Technically the game does have innovative gameplay, no AAA studio has the balls to release a game as boring and lacking in gameplay that Bethesda has, they spent over a decade making fast travel the most integral gameplay mechanic.
The awards don't mean shit, there was nothing even close to innovative about Starfield. They took No Man's Sky, made it worse, and shoved their 15 year old npc behavior in it.
I have no side to take, but it's sorta hilarious seeing people saying the award mean nothing when it's starfield that win it, and on the other hand congratulate Baldur's Gate for winning another GOTY. Truly the Schrodinger Award.
That‘s a user-vote, no? I can‘t say I‘m surprised that there‘s some headscratchers, I doubt the average user knows what innovative gameplay is supposed to be. They should let people vote as they did, then curate the top 20 of each category into 10 fitting games so those that don‘t match the award category are out, and then let people put their final vote between those 10.
Even if it weren't for all of the problems the game has it's hardly innovative. I don't think a Bethesda game has been innovative ever. They didn't even invent the fallout franchise.
It was indeed quite innovative. Was the first game I ever installed on my HDD that refused to run at any acceptable level, without any warning anywhere that it needed to be on SSD or not at all.
The way that they were able to use their toolset to make space, actually super cool. Especially when you start to poke at it a little and see how the clock actually ticks. BUT, it doesn’t really serve fun. Like I bet there is a morrowind technical dev somewhere who shit their pants when they saw it but for the rest of us, it ends up feeling bland.
So there was some interesting innovation, but it did not serve gameplay. Strange award to give that game. The strongest thing they do is level design and all the bespoke levels are really good. That is a compliment I can give starfield without any reservation.
I played way too much of this game and enjoyed most definitely more than the average player. And uh yeah I'm certain steam users are just making a mockery but such is the Internet haha.