Indie RPG Awards?

[Andy Kitkowski]

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I still like the idea that Andy simply picks the winners as he sees fit, and screw all the voting.
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I love that idea.

Unfortunately:

*I have a job, wife, and other interests.
*This means, unfortunately, that even if I had all the money I simply don't have the time to read everything that's out there every year.
*Much less actually PLAY everything that's out there, which I really should do if I want to even try to be fair.
*The types of games I like others would hate.  The kinds of games others like I hate or am not interested in. I couldn't even fake non-bias, even if I tried.
* I like projects that involve other people on some level. Having one vote, the "Andy Vote", would kill that right out.

One thing that I was thinking of was doing, for one of the awards, the "Andy's Pick Award".  In other words, tally up the votes, offer a grand prize, and the OTHER prize would go to the game (out of the one's I've seen) that I think is most worthy of the award.

We'll see how this thing festers.

As for games:  I'm not about to go back 5 years, or more than one for that matter, and include anything beyond last year. Just don't have the resources, and I don't have the interest. This thing has to start somewhere, so limiting it at this year's gaming products, I think, is the best start.

As for the electronic crew updating stuff every year- I'm only going to count the first year of release. Ex: If Jared keeps updating octaNe in little ways every year and publishing it over, he'd only get credit for that first year.
*I'll eventually make rules for "second editions", next year, which will allow games to rerun if they're significantly updated in some quantifiable way.
*If a game goes from "Free" to "For Purchase", it will be counted as "new" for that year's awards only.
*If someone tries to get their game into the awards by pretending that it was released this year, when in fact it was released earlier, I will fly out to their house and spank them with a yardstick.
*More miniscule rules that I'll decide will be presented later.

Man, this is FUN!

-Andy

[Peregrine]

Hi all,

Not sure how old this thread is, but I thought I'd chime in with an idea. The term 'Indie-RPG', rightly or wrongly, is a bit tarred these days, and as that endless thread at RPG.net will tell you, it's also vague as hell.

I'd suggest following the suit of literary publishers and give an award for 'small press' instead of Indie. Basically it can still boil down to the same thing in your POV. It just has better PR, as names go.

Otherwise it seems you've got pretty sage advice already. From reading through all this, the way I'd do it:

Only give out 1 Andy a year to keep 'em special.

Allow for several honourable mentions, but don't call these Andies. Call them Something else, like the Kitkwoski award for excellence in... Thus Kitkwoskis still give the layout designer their moment in the sun, but what everyone really wants is an Andy.

Games are only elegible if they were released *this year*. I can think of no industry award anywhere that does it any other way. Personally, I think it is a bit ridiculous to suggest it be done any other way. I'm sorry but in the first year of the Oscars they did not allow 'Metropolis' to be considered not matter how groundbreaking and worthy a film it was in its day. By making games 'this year only' you also remove the possibility to appear biased with the first round of awards. It cuts down the likelihood that the award to go to a friend of Andy's. Unless, that is, sheer chance determines that friends of Andy release a damned fine game in 2003. Who knows.

Maybe establish a RPG Academy (free to begin with, a minimal joining fee later if this whole thing takes off), open to those who meet certain published criteria. Membership entitles one to nominate and then vote for a best small press RPG release. Once you've got a record of members you've got a record of members, an e-mailing list, and whatnot. Makes life easier than just spamming everyone every year.

Free vs Pay: You're gonna have a nightmare over this one. Maybe you could just have a Kitkowski for best electronic only game. Pay or otherwise. That way to be in the running for an Andy, you've got to show you've enough faith in the RPG industry to actually invest some real time and momey in it. (Not that I'm saying free or PDF publishers don't have their whole heart and soul in their games. I'm just saying that if some brave soul is willing to risk real money over a game, then lets acknowlegde them for it. I have more respect for the dreamers behind small time press RPG companies than I do for any low risk PDF-only games, mine included.)

Criteria. Give your Academy a short list of criteria they can measure a game against, and make the criteria open to the public. Include such cirteria as: Setting, Originality of Concept, Professionalism of Writing, Professionalism of Layout, and so forth. Define each one, and add more if you like as time goes on. You could even ask that Academy members simply rate each criteria 1-5 for each nominee. Perhaps even e-mail them a PDF form with dots to click, and a box to fill in one's name, and a return e-mail address. A 'I haven't read this' box for those games an Academy members not actually seen. Can't get much simpler than that. You could then add up all the points. In the unlikely event of a tie: Andy chooses.
This way you could also base the Kitkowski's on the individual critea. Although whether or not any RPG out there should be given an 'Honourable Excellence in the field of Professionalism of Writing' award is debatable. *grin*
Make the votes (but not the names of the voters) available for inspection by the general public once its all tallied.

An online award ceremony that can be saved and archived on the website would also be fun. Or even just short e-mail acceptance 'speeches' from the winners over the various years.

Who knows. Maybe Andys will be synonomous with quality in a few years time? Maybe big companies will get desperate enough to win themselves an Andy they start up small subsideraries to release more innovative 'indie' or 'small press' games. Let's hope so.

Hope that was helpful

Chris

[Andy Kitkowski]

Thanks, Chris!

Sorry that I haven't been keeping up on this thread.  I'm in the last stages of finalizing everything to post online (rules, qualifications, etc).  You'd be surprised how many of your ideas - well, ideas that I had that you also had (^.^) - are being incorporated into the final awards thing.

The award will be yearly only.  I don't want to open it up to past awards.  I mean, how many awards does Sorcerer really need? ;-)

Yeah, definitely one award.  Then a number (looks like close to 10 at this point) of other smaller points of recognition; things like Best Layout/Design, Best Marketing/PR, Best Publisher Support, etc.

I think I'm going to have a recognition award called "Best Free RPG". Free RPGs _WILL_ be able to be nominated for the "big award", and they can win (if they do, then the Best Free RPG will go to the Second Best Free RPG).  My whole issue on this wasn't the game itself, but the votes that Free RPG Publishers get to use on the awards.  I figure that, for the 3-5 games nominated for Best Free RPG, their designers will each get one vote towards the Big Award. The person who wins the "Best Free RPG" recognition will get to vote in following years, just like publishers of pay games.

>>>>
Who knows. Maybe Andys will be synonomous with quality in a few years time?
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Yeah, I hope so.  Because of the great suggestions by Scott on the other thread, I've decided to make the Big Award basically a certificate and a Buttload of Cash.  See, if it was just an "image" or a "figure"... well, that would be nice.  But a Buttload of Cash going to the winner... That would not only encourage that winner to write more quality games in the future, but it would get more people to take the award seriously from the beginning.

"A Buttload", right now at this point in time, is a measley $200. But I hope to increase that substantially through contributions and people buying votes.

Oh yeah, I also have an equasion by which people can BUY VOTES (max one vote per person, max 5 bought votes per game, at a SUBSTANTIAL cost, though). That would get the everyman involved if they felt strongly towards a game, and also increase the pot for the winner!

Thanks!

-Andy

[Peregrine]

Thanks. Look forward to seeing the final outcome.

Buy a vote? So you are going to impose a meta-resource on the awards voting 'mechanic'. If that is not in the spirit of indie RPGs I don't know what is.

*chuckle*

Chris