Best Game That I Don't Actually Remember Anything About Because My Memory Is Garbage

I remember playing this game. The screenshots look familiar. I definitely remember enjoying it a lot! But I have no idea what the actual content is anymore.

Best Frog

a surprisingly contentious category this year but this is the best frog there is

Best Game Jam Mechanic That Should Be A Full Game

damn this is cool and with some refinement on how it works and maybe some narrative or something to actually push you to play more this could be a very cool thing

Trans Women? More Like Trans Winnin'! Award (tie)

I'm terrible at shooters and multiplayer games (especially team-based or competitive ones) make me super anxious but they added a trans goth mommy so, like, what am I supposed to do? Not play this game? Don't be ridiculous.

I haven't played since launch but getting back into it was a lot easier than expected. Sure, I got lost on all the maps and didn't know what half the characters do and didn't know what guns were considered good or bad but it's okay because Catalyst is cool as shit and I had a good time playing as her.

Trans Women? More Like Trans Winnin'! Award (tie)

I don't play Guilty Gear because fighting games terrify me but it has been an absolute joy to see friends get into fighting games and Guilty Gear because of this. And also all the incredibly cute Brisket fanart people make.

There's also this element where, from what I've seen, large parts of the fighting game/Guilty Gear community have been Extremely Chill and Supportive about this all and it's give me hope that maybe video games and the communities that form around them are not a lost cause.

Best Lady Maria of the Astral Clocktower

Surprise winner here. A real dark horse entrant in this category.

The real surprise here is that I started another Bloodborne playthrough this year but I didn't finish and I also didn't finish the DLC. I did fight Lady Maria and let her kill me a bunch because fighting her is so much fun, she is easily my favorite FromSoft boss. And I finally beat Orphan of Kos!! The boss that walled me last time I played the DLC. And then I got lazy about fighting Laurence so I still haven't beaten all the Bloodborne bosses, what the hell. Fake gamer. Rigged awards.

Best Game That I Want To Like A Lot More Than I Actually Like

I think this game is capital-c Cool and I like that it exists and I am glad it was made and that I played it but it didn't fully connect with me but that's okay and I like it anyway, y'know.

Best Hand-Holding Award

I took forever to get through this game even though it's not that long relative to most JRPGs and so it gets to win this very prestigious award two years in a row!

Best Game Made By a Friend (tie)

ROXY MADE A COOL GAME AND YOU SHOULD PLAY IT AND IN THE TIME SINCE STARTING THIS LIST SHE MADE ANOTHER COOL GAME CALLED NEOTROGLA AND YOU SHOULD PLAY THAT ONE TOO

Best Game Made By a Friend (tie)

WOODABA MADE A COOL GAME AND YOU SHOULD PLAY IT

The "Apparently Everyone Else On Here Hates It" Award

Best Game I'll Never Fully Finish Because They Keep Adding More

I played through the first four campaigns and, at the time, there was one more main campaign and two bonus ones. But I needed a break so I stopped for a while and in the time since then they've added approximately ten thousand more campaigns and oh my god it'll never end. But, see, that's cool and good and Wildermyth is cool and good and y'all should play it, it does some really special stuff with procedural generation that I think is worth seeing.