RDR 2, which Rockstar left behind, won the Steam Labor of Love award. Fans and game lovers are confused. The Reddit community supports Deep Rock Galactic.
Red Dead Redemption 2 this year Steam Awardsin Labor of Love Award, and although these are purely community-driven recognitions, we’re all wondering why the 2019 Rockstar PC port won this award over the other nominees. While some of the PC community is rallying behind the re-nominated Deep Rock Galactic, questions continue to be asked about how this could happen.
Labor of Love Award from Steam to RDR 2
Red Dead Redemption 2 is one of the best PC games on the market, but it was released in 2019 (on PC) and the Read Dead Online front has been in a very weak state lately. At least compared to the decade-old GTA 5.
Rockstar said goodbye to RDR2 in 2022, so why did it win Steam’s Labor of Love award in 2023? It’s actually a reward given “when developers continue to nurture and support their work,” to quote Valve. After all, Rockstar reused an old event from 2012 in both 2022 and 2023. This contradicts Valve’s claim that RDR2 “still has new content after all these years.”
To be honest, Starfield also won the Most Innovative Game Award and players were confused about that too. That’s why the community vote was so exciting this year. One post on the RDR2 subreddit even said, “This isn’t deserved, right?” While others describe Starfield’s win as a “joke”.
Reddit Supports Deep Rock Galactic1
However, it is a fact that these are not all jokes. There are also many comments on Reddit saying Deep Rock Galactic should win the Labor of Love Award. Although it was nominated in both 2022 and 2023, it was defeated by Cyberpunk 2077 and Red Dead Redemption 2 respectively.
CD Projekt Red and Rockstar Games are both huge communities. So the fact that the community votes for these games more than others feels like a contest for popularity for a game that people love, rather than something that might be more deserving on paper. However, it’s also important to note how Terraria’s much-deserved win at the 2021 Steam Awards has led to a huge update for its fans. That’s why we never see the deserving games usually win.
In essence, the Steam Awards are actually like a popularity contest. While it doesn’t always mean that the biggest game can win every award, it is clearly a contributing factor. Ultimately, this is just a virtual award, but that doesn’t mean it’s not incredibly strange for an abandoned game to win an award focused on “nurturing and supporting works” a year after it was left behind.