The Last of Us Part 2 won last night’s (or tonights, depending on how fast I can type this) Game Awards. I don’t know anything about the game awards and I don’t really watch movies anymore so i’m basically as removed from reward culture as I can be. Who do you even wait for at Game Awards Red Carpet, Kratos???

Besides all of the articles and opinion pieces that will come out about how TLOU2 doesn’t really deserve the award, I kind of wonder where we are in the whole gravity of culture in relation to what about these awards matter.

Life won’t, for anyone but a small group of Naughty Dog executives and maybe whoever gets the benefit of the after party, drastically improve. Broadly, even past game awards haven’t outwardly given videogames even a larger idea of some kind of ‘canon’

Movies are basically the same – an age old comedy website philosophy was that “nobody remembers who fucking wins an Oscar” but everyone remembers their personal favorites, without even getting into cult film or true classics. Videogame awards still read a full decade of these “professional” events like juvenile imitation.

One of the industries long term embarassments is an infatuation with being taken seriously. Rather than just as a giant trade-show (and to profit for an alltogether different group of stockholders) Geoff Keighley’s game awards has always felt like that. Red carpets, celebrities. Whoever is the currently accepted videogame auteur. Someone gives a speech. Credible journalists get their due.

It would be a celebration of the industry – if it gave even the basest of lip service to worker crunch time, workplace harassment or the general horror stories of racism and sexual misconduct that seemingly come unfettered every year.

Even the immediate buzz about The Last of Us 2 was met by a certain crowd of writers with absolute derision. Never mind that the game that split industry talking points down the middle all year really kind of does deserve it. In notorizing it as the biggest and boldest game of this year to face down all others – a kind of canon is preserved.

While later printings of whatever wins these awards usually only benefit in the terms of new fancy gold stamps on the case, there’s still an idea being created. At a time when studios continue to shut down, and independent videogames (and their creation tools) become available, an awards ceremony is the only way to build a wall.

The Last of Us 2 is the way to Make A Videogame. With one interesting diversion, the history of the awards show favors those games that answer a made-up hunger for cinematic, life exterminating experiences. We cannot see ahead of us, but if we give out enough little gold statues there might be some kind of light to guide our way.

More than just creating a wall to protect it from the outside, awards shows function as a way of recognizing who gets to have an opinion and who doesn’t. There’s a funny thing about the time you stop seeing certain actors give speeches at awards shows every few years. In creating a certain kind of public, and a spectacle for people to hate on, yeah sure we’ve got recognition.

What do I mean about a wall though? We’re living in a time where you can build a wall and get away with it. 2020 has been the year of recognizing how influencers get special perks even in the realm of videogames. It’s been a year in recognizing who gets to have an opinion even over the people they’ve hurt or abused. The wall is there, it can be seen. It alternatively says Keep Out If You Are Not This and You’re Safe Because You’re Not That. It can be cynically read as a definite way for shareholders and board executives to say there can be a formula for making an award winning, successful game.

When we describe an audience, we have a tendency to also describe the production the audience is witnessing. The Videogame Awards highlight the idea we’re getting closer and closer to being Grownup Art for Adults. You’re participating in the awards show – this is how regal and fine and developed we all are. Even the people just paying for it every release cycle. Even the people paying for it with their bodies and time on the line.

The Last Of Us Part II is the game of the year, like Sekiro and God Of War say. Like Overwatch says. Videogames are cinematic affairs that also offer room for pop-psychotherapy that creates a brand acknowledgement over time. Cinematic means only in the way we essentially insitutionalize workers to make our fake-cameras pretend-sway while a Samurai says some Cool Shit.

Now there must be a The Last Of Us Part 3. It might also mean there’s gotta be a Sekiro II. I won’t pretend any other culture is invincible to this shit. Future versions will aspire to be more expensive, more entertaining, prettier, more cinematic. We must resist. Videogames have a unique creative vision that there’s nothing like. We must reward the hardworking men and women who create for us. Can you believe it folks? More developing power this year only.

Every year, we should all stand up and talk about how important we all are. Hard working individuals have fought for years to make the game industy a place that rewards creativity.

Welcome theydies and gentletheys, it’s Hideo Kojima. Clap. Laugh.
Presenting the best game of the year award.