Since my recent proposition to create a "Codex RPGOTY - Retarded Edition" poll was silently ignored by the esteemed administration, I bring forward another idea that occured to me as I pondered why is the Codex RPGOTY becoming more and more of a joke every year.
One phenomenon is that RPGs formally "released" in one year take another year at least in order to become semi-finished and worth starting up just out of curiosity, because everybody wants to get paid for doing half the work nowadays, twice the quantity with half the quality. Another is that there is a subset of RPGs which either become worth playing only years later after being properly modded, or while worth playing around +1 year after release, suddenly become much better with time thanks to mods.
Three examples I can think of of games which I've played modded for a long time. First, FNV, which goes from rather unimpressive to much more immersive and better paced with mods. Second is Cyberpunk 2077 which is a unique case of a game that became sort of good action RPG after integrating balance and QoL mods that people had already been playing with for 2 years, after being an irredeemable disaster at launch (2020). Third and most recent - PoE: Deadfire. I've been playing this modded for a while now (lvl 16 currently) and the difference mods make to the experience is significant - enough to make me pick up the game and spend another ~60 hours with it.
Such a poll is obviously only worth doing once every 5-10 years, and often the same games would pop up, but the information provided to players would be much more valuable than the yearly "RPGCodex GOTY" poll can give, seeing as that poll largely mimics the mainstream tastes.
Personally I think the codex having GOTY poll is by now redundant exactly for this reason, and conforming to the "GOTY poll" buzz-inducing trick amounts to the Codex assuming one of the worst practices of "gaming "journlism"". But a more in-depth ranking of RPGs, ordered by criteria requiring intricate knowledge of the games, especially knowledge of the systems, will be both useful, unique and attractive to people who might even join the forums for the right reasons.
One phenomenon is that RPGs formally "released" in one year take another year at least in order to become semi-finished and worth starting up just out of curiosity, because everybody wants to get paid for doing half the work nowadays, twice the quantity with half the quality. Another is that there is a subset of RPGs which either become worth playing only years later after being properly modded, or while worth playing around +1 year after release, suddenly become much better with time thanks to mods.
Three examples I can think of of games which I've played modded for a long time. First, FNV, which goes from rather unimpressive to much more immersive and better paced with mods. Second is Cyberpunk 2077 which is a unique case of a game that became sort of good action RPG after integrating balance and QoL mods that people had already been playing with for 2 years, after being an irredeemable disaster at launch (2020). Third and most recent - PoE: Deadfire. I've been playing this modded for a while now (lvl 16 currently) and the difference mods make to the experience is significant - enough to make me pick up the game and spend another ~60 hours with it.
Such a poll is obviously only worth doing once every 5-10 years, and often the same games would pop up, but the information provided to players would be much more valuable than the yearly "RPGCodex GOTY" poll can give, seeing as that poll largely mimics the mainstream tastes.
Personally I think the codex having GOTY poll is by now redundant exactly for this reason, and conforming to the "GOTY poll" buzz-inducing trick amounts to the Codex assuming one of the worst practices of "gaming "journlism"". But a more in-depth ranking of RPGs, ordered by criteria requiring intricate knowledge of the games, especially knowledge of the systems, will be both useful, unique and attractive to people who might even join the forums for the right reasons.
