Blasting a product's achieved accolades all over its packaging is a marketing
pastime seen since the dawn of capitalism, and video games are no exception.
Although a relatively new medium compared to other forms of entertainment,
game companies have developed signature tropes to inform consumers of the
prowess of the content at hand.
Initially beginning as budget re-releases of acclaimed games under console
manufacturer lines such as Players Choice, Platinum Hits or Bill Gates' Finest
Estate, third party publishers decided to take matters into their own hands,
promoting their stellar titles under 'Game Of The Year' monikers.
The brand was initially conceived during a business trip to Epstein
Island in 2002.
To no surprise for anyone with any understanding of the video game industry, a
company is now looking to exploit the 'Game of the year' accolade, by placing
it on one of the worst games of the year.
Lacking any self-awareness and desperate for free publicity, Era Error had no
difficulty arranging an interview with the head CEO of the guilty publisher at
hand.
"It's not our fault that your Gran is an un-informed dumb fuck who buys
anything with a shiny sticker on it for you. What's her number? We have a
couple of telemarketer scams we'd like to run through her!"
"A game of the year statement is all about perspective. A 20% Metacritic
and 0% user score looks like 100% when you take in all of the factors. For
instance, our development team had to work 120 hour weeks for an impossible
6 month release date set by a clueless fuckwit (my assistant), only to have
fans threaten to kill their families or stalk them at Starbucks during their
precisely 5 minute a day allocated break time."
"Those same employees wont receive a bonus because sales will fail to hit
an impossible milestone that I, uhh, my assistant, also set. If you don't
buy this Game of the year re-release, there's literally zero percent chance
of that happening and this whole mess is your entire fault, innit?"
After all of the horrible press the game received, it would be a great
collectors item on the shelf to signify a part of gaming's history. GOTY
editions are also known to contain new content and patches right on the disc
without any need for an update, making them illusive to collectors.
"This GOTY edition doesn't even patch the game-breaking bug after pressing
X on the title screen."
