The Hugo Awards are a speculative fiction award given out yearly at that year's Worldcon, recognizing outstanding speculative works and contributors to speculative fiction fandom. The Hugo Awards have been awarded every year since 1955, and are voted on by World Science Fiction Society (WSFS) members. That means most Worldcon attendees, and many other people — if you nominated, you're a WSFS member already. Anyone can be a WSFS member, but not everything can get a Hugo Award.

Right now, there is no Hugo Award category for games. We're working to change that.

It's Time for a Hugo Award for Games — All Games

Games, whether digital or analog, are a thriving site of speculative fiction work today and are major innovators in the genre. Whether it's video games or tabletop RPGs, board games or interactive prose, amusement park installations or VR experiences, if it's interactive it's doing something totally unique, something that deserves to be recognized alongside other speculative fiction work.

To make a new Hugo Award category, the WSFS Constitution must be amended to define the new category. This is done by proposing a constitutional amendment at a WSFS Business Meeting, which is open to all attendees of that year's Worldcon. If the amendment passes there, then it must be ratified at the next year's Worldcon. Each Worldcon also has the prerogative to run one discretionary category of its own choosing. New categories are more likely to pass if they have had a successful trial run at a recent Worldcon — which we just did!

At the 2019 WSFS Business Meeting, Ira Alexandre brought a proposal for a medium-neutral Best Game or Interactive Experience category, which was referred to the Hugo Award Study Committee. In 2020, DisCon III agreed to use its discretionary category on a medium-specific Best Video Game award. After reviewing the data from the trial category, the subcommittee of the Hugo Award Study Committee devoted to the proposal is returning to the next Business Meeting (Chicon 8 in 2022) with a new medium-neutral Best Game or Interactive Work proposal that incorporates everything we've learned.

At this stage we are seeking public feedback from anyone who has thoughts on the proposal, as well as additional subcommittee members to work on the proposal in a more concentrated fashion as feedback rolls in. Join the conversation on any platform, but if possible please use the #GamesHugo hashtag on Twitter and link us to your thoughts there!