The official ENnies award nominees for 2020 were announced yesterday, along with the Judge’s Spotlight winners.
The Lancer core rules are nominated for Best Electronic Book. The indie sci-fi RPG ran a very successful Kickstarter, taking in $432,029 in funding from 9,440 backers and then publishing to critical praise.
This blogger is a backer and one of the reviewers who applauded the game.
However, publisher Massif Press is less than thrilled with the nomination.
The adventure Massif Press is referring to is Blood in the Chocolate from Lamentations of the Flame Princess. The supplement is a gory take on Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
Blood in the Chocolate won Best Adventure in 2017, taking the gold prize ahead of Chaosium’s Doors to Darkness.
On Twitter, I asked Massif Press if they would ask to have Lancer removed from the ENnie Awards.
Massif Press stated that until further clarity was given as to why the adventure won the award that they will not be accepting any ENnies.
There is a disclaimer in the form of an ‘added note’ on Blood in the Chocolate’s DriveThruRPG page which says;
We’ve been advised to inform you by site management about some bits that people may consider particularly icky. The villain’s henchmen, magically mutated tribesmen, engage in all sorts of candy-inspired silliness and mayhem with the intruders they catch. Including the “berry orgy”, which in the publisher’s opinion is just simply ridiculous, but some readers might have different opinions.
Geek Native has reached out to the ENnies for comment and will adjust and amend this article if and when there is a response.
Update: 30 June – Geek Native has received an update from the ENnies. Firstly, it is relevant to point out that there has been leadership and policy changes at the ENnies since 2017. Secondly, Geek Native understands that the ENnie organisers have reached out to Massif Press to ask whether they would like to retract their voluntary submission.
Update: 1 July – Massif Press has now formally withdrawn from The ENnies.
A blog post from the awards site has announced Uncaged | Volume III has earned the replacement nomination. Uncaged is a series of D&D adventures that subert tropes around female monsters in myths.
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