Today, CBS aired a preshow for "The Gamer's Choice Awards", a really-for-real awards show that seemingly sprung up out of nowhere overnight. The Gamer's Choice Awards is brought to you by the makers of the Teen Choice Awards, ES&G Entertainment, Inc. A quick Google search of the company reveals no web presence outside of an automatically generated LinkedIn page. The show will broadcast on CBS Sunday, December 9th, just days after Geoff Keighley's The Game Awards. Hosts for the ceremony include VH1's Carrie Keagan and "gaming expert" Marcus "djWHEAT" Grahm. Mr. WHEAT is the director of Twitch Studios, producers of a Twitch based reality series called Stream On.
Gamers can register on the official website and vote once an hour from now until November 27th. Categories include those you'd expect with Fan Favorite Game, Most Anticipated Game, and various genre awards. It also ventures into some new territory with categories such as Most Desired Franchise Resurrection, Favorite Streaming Service, and several categories of Favorite Celebrity Gamer.
Award nominations are seemingly unrestricted by year. Plenty of top games from 2018 make the cut, but past hits like Overwatch and League of Legends are also up for top prizes. Meanwhile, gaming's current obsession Red Dead Redemption 2 is nowhere to be seen outside of Favorite Gaming Moment and Fan Favorite Fall Release. The latter category (added as I was composing this article) also features recent releases Fallout 76 and "Battlefield". One assumes that this refers to EA's Battlefield V, but anything's possible.
There are also several awards which go back into gaming's history. Classics Pong and Space Invaders duke it out for Fan Favorite Retro Game. Meanwhile, There are nine nominees for Fan Favorite Retro Character, ranging from "Pacman" and Samus all the way to obscure 16-bit caveman mascot Bonk.
Despite votes beginning to roll in earlier today, the nominees and categories are still in flux. Arika's Fighting EX Layer joined the fighting game category while this article was being written. Other changes may occur in the coming days. Capcom's Street Fighter: 30th Anniversary Collection gains a nomination in Fan Favorite Fighting Game. This despite it being a compilation of several games in the Street Fighter franchise. As of now, the website lists both Fan Favorite Sports/Racing Game and Fan Favorite Sports Game with the same list of nominees. In addition, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic gets a nomination under Most Desired Franchise Resurrection despite Star Wars: The Old Republic being an active MMO.
If you do choose to vote, we strongly recommend taking extra caution with what information you sign up with. Upon a quick inspection, The Gamer's Choice website seems to be lacking in basic web security. The login and registration pages are in HTTP and not HTTPS. This means that your sensitive information is unencrypted. Additionally, the registration confirmation email sends your password out in plain text.
Please look forward to TechRaptor's coverage of The Game Awards on December 6, 2018, 8:30 PM EST. As for The Gamer's Choice Awards, I think Geoff Keighley sums it up best in his latest tweet.
https://twitter.com/geoffkeighley/status/1063869761975504901
