agreed should be GOTY

 

[Panajev2001a]

What a load of waffle.

While the game is clearly excellent, it's not made by an independent studio. It's disrespectful to developers out there who are truly independent and as a result work under that extra degree of pressure/uncertainty.

If they want to insist on giving a game like this some recognition then create a "budget title" category for full games with a release RRP of under $20.

The point kind of stand or at least maybe we should have a category for AA or A level title to reward niche bets that even mid or large publishers might make?

You do realise that Valve is an indie dev if you go by the no publisher definition? Is HelloGames not an indie anymore because it is more than 3 folks in a bedroom (although it is not a massive dev like Valve is)?

The problem is that we have no good definition.

 

[AzekZero]

To me, the spirit of the indie award is about recognizing and rewarding new players in the industry.

In my opinion, handing out indie nominations and awards to skunkworks teams from the big players (e,g, EA, Microsoft, Sony, Nexon) doesn't accomplish this.

 

[Peroroncino]

I'm starting to wonder if they even knew it was not an indie game and now that they nominated it, they're damage controlling.

No matter how you slice it, this is not an indie game.

 

[calistan]

I'm starting to wonder if they even knew it was not an indie game and now that they nominated it, they're damage controlling.

No matter how you slice it, this is not an indie game.

Didn't this awards show also nominate somebody for a dubious e-sports category, "best trainer", and he then said he hadn't actually worked in that field in a long time?

I remember Resident Evil 4 getting nominated in - and winning - the "best movie adaptation" category at the Golden Joysticks. I worked with the people who ran it at the time, and even though the stupidity was pointed out as soon as the categories were revealed, they just said it was too late to change it.

Gaming awards are dumb, there will never be anything as respected as even the most minor movie or book awards.

 

[ssringo]

Yes, Geoff, it can mean different things to different people, so the question is, as the man in charge of this show, what does it mean to YOU? Because that's all that matters for this award show.

This. Really, that's all there is to it. Lay down the requirements for each category. Likely won't be perfect so adjust as necessary as the years go by. Most categories should already be pretty easy to figure out.

Gonna be interesting if Dave wins best indie after all this hubbub being made about it not even being an indie.

 

[tommycronin]

Returnal is my favourite indie game

 

[SmokedMeat]

Do you also consider breweries owned by Anheuser Busch - InBev to be “microbrews”?

If McDonalds spins off a small burger joint, are you going to call it a “mom and pop” business?

Saying something’s an “indie” because it looks low budget, despite being backed by an enormous publisher is a slap in the face to the genuine indies.

You’d think an enthusiast site wouldn’t be in agreement with the mainstream dullards running an awards program.

 

[Kiya's Guard]

If "independent" is a broad term, is "world premier" broad too? And the term "award" does it actually mean anything here? Comeon geoff

 

[SmokedMeat]

For a lot of people, simply being 2D makes a game "indie."

Mario Wonder should’ve won indie game of the year.

 

[Robb]

Mario Wonder should’ve won indie game of the year.

 

[rofif]

Load of shit. He acts as if they considered if it counts as Independant or not before voting. No they didnt. They saw pixels and it was indie for them.

 

[Heisenberg007]

I can understand Geoff's conundrum here. Defining "indie" games is never straight-forward and simple.

 

[Hudo]

Isn't Baldur's Gate 3 more of an indie game than this one?

 

[Deft Beck]

A hidden reason they don't want to change the nominees is because they have already rendered the sizzle reel/rehearsed the spiel and they don't want to redo anything last minute.

 

[Godot25]

It's poorly defined category.
Just call it "Best AA game" or something like that.
Games like Dave the Diver, Pentiment, Grounded etc. should not be included in indie category because they have massive publisher behind them. But on the other hand Larian could be called "Indie" despite fact that their game is huge AAA project. By labelling category "best AA game" you can avoid both scenarios.

Whole TGA is in desperate needs of category overhaul

They should get rid of every esports category unless they are willing to let e-sports experts to be part of jury. It's embarrassing that coach that did not coached this year is nominated in "Best e-sports coach category"
They should overhaul "best community support" and "best ongoing games" category, because members or the jury are clearly not playing them and they are just nominating usual suspects or big games (nominating Destiny 2 this year is just pure nonsense. Same for Apex Legends).
They should add "Best new IP" category.
They should forbid remakes to be part of general categories and maybe make separate category for them since they are so prevalent currently.

 

[Filben]

If you go by the source of finance I guess Baldur's Gate 3 is considered an indie game, isn't it? If so that's tough for other small indie studios.

If you go with team size you have the same thing but with Dave the Diver. Tough for similar size teams but only a fraction of the budget.

"Indie" is indeed ambiguous. From what exactly is it independent? Focus groups? Investors? Big personnel? Industry standards in terms of visuals, mechanics, music and narrative?

A simple answer will lead only to more questions. So the term needs to be discussed if it has real life impact and relevance besides being used at the cracker barrel.

 

[Del_X]

"Indie can mean different things"

No? It literally means independent - not "wow this is so meta and ironic and cute"

 

[Toots]

what an enormous load of bullshit.

Keighley answered that the definition of an indie game is hard to define,

Question the meaning of words when their meaning doesn't suit you. Never go look at the correct definition in the dictionary because your truth is more important than facts.
Clown world 101

Kudos to the juournalist who wrote without skipping a beat "the definition of [whatever it's not important] is hard to define"
If he was really facetious, he would have written "the definition is hard to define definitively"

 

[Montauk]

Looks like an indie game to me. I'd define it as a style rather than anything to do with budget or team size.

That’s not what it means. It’s not an art style or a budget.

 

[calistan]

That’s not what it means. It’s not an art style or a budget.

Then what is it? The fact that there's no consensus suggests it's a tenuous category. Like indie music, which began as independent of the major labels but eventually became a style when big publishers got in on it.

Independent of third-party publishers? Then Larian and CDPR should count, since they don't publish anybody else's games, whereas Devolver and Annapurna don't qualify since they release countless games. But the latter two focus on the indie "style".

It's a stupid way to categorise games anyway. You don't have an Oscar for best indie film - you have separate awards ceremonies and festivals dedicated to those guys - but if an indie film is a breakout critical hit then it might be in with a shot at the big prize.

 

[Arcadialane]

Then what is it?

It's pretty simple, It means the product is distributed independently instead of through a publishing company.

Not complicated

 

[Bridges]

Yeah this is kinda dumb. I'll echo the post earlier that if they're playing this loose with the definition then Microsoft/Obsidian's Pentimento should've been nominated (and should've won).

But really this isn't unfamiliar to me since the same thing happens in music.

For example, "Indie" band Foster The People that had the mega hit "Pumped Up Kicks". Got insane radio play, had their songs at sporting events and in commercials, and most importantly were signed to Columbia Records. Yet they are considered an "Indie" band. In music, Indie is a term to describe the sound and scene but many of the figureheads of the movement had a lot of backing by major record labels.

I agree that for games it should truly mean independent, but in my mind this was inevitable.

 

[calistan]

It's pretty simple, It means the product is distributed independently instead of through a publishing company.

Not complicated

Cool, then my vote would go to BG3.