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[iffi]

Glad Amnesia got a nomination in Audio. So horrible the audio in that game (in a good way) especially the teeth grinding.

I'm glad about that too - from what I've seen (which isn't much, since I'm trying not to spoil too much before I actually get a chance to play it) the audio is really effective in that.

I have mixed feelings about seeing Minecraft's nominations - while I'm not surprised to see it nominated for the categories it got nominated in (it does deserve those nominations), it really doesn't need the attention or the prize money, considering how much of that it's already got.

[Dragonmaw]

not a bad year.

Cat and the Coup looks fantastic really, really excited for that game.

Glad Amnesia got a nomination in Audio. So horrible the audio in that game (in a good way) especially the teeth grinding.

I'm actually really sad that it didn't get a visual nomination, rather than a technical one. I think the visuals are far more impressive than the physics stuff (which they already perfected in Penumbra)

[floatstarpx]

I think it's all great, apart from "Under A Killing Moon" getting in the technical excellence category.

[ella guro]

Can't waaait to finally play Amnesia, that looks like my kinda game

[allen]

I'm actually really sad that it didn't get a visual nomination, rather than a technical one. I think the visuals are far more impressive than the physics stuff (which they already perfected in Penumbra)

Yeah, technically the game doesn't seem to be as impressive as something like Overgrowth. But visually and the art direction is much better. So yeah.

[iffi]

Can't waaait to finally play Amnesia, that looks like my kinda game

If you haven't realized, you can buy it now.

[ella guro]

Can't waaait to finally play Amnesia, that looks like my kinda game

If you haven't realized, you can buy it now.

Yep, got it gifted to me on steam when it was on sale.

[eva_]

bought it too idk when i gona play 

[Taiko]

I will have to give desktop dungeons a try too.  Also amnesia, though I'm not good with horror ...

Overall, I like the list this year!

btw the OP missed the honorable mentions and one of the mobile entries, so for completeness here's the missed stuff:

Seumas McNally Grand Prize Honorable mentions: Neptune's Pride (Iron Helmet Games); Super Crate Box (Vlambeer); Recettear: An Item Shop's Tale (Carpe Fulgur); Bit.Trip Runner (Gaijin Games); Retro City Rampage (Vblank Entertainment).

I wish Recettear got more than a nomination for the grand prize.  I loved that game.

Also, I had no idea Svedang released another mobile game.  But then, I don't have an iPad.  One good thing about these nominations is it gives me a list of new games to try out.

[SunnyKatt]

Desktop dungeons always felt... amateur to me. Certainly not good enough to win any award, but it's not my contest...

I also think Overgrowth should have gotten a technical excellence; instead of minecraft. I didn't see anything fancy about minecraft that deserved technical excellence. Infinite procedural world generation isn't that impressive considering what the other games did, but to each his own. :|

But whatever. Congrats to the finalists!

[wsworin]

Congrats to the finalists! 

[Vermeulen]

I was definitely disappointed that our game Capsized wasn't even mentioned, mainly for visual arts and audio. I am not really bitter about the contest but it really doesn't make sense to me, hopefully judges notes will give some idea. I think a part of it is I gotta get more into the indie community and see what people are up to, hence why this is my first post

In any case i still love the Visual Arts selection more than I thought I would - Bastion / Hohokum

[Paul Eres]

capsized does look very good; here's the trailer for those who haven't seen it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bY5NYrgmv1o

[Zaphos]

Yeah, Capsized looks amazing -- I would have thought it would get a mention, too!  Regardless, I'm looking forward to playing it when it comes out

[adev]

Come on, just because the other crazier thread accidentally impregnated every man and woman reading it doesn't mean this thread has to be completely neutered. Let's actually discuss something instead of just congratulate the nominees! (that said, big congrats to all the nominees!)

Here's an opinion:

I think the way IGF judges games has taken one great step forward and one or maybe even two great steps back. Having a separate panel of judges (juries) for each award was a great idea and one that I personally vouched for last year. I think Simon/Brandon/the organic entity known as the IGF have listened to the criticism that was made and this I'd like to congratulate them for this. The fact that they do listen to the valid criticism made amongst all the vitriol speaks loads for them and it gives me hopes the IGF will only get better and better.

Unfortunately, I think the judges chosen for the panels inflate some of the problems of the previous system(s) something enormously and completely undo the positive effects.

What I'm talking about is the systematic bias (which was briefly discussed in the other thread), and the seemingly ever-growing buddy incest. Each panel feature almost exclusively active indie developers, incredulously including some who even have worked on games submitted and nominated this year¹! These might have been the kind of accidental slip-ups you're bound to get every year, but the even bigger problem is that these active developers will act as judges one year, and nominees the next. And then judges again the year after that..!² the qualification to be a panel judge seems to be "somebody who won an award previously", which seems to me like it would be an incredibly effective breeding ground for the kind of bias some refer to as "circle-jerking". I mean, since there's no stopping the famous and successful developers from becoming friends with each other, it seems to me a really stupid choice to let the juries be dominated by developers who can easily be accused of favoring their friends!

This of course makes the cultural bias discussed in the other thread even worse ³. I find it ironic that Phil Fish posted a list of previous winners as an argument for the IGF being international/not having much of a bias (and for critics to "fuck off"), failing to note that with one exception (a Czech game), every single IGF award has for the past five years gone to either a dev from an either English-speaking country or a Nordic one. That's really, really not a track record to be proud of and just demonstrates how big the problem really is! If anything, this alone should be enough to motivate the people behind the IGF to make much, much greater efforts to reach out to the Japanese, Chinese and whereverese game developers in the world (that said, I applaud IGF China).

I think the solution to this problem would be to include more critics, people from academia, mainstream game studios, hell, maybe even people completely unrelated to game development for at least some of the awards (visual, music, and nuovo in particular seem like they'd be good fits). I mean, I think the argument that no indie developer who is still actively pursuing that career should be a judge is quite valid (but I'll be happy to hear the counter-arguments).

(footnotes)
¹ AdamAtomic was a judge on two or more panels, while at the same time having done graphics work on Cave Story Wii. Derek Yu was a judge on one of the panels, and made a graphic package that was adopted as the default in Desktop Dungeons. I'm sure there were more cases of this, as I've just glanced at the lists of judges but still noticed these two immediately.
² I'm sure this holds true for even a majority of the judges (but if I were asked to substantiate the claim, I'd point to one of the guys behind Cobalt being a judge last year, also having entered the IGF two or three years ago)! None of them seems to have pondered whether working for the IGF as a judge one year maybe should disqualify them from entering the next year. I'm not saying this is necessarily the case, but I definitely thinks it deserves a good debate...
³ And it's pretty damn bad to start off with, to be frank! Even if we assume that there's probably not that many indie developers in developing countries, I didn't see a single judge even from a country like Japan on any of the panels!