Videogame Hugo: 2015 potentials

Saturday, October 17, 2015

Comments: 10   (latest 3 days later)

Tagged: interactive fiction, worldcon, if, awards, hugos


Last month I posted about the idea of a videogame category for the Hugo awards.

A few days later there was a discussion thread on File770 (a prominent SF fandom news blog). The discussion was a good snapshot of community response to the idea.

The biggest objection was that there aren't enough good games to make a category worthwhile. People cited 15 to 25 as a desirable minimum. (The Hugos have a two-stage voting process. So you want at least 25-ish plausible suggestions for "best game of the year", which then get narrowed down to five finalists, which then get narrowed down to one winner.)

The petition that sparked that discussion thread went nowhere. However, I think it's worthwhile to put up a concrete list. The subject will certainly come up again, and I want people to be able to point and say "Yes, look, there are that many games every year!"

I'm going to focus on indie and amateur interactive fiction titles, because that's my field. I've got nothing against big-budget SF games, but you can get a list of those off any game-industry news site. This is the wider field of games which might not be familiar to the non-gaming SF fan. Most, though not all, are short games -- two hours playtime down to ten minutes.

I'm not saying that all of these games are, in fact, Hugo-worthy. I haven't played most of them! I'm gathering highly-rated titles from a variety of sources, including IF competitions and game-jams of 2015. (Special thanks to Emily Short's mid-2015 roundup post.)

(I do not yet include games from IFComp 2015, the big IF competition of 2015. That's still in progress and will be for another month. When it ends, it will certainly add another handful of titles to this post. I'll update then.) (Also still in progress: the Windhammer Prize for Short Gamebook Fiction.)



Notable and Highly-Rated SF/Fantasy/Horror IF and Narrative Games of 2015:
  • Arcadia, Iain Pears ($)
  • Below, Chris Gardiner ($)
  • Champion of the Gods, Jonathan Valuckas, Choice of Games
  • Chlorophyll, Steph Cherrywell (ParsC)
  • Choice of the Petal Throne, Danielle Goudeau, Choice of Games
  • The Compass Rose, Yoon Ha Lee and Peter Berman, Sub-Q Magazine
  • Delphina's House, Alice Grove (ParsC)
  • Does Canned Rice Dream of a Napkin Heap?, Caelyn Sandel, Carolyn VanEseltine, Danielle Church, Jamie Sandel (AnthJ)
  • 80 Days, Meg Jayanth, Inkle Studios (EXP from 2014) ($)
  • False Mavis, Ted Casaubon (ShufC)
  • Her Story, Sam Barlow (MAR, fairy-tale elements) ($)
  • Leadlight Gamma, Wade Clarke (EXP from 2010)
  • Lifeline, Dave Justus, 3 Minute Games ($)
  • Molly and the Butter Thieves, Alice Grove (ShufC)
  • Neon Haze, Porpentine and Brenda Neotenomie, Sub-Q Magazine
  • Oppositely Opal, Buster Hudson (ParsC)
  • PataNoir, Simon Christiansen (MOB from 2011)
  • Photopia, Adam Cadre (MOB from 1997)
  • Ratings War, Eddy Webb, Choice of Games
  • Scroll Thief, Daniel M. Stelzer (EXP from 2014)
  • Six Gray Rats Crawl Up The Pillow, Caleb Wilson (ParsC)
  • The Skeleton Key of Ambady, Caelyn Sandel (ShufC)
  • Snake Game, Vajra Chandrasekera and Tory Hoke, Sub-Q Magazine
  • Starry Seeksorrow, Caleb Wilson (ShufC)
  • Terminator Chaser, Bruno Dias (ParsC)
  • To Spring Open, Peter Berman and Yoon Ha Lee (ShufC)
  • Tonight Dies the Moon, Tom McHenry (AnthJ)
  • Versus: The Lost Ones, Zachary Sergi, Choice of Games
  • When the Land Goes Under the Water, Bruno Dias (ShufC)
  • A Wise Use of Time, Jim Dattilo, Choice of Games

Tags on the above:
  • ($): Costs money (all titles listed here are US$10 or less)
  • (EXP from...): Significant expansion of a game released in an earlier year
  • (MOB from...): Mobile port of a game released in an earlier year
  • (MAR): Marginally genre but I'm counting it anyway
  • (ParsC): High-rated entry in ParserComp (IF competition)
  • (ShufC): High-rated entry in ShuffleComp (IF game exchange)
  • (AnthJ): Entry in Antholojam (SF-themed IF game jam)
  • note that Choice of Games titles are available both as apps ($) or free-to-play online

Other suggestions welcome! Comment away.



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