Last Friday, July 5th, I learned that the latest tabletop roleplaying game I worked on, Pinebox Middle School for Savage Worlds, had been nominated for an ENNIE Award in the category, “Best Family Game / Product.”
“The ENNIE Awards (the “ENNIES”) are an annual fan-based celebration of excellence in tabletop roleplaying gaming. The ENNIES give game designers, writers and artists the recognition they deserve. It is a peoples’ choice award, and the final winners are voted upon online by the gaming public.”
While there are naysayers out there who sometimes poo-poo the ENNIEs, saying that the whole thing is just a popularity contest and the awards don’t necessarily reflect the quality of the works presented, I will say, as someone who has been nominated twice, they are still prestigious awards in the tabletop roleplaying game industry, and awards that, at the very least, offer a nicely categorized selection of works that may well be worth investigating.
Like many (most) industry awards, the way the ENNIEs work is that publishers interested in participating must submit copies of their “personal best” releases from the previous year for consideration. In reviewing the 800(!) or so submissions for this year’s ENNIEs, I present to you a list of some of the more well known TTRPG publishers and the numbers of items they put forward for consideration:
- Chaosium - 38 (includes “Chaosium Community Content”)
- Renegade Game Studios - 37
- Paizo - 23
- Pinnacle Entertainment Group - 10
- Free League Publishing - 9
- Cubicle 7 - 8
- Modiphius - 4
- Evil Hat - 3
- Green Ronin Publishing - 3
You’ll notice that Wizards of the Coast is not present on the list this year and it’s possible that some of your other favorite publishers are also not represented. To quote a section from the ENNIE Awards’ own FAQ:
“A lot of people ask us why their favorite products were not submitted. The answer is that we have no control over it. If you want a publisher to submit a product, then you need to contact them and convince them to do so.”
Anyway, not only am I thrilled to be on the list of nominees, but I am also delighted that our game is a nominee in the “Best Family Game / Product” category as I always intended the game to appeal to both kids AND kids at heart. While there are certainly plenty of scares to be found in the setting, if Pinebox Middle School were a Netflix series (one can hope) it would likely have a TV-14 rating (the same rating as Stranger Things, Wednesday, or Locke & Key).
For those interested in supporting me, Pinebox Middle School, and Savage Worlds, voting will take place from July 12th through the 21st with winners announced on August 2nd at Gen Con!
