Vote for the ENnies! Show some love!

Voting is open for the ENnie awards… Oh, crap! I went to the site to link it to this post, and it says they lost all the votes anyone cast Monday, actually up through Tuesday morning. That means me. OK, so if you want to vote or if you already voted and they hosed it up, go to ENnie Voting and cast your ballots for your favorite games. I guess I’ll do it again as I write this. Again, GO BACK AND VOTE IF YOU ALREADY VOTED BECAUSE THEY LOST YOUR VOTES. Some kind of Diebold-using chad-hanging conspiracy I’m sure.

I already mentioned some of my favorites that were nominated, but I’ll tell you who all I voted for after the jump!

Best fan product: Pass. Don’t use any of them.

Best cover art: I kinda don’t care, but Pathfinder and Freeport in that order.

Best interior art: Both Paizo products are great. I was underwhelmed with the Solomon Kane and Changeling art. I don’t have Alpha & Omega, but the pdf preview on their site looks really nice!

Best cartography: OK, I was pushing it to care about art, and this is a minor sub-category of art, so pass.

Best production values. My copy of Aces & Eights is sweet! Faux leather bound, heavy glossy pages, transparencies included. Feels like a volume of the encyclopedia, even my ex-wife admired it. (Is this really the complete list of nominees? Some other games that looked decent came out didn’t they?)

Best writing. Well, I haven’t seen Grimm and White Wolf gives me a rash. Monsters and Other Childish Things is cool. I haven’t seen Two Fisted Tales, though RPGpundit loves it. And Trail of Cthulhu… Maybe it’s because I have Cthulhu gaming materials stretching back for decades, but yet another didn’t do much for me.

Best rules. I kinda like the GUMSHOE system that Trail of Cthulhu (and Esoterrorists, and Fear Itself) uses but it’s uneven. Inspired bits and sloppy bits. I like the Aces & Eights rules a bit more even if they are really complicated. The Star Wars Saga Edition is actually a strong contender here – I liked it and the Book of Nine Swords, which WotC claimed were the inspirations for D&D 4e – 4e sucks, but those were a good evolution I think.

Best adventure. Paizo all the way! Both of the APs have been some of the best adventures to grace D&D EVER. Ruins of Greyhawk – I wanted to like it, I like Greyhawk and have the original Ruins and like the authors – but I don’t like it. And I don’t have the Goodman Games adventures, but I suspect their 1st edition derivation would make me think “not the best of 2008.”

Best setting. Freeport first and then Pathfinder – if this was versus the full new Pathfinder setting hardback, it might come out differently, but this is a full Freeport setting vs a mini-gazetteer of Golarion. The latter is high quality too, but Freeport wins on weight.

Best monster product. The Book of Unremitting Horror is the best and scariest horror monster book every committed to paper for any RPG and I say that with confidence. It kicks total ass. If you disagree you are a Dirty and Uneducated Person of Substantial Moral and Intellectual Failings. I really like the Monsters Revisited book, it has the usual top quality we’ve come to expect from Paizo, and I thought Glimpse of the Abyss was good (some flaws, but good). Elder Evils – please.

Best supplement. Don’t have any of them. And none inspire me much. I like Spirit of the Century, but a sourcebook about Christmas? Whatever.

Best miniature product. Who cares? Pass.

Best regalia. Apparently that’s Latin for “crap I wouldn’t buy at gunpoint.” Pass.

Best aid or accessory. Not as vile and pointless as “regalia” but I don’t buy this stuff. Pass.

Best free product. The Pathfinder RPG has to take top honors here. Although the Signs & Portents magazine from Mongoose is also very nice (it would be nicer if you could download them without going through a pain in the ass process; I dl’ed them all a month ago and it took me like 6 hours of clicking – not download speed, but navigating their damn site.)

Best electronic book. No such thing, except for scanned copies of real books. Pass.

Best d20/OGL. I don’t feel strongly about these this year, but the True20 Freeport companion, Star Wars: Saga, and Monte’s WoD are all good products.

Best game. Why didn’t games from other categories get nominated here? It’s a pretty small and shallow field. I’ll have to say Aces & Eights just because the rest of the field is underwhelming. I like the Monsters concept but haven’t read it so can’t really vote for it.

Product of the year. Pathfinder AP has to win. Then in order, Freeport, Aces & Eights, Traveller, and Star Wars.

Best publisher. And the winner is… Paizo! They are just doing double the amount of great things as anyone else. But also props to Green Ronin, KenzerCo, Mongoose, Pelgrane, Evil Hat, Pinnacle, and many of the rest of you! Except for WotC, you all deserve the nomination!