Prove the bolded. Keighley, the “judges”, and Keighley’s former co-workers don’t count.
Fact is, you can’t. Nobody can. There isn’t an independent source to do so. The conflict of interest is readily apparent, but as I’ve stated numerous times, it’s on Keighley’s dime and his “awards” have never been and never will be legit... so, at the end of the day, he can and will do what he wants.
It’s also shitty of you to generalize criticism of this as people who “hate” the game at hand. I don’t have a horse in the race, and there are likely others in the same boat. What we’re calling attention to is the perception that Keighley created by basically worshipping this developer and accepting a role in the game while full well knowing that he is allegedly running an impartial awards show. He created this problem; he could have said no to the guest role, but being so enamored with Kojima as he is, he couldn’t say no.
Of course, Keighley is going to ignore/deflect the criticism. Nothing is going to submarine his baby.
Lastly, save the whataboutism. Deflecting from the argument at hand by citing another source to justify said conflict of interest is not a good look. And, if you kept up with the thread, you’d notice that we addressed a similar conflict of interest situation with Dan Ryckert and his appearance in L.A. Noire. Despite the decision to have someone else other than Ryckert review the game, there were still questions about the source’s ability to stay impartial because of favorable treatment.
Death Stranding will likely get its fair share of awards later this year, and many of them won’t be shrouded in the same conflict of interest that these non-awards have showcased. In the future, perhaps Keighley will think of the optics before he publicly fawns over a developer and accepts a role in said developer’s game. “No” is always an option, even for the heartiest of fanboys.