It’s Game Awards day, when many of us stay up far too late watching an overly-long awards show that every so often remembers it’s supposed to be an awards show. Yesterday, IGN reporter Rebekah Valentine asked what marks the difference between a Game Awards ad and a Game Awards trailer, and now I’m bringing that question to you.
“Whenever TGAs are on, there are some trailers where everyone is like ‘oh yeah, trailer!’ and others where everyone goes ‘ew commercial’ and tunes out. Setting aside the fact that they are all, yes, technically commercials, what exactly is the differentiator for people in an event like this? “ Valentine asked on Bluesky. I said this was an interesting question and should be a blog, but since I’m not the editor of every games journalist out there and cannot in fact assign them blogs, she replied that I should blog it instead. So here we are.
I posited that one difference is whether a video is about a game that’s already out (ad) or one that’s upcoming (trailer). Lots of other people in Valentine’s replies shared this sentiment. I also suggested it had to do with the presentation of the video–whether Geoff says “world premiere” or someone who made the game introduces it, or whether it just plays in a string of videos about computers and Fortnite battle passes. This, too, was a common sentiment.
Other folks said it was vibes or the sense of artistry behind the trailer; there’s a narrative to a trailer, or a purpose beyond just telling you something exists to buy. But of course, one purpose of every trailer is telling you that there’s something you can buy, though that thing might not exist yet. And, of course, there can also be an artistry to ads.
More than one person said something along the lines of “if I like it, it’s a trailer,” which I find to be an accurate and refreshing bit of honesty. I’d guess the only people who want to get excited about ads are, well, people who make ads. And since the trailers are the “events” of The Game Awards, turning the thing you’re excited about into a “trailer” and thus an “event” can make it feel like you watched a “good” Game Awards where a lot of things happened, instead of a show stuffed with ads.
The more I think about it, the more I'm partial to this line of reasoning: One of the weird things about The Game Awards, at least from the perspective of someone who's had to cover it, is that it's something that's happening where not a lot of things actually happen. Barring the semi-regular stage-intruding and the occasional excellent musical performance, what are The Game Awards as an event? Is delineating between an ad and a trailer a way to assert narrative and agency into the formless swirl of forced hype that defines the event? (Barring the obvious option that you simply do not have to watch it at all.) Is the search for trailers humankind's deeper search for structure and meaning?
I appreciate the opportunity to turn Geoff’s Day of Hype into a philosophical exercise, so weigh in in the comments. I wrote the blog. I hope you’re happy, Reb.
