2013 Origins Awards Nominations Announced

The nominees for the 2013 Origins Awards were recently announced and, despite the unfortunate choice of April 1 for the press release, it is no joke that they’ve made some significant improvements in their selections for nomination. Don’t get me wrong, still some headscratchers in there, but they’re almost all games you might have heard of and almost all of them came out in 2012 (and the ones that didn’t have some sort of extenuating circumstance).

The nominations in the categories we follow are listed below, followed by my personal, off-the-cuff list of some really great games from 2012 that managed to not get nominated.

Best Roleplaying Game
Iron Kingdoms Full Metal Fantasy RPG Core Rules – Privateer Press
Marvel Heroic Roleplaying Basic Games – Margaret Weis Productions
Monsterhearts – Buried Without Ceremony
Nights of the Crusades – Aetheric Dreams
Primeval RPG – Cubicle 7 Entertainment Ltd.

 

 

 

Best Roleplaying Supplement
Marvel Heroic Roleplaying Civil War Essentials Edition Event Book – Margaret Weis Productions
Menzoberranzan: City of Intrigue – Wizards of the Coast
Mutants & Masterminds: Threat Report – Green Ronin
[Eclipse Phase] Rimward: The Outer System – Posthuman Studios
The Mythos Dossiers – Cubicle 7 Entertainment

 

 

 

 

Best Board Game
Hot Rod Creeps – Cryptozoic
Kingdom Builder – Queen Games
Lords of Waterdeep – Wizards of the Coast
Mage Knight – WizKids
Mage Wars – Arcane Wonder

 

 

 

Best Collectible Card Games
Card Fight! Vanguard Breaker of Limits – Bushiroad
Kaijudo: Rise of the Duel Masters – Wizards of the Coast
Legend of the 5 Rings: Embers of War – AEG
World of Warcraft: War of the Ancients – Cryptozoic
Yu-Gi-Oh! Battlepacks – Konami

 

Best Traditional Card Game
Doctor Who the Card Game – Cubicle 7 Entertainment/Treefrog Games
Legendary – Upper Deck
Locke & Key – Cryptozoic
Penny Arcade: Rumble in R’lyeh – Cryptozoic
Smash Up – AEG

Best Family, Party or Children’s Game
Catan Junior – Mayfair Games
Escape: The Curse of the Temple – Queen Games
Love Letter – AEG
Once Upon A Time 3rd Edition – Atlas Games
Quarriors! Dice Building Game – WizKids Games

 

 

 

Games That Should Have Been Nominated For Something In The Above Categories (Not That These Are The Only Ones That I Think Are Better Than The Ones Nominated, But I Have To Draw The Line Somewhere)
Android: Netrunner – Fantasy Flight Games
Guildhall – AEG
Seasons – Asmodee
Imperial Histories (L5R RPG 4E) – AEG (sorry, Second City, you’d be here if Imperial Histories didn’t exist)

Also – Star Wars: X-Wing Miniatures Game (Fantasy Flight Games) failed to pick up any sort of nomination in the miniatures categories. Really, what’s up with the lack of anything by Fantasy Flight on the nomination lists? I’m presuming that FFG just doesn’t submit copies of its games to the panels for consideration, but games like Netrunner and X-Wing are both big sellers and critical successes (probably Descent 2.0 as well) and it’s a strange set of “game of the year” nominations that doesn’t look at them.

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