Game:

Terraria (2011)

Duration: 9:38

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55

With the launch of the 2016 Autumn Sale, The Steam Awards nominations are now under way; these are my picks. I am not sure how significant these awards are going to be. Is there going to be a ceremony? Are actual trophies going to be given/sent out? Will this eventually be recognized as a prestigious accolade? I don’t really know, but they are putting it in the hands of the community to decide and I am ready to do my part! I hope that these awards actually do end up meaning something and will be a benchmark of sorts for companies to place on their Store Page. There aren’t enough companies that give the community a say in who wins these things.

First in line in my nominations for the Steam Awards is a game that just about everyone who knows me would expect to see; Half-Life 2. The game has always and will always be my favorite. It might be a bit weird for Valve to give themselves this honor, but I feel like a lot of people will agree with my choice. Half-Life 2 is still revered as one of the greatest games of all time and has singlehandedly changed the face of videogames since its release in 2004. A launch title for the both Steam and the Source Engine, it brought fourth revolutionary physics and gameplay that still stand up to many games today. It was one of the first PC games I played and is one I still consistently play now, 12 years later. All these things said, it is a no brainer to choose Half-Life 2 as my “Test of Time” game.
The next category for the Autumn Sale nominations is “I'm Not Crying, There's Something In My Eye.” These categories are just plain silly, but I like them, so fuck it. My choice for this one was Brothers – A Tale of Two Sons because holy crap this game makes you sad as fuck without ever even saying a word. Small spoiler, the game starts with their father dying. RIP. The journey is uplifting and has its sad moments along the way, but the ending is really what qualifies it for its designation in The Steam Awards. I won’t spoil that though, because you should definitely play it. It is super short, but has GREAT gameplay, impressive and stylistic visuals, and will make you feel stuff. I don’t know what more you could ask for.
The “Just 5 More Minutes” Award is a category in which I have suffered with many games. I usually will bail on the game for quite some time after this, but it has happened with Minecraft, Terraria, and Starbound multiple times. Terraria will always be the one that holds the truest in my head though because I can remember being absolutely enthralled by it with my friends for over half of a day. Like legit 12+ hours. It wasn’t healthy, but we loved it a lot at the time and didn’t give a shit. Since it showed this effect on not only me, but several of my friends, I definitely wins the nomination.
Deus Ex: Human Revolution and its series in general has always been known for the illuminati twists and turns, betrayal, and conspiracies from every which way. The Steam Awards this year have a “Whoooaaaaaaa, dude” section and it specifically mentions plot twists in the description. I honestly don’t think much more needs to be said regarding my nomination here; I never asked for this category.
The next category is for a game with a villain that really just needs a hug. I just recently completed a full playthrough of Dishonored 2 and it was a no brainer. Delilah is the main antagonist in the game and is constantly justifying all of the horrible things that she does by guilting others with stories about her deprived childhood, the death of her mother, and the things to which she felt entitled. In some cases I truly did feel bad for her, but at the same time I knew that I wasn’t going to let her get away with the atrocities at hand. Of course, the next best option would be to give her a hug and letting her know everything will be okay.
A game within a game. A lot of games have things similar to this and accordingly, they don’t particularly stick out to me the way they should. I spend some time on this decision for the Steam Awards but it all came back to one of my favorite platformers: BIT.TRIP Runner 2. The game has Warp Zones that take you back to 16-bit versions of the game and allow you to play a completely different game within the main game. Another big contender in this department would be GTA.
Gang Beasts is a meme game I forced my friends to like. It won my hipster nomination.
The “Best Use of a Farm Animal” category is fucking stupid. I don’t care what you say, there is silly and then there is dumb. I chose Stardew Valley because fuck Goat Simulator and this entire category.
Lastly, I chose the nomination of “Could Stand Alone as an Album” for Hotline Miami because holy shit it is groovy. Ran out of space. Sorry for the rush.

On Axis by P C III via Free Music Archive under a Creative Commons Attribution license.
http://freemusicarchive.org/music/P_C_III/Ad_Astra_Vol_3/04_On_Axis

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