You voted, the votes were tallied, and the results are in! We received 37 ballots for the Baer Award for the best game of 2021, and 12 ballots for the Higinbotham Award for the best game of 2020 in retrospect. Without further ado, here are the results.

Baer Award: Best Game of 2021

1. Returnal [31 points]1Both Returnal and It Takes Two garnered 31 points, but Returnal had a 1st place vote and It Takes Two didn’t, so I broke the tie in Returnal‘s favour.
2. Inscryption [37 points]
3. Disco Elysium – The Final Cut [38 points]
4. Mass Effect Legendary Edition [48 points]
5. Super Mario 3D World + Bowser’s Fury [50 points]
6. Resident Evil Village [52 points]
7. Deltarune Chapter 2 [53 points]
8. Metroid Dread [58 points]
9. Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy [77 points]
10. Psychonauts 2 [92 points]

Congratulations to Double Fine and Xbox Game Studios for making the Avocado community’s game of the year!

• 27 ballots were ranked, and 10 were unranked.
• 7 ballots contained a full slate of 10 games.
• 94 different titles received votes.
• On average, each game that was voted on appeared on 2.29 ballots.
• 53 games only appeared on a single ballot. Of those, four were first-place choices: Call of the Sea (PlayStation version); Fantasian; OPUS: Echo of Starsong; and Rhythm Doctor.
• In addition to garnering the most points, Psychonauts 2, Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy, and Metroid Dread also appeared on the most ballots overall (12, 10, and 9, respectively).
• Deltarune Chapter 2 appeared on fewer ballots than Resident Evil Village, Super Mario 3D World + Bowser’s Fury, or Mass Effect Legendary Edition (6 vs. 8, 8, and 7) but still garnered more points overall due to being very highly ranked by those who played it.
• Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy and Disco Elysium – The Final Cut had the most first-place votes at three apiece.
• Three remasters/re-releases/enhanced editions appeared in the top 10: Super Mario 3D World + Bowser’s Fury; Mass Effect Legendary Edition; and Disco Elysium – The Final Cut.
• Distributional statistics for points — Mean: 14.46; Median: 8; Standard deviation: 16.44; Skewness: 2.39; Excess kurtosis: 6.45; IQR: 11.

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Higinbotham Award: Best Retrospective Game of 2020

1. Animal Crossing: New Horizons [17 points]
2. Persona 4 Golden (PC version) [18 points]
3. Death Stranding (PC version) [18 points]2Both Persona 4 Golden and Death Stranding garnered 18 points, but Death Stranding had a 1st place vote and Persona 4 Golden didn’t, so I broke the tie in Death Stranding‘s favour.
4. Paradise Killer [19 points]
5. Ori and the Will of the Wisps [19 points]
6. 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim [19 points]3There was a three-way tie between 13 Sentinels, Ori, and Paradise Killer. Paradise Killer had no 1st place votes, while 13 Sentinels and Ori each had one, so Paradise Killer took the bottom spot among the three. The problem was that 13 Sentinels and Ori had the exact same voting patterns (one vote each in 1st, 5th, and 8th place), so I broke the tie by flipping a coin.
7. Ghost of Tsushima [20 points]
8. Final Fantasy VII Remake [27 points]
9. Yakuza: Like a Dragon [31 points]
10. Hades [41 points]

Congratulations for Supergiant Games for once again coming out on top!

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Thank you all for participating! Post your thoughts in the comments below, and please check out the rest of the topics for The Pits.