Now that The Game Awards for 2021 have come and gone, fans are beginning to look ahead at what the show will look like in 2022. After all, the show's executive producer and host Geoff Keighley has already begun talking it up, promising that it will be bigger and better as the industry continues to grow. "Bigger and better" are perfectly fine aspirations for an event like The Game Awards which requires the maximum viewership possible. However, based on the way that the show is marketed, "bigger and better" only seems to suggest one thing: More game announcements and bigger headlines.
A major industry event like The Game Awards wanting to premiere new titles and trailers for highly anticipated games isn't a bad thing inherently, but after this year's show, viewers have begun to notice just how much of a backseat the actual awards portion of the show has taken. That isn't necessarily a new observation but following the conclusion of this year's show, many fans couldn't help but feel a little let down by how seemingly unimportant the awards have become in favor of more world premieres and game announcements. For the 2022 Game Awards, it would be worth the show's time to refocus a little bit and put the awards and other industry recognition first in terms of priority and let the announcements come second.
The 2021 Game Awards' Lack of Industry Recognition
Next to E3, The Game Awards is one of the biggest events in gaming, meaning that people all over the world will be tuning in to see everything that the show has to offer. However, unlike E3, The Game Awards has the unique quality of recognizing the achievements of those in the games industry each year.
Although it's literally a part of the show's title, the awards this year clearly weren't the focus: Six awards were read off during the preshow which, while its quality isn't up for debate, certainly isn't the main event. What's more, only a handful of awards were actually announced on stage by presenters, and the rest were rattled off four or five at a time by Keighley between world premieres.
Adding to the overall dissatisfaction with the way that the 2021 show handled industry recognition, most studios that did win awards and got the chance to give a speech on the main stage weren't given much time to say anything of note about the industry or the game making process. The Game Awards' Future Class, 50 people in the industry who the show believes represent the future of gaming, also weren't given much of a spotlight like they have been in years past. The show quickly saying that interested viewers could see the full list on The Game Awards' website before moving on to the next trailer reveal was disappointing to many.
World premieres are exciting and definitely get viewers in the door, but a show titled "The Game Awards" should do more to actually recognize those that are getting the titular awards. It seems as if a lot of The Game Awards' viewership has begun to notice just how sidelined the awards are, and are hoping that the 2022 show can fix this issue and give credit to those who make the event possible in the first place.
That doesn't mean that fans want The Game Awards to drop the World Premieres entirely, but just to cut out the proper time needed to focus on the industry people who are nominated for awards. As it stands right now, it feels as if the awards sections are viewed as getting in the way of the newest trailers, when it should potentially be the other way around. Hopefully, 2022 brings with it a change in format that gives more credit to the studios and game makers invited to the event in the first place.