The ENnies and RPG Awards
The nominees for the 2009 ENnies awards were recently announced, and public voting to determine this years winners is about to get underway next Friday. Since I don’t work in the industry my interest in these kind of awards is usually limited to finding out about some new games I might otherwise have missed. This year there’s been a bit more chatter online about the nominees and the process which has caught my attention.
The ENnies are community based awards, originally started on Eric Noah’s popular D&D message board EN World. Over the past 9 years the scope of the awards has broadened to include all RPGs and the awards presentation is now a live event at Gen Con in Indianapolis, Indiana.
When this year’s nominees were announced people immediately began to comment that there were noticeable absences in some of the categories — the most recognizable and popular RPG podcasts (Fear the Boot, The Podge Cast, RPG MP3, etc) weren’t mentioned. There was also some concern that the “Best Free Product” category had genuinely free products like Swords & Wizardry competing against teaser products for $50 commercial products. The Best Website category has also drawn some criticism as it mixes individual sites, collaborative efforts and subscription services – yet doesn’t include Wizards of the Coast’s new subscription service the D&D Insider.
After chatting with Tony Law the Public Relations Coordinator for the ENnies on Twitter, it seems that this year there weren’t many submissions for some of the categories so they were forced to put disparate type entries together. Tony asked for ideas to improve the process for next year and suggested that I should consider running to be an ENnies judge for 2010.
I think allowing 3rd parties to nominate products and companies for an award would go a long way to increasing the range of items under consideration. Perhaps an automated system that notifies people whenever they’ve been nominated could be setup. If a small press publisher, website or podcaster were to receive enough email nomination notices it might encourage them to fill out all the required paperwork and submit their products for review.
If a website or blog were to update with submissions as they came in then people could see what was under consideration, and what might have been overlooked. Some ENnies judges have done similar things with temporary blogger blogs, but I’d think a site that was part of the RPG Bloggers Network would help ensure it got more views.
I’m still weighing the pros and cons of running to be an ENnies judge for next year. It sounds like the judges had a lot of work on their hands for this year, and that’s not something to jump into without being sure it’s what I want. At the same time I like the idea of helping make the process better — or at least being an outside voice that can confirm the current process is as good as it can be.
Campaigning for ENnies Judge starts July 24th, and I’ll (hopefully) have made up my mind about it by then. 
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You know my stance on this. The best way to change something is to work from the inside. If you feel strongly enough that things need to change, then become a candidate for a 2010 ENnies Judge. Work with the system and things might change. It’s happened before.
Thanks again Tony for the encouragement.
I’m going to research just how much of a time commitment this would be, and when the busiest times are scheduled to be before I confirm that I’m running.
Even thought it’s strictly voluntary, the ENnies requires a lot of time and patience. Consider that each judge has to go through every submitted product and do a thorough review. This year there were over 250 submissions. You do the math.
I have 75 University students each fall with multiple design projects I need to review… so I *know* how much time this sort of thing can take up!
What time of year do the entries come in? Is it all in the month or two leading up to the announcement, or is it spread out throughout the year?
It’s spread throughout the year. In fact, we tell publishers they can drop things off stuff at GenCon that the judges take home with them to start reviewing. However, the last three or four months before the close of the submission period are usually the busiest.
Good luck if you decide to run, Stuart. Changing the ENnies submission process has been an issue every single year and things never seem to improve more than an inch when whole yards are needed *just* to catch up. I’d love to see it, though. I know it might restore the faith in the awards to a lot of people that have just given up over the years.
Oh, and you’ll just never see FTB be nominated beyond that first year, by their own choice.
Stuart,
I would have to say it would require more than 1 person to work from the inside to change this. It HAS been something brought up each year, and each year, there’s the debate. Things end up where they were, pretty much. I think the culture of the awards has stagnated to a degree, and they would need to want to change that before any change came around.
You’re aces in my book, and I know you’d do your best. If you want to talk about my experiences before deciding to run, I’m always here. Either way, best of luck!
I’ve done what I could to keep the entries lists public on my blog, but probably could use some more visibility.
As for how busy it gets… I’d say it’s pretty steady and slow for most of the year, with a huge bump, say a hundred or so products, in the last two months. May/June is by far the busiest time.
I’m with Tony by the way, you should totally run. I think I’ve decided to give it one last shot this year myself, and I think it would be great to work with you (assuming I could pull off a win this year).
“Oh, and you’ll just never see FTB be nominated beyond that first year, by their own choice.”
That statement is correct. I’m a big believer in “never say never,” but we’re hesitant to reopen that can of worms. We did not submit anything for consideration this year, and therefore, our absence says nothing about the ENnie nomination process. As for the other shows (and categories) you listed, I really don’t know the details, so I have no specific insight.
“I think allowing 3rd parties to nominate products and companies for an award would go a long way to increasing the range of items under consideration.”
Good point. Especially since third parties were able to do so this year.
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