Does anybody really value Cacowards?

I have known about the Doomworld Cacowards for a while, but I wonder if anyone really values them, or even respects them. Anyway, does anyone value the Cacowards as if they were real seals of quality, or is it just seen as a glorified participation award?

Yes, I respect them, though I can think of exactly one notable member here who fervently despises them. Paraphrasing: "I could shit in my hands and it would have more value than the Cacowards."

The people doing the judging for the Cacowards have probably finished more WADs than I have ever started. I've played Cacoward WADs which I personally didn't think were all that great, but that was because I ended up not liking the play style or the atmosphere the author(s) were going for. The quality has otherwise been consistently decent.

I see them just as a bit of fun for the community. I feel it is more of a showcase of the better things to have happened in the year.

Cacowards are awesome and probably the single best resource for getting into pwads if you're a newcomer since they collectively function as a giant archive of highlights from every era of mapping, and also are a really nice way to look back at the year and celebrate everything cool that happened. There will always be people who are salty because they think such and such a project in a particular year got snubbed or whatever, but in general I'd say the people who got awarded had to work insanely hard and produce something excellent to get one.

Yes, everybody respects the cacowards. Whenever you hear a review of a WAD, they always tell you if it has a caco. It is really important, and a great recommendation tool. 

28 minutes ago, AtticTelephone said:

I have known about the Doomworld Cacowards for a while, but I wonder if anyone really values them, or even respects them.

They are just BS Awards without any merit.

No seriously, what are you thinking? Cacowards award the top tier entries of that year, which is always a proper release. Cacowards literally are a stamp of impressive quality.

Given how long the format is running, you cannot have not recognized this from the start.

28 minutes ago, AtticTelephone said:

Anyway, does anyone value the Cacowards as if they were real seals of quality, or is it just seen as a glorified participation award?

I personally really wonder what makes you arrive at such questions.

They are seals of quality.

5 minutes ago, Redneckerz said:

I personally really wonder what makes you arrive at such questions.

 

They are seals of quality.

I guess this is a response of that "megawads you think are overrated", where some people have said "I don't understand why *insert WAD name here* got a Cacoward".

4 minutes ago, InDOOMnesia said:

I guess this is a response of that "megawads you think are overrated", where some people have said "I don't understand why *insert WAD name here* got a Cacoward".

Actually, it is.

It isn't. Cacoward is meant to be a place where a bunch of people talk highly about a bunch of works for valid reasons, usually due to the works' uniqueness, replay value, visuals or are just really good in general. The people are good writers too, even if somehow the mod isn't good there will certainly be something interesting going on in these words, like a sneak peak of the mod's history, gameplay breakdown and so on.

Preference is subjective, so there's always be some sort of unpopular opinion regarding the awarded material (see Lilith) but there's a reason Cacoward has a high reputation amongst the Doom community and even outsiders - I can only think of a wad that's objectively bad in the award's inception. (Hell Revealed 2).

I don't have particularly strong feelings about the Cacowards, but I'm glad it exists. Whenever people get particularly salty about something winning a Cacoward, it just makes me more interested. This is the main reason that lilith.pk3 is on my hard drive, and I'll eventually play it, even though I usually don't play Doom mods/wads that aren't compatible with PrBoom+.

Whenever I feel like looking for new things to play I go through the cacowards and try something I would normally skip.

3 hours ago, AtticTelephone said:

I have known about the Doomworld Cacowards for a while, but I wonder if anyone really values them, or even respects them. Anyway, does anyone value the Cacowards as if they were real seals of quality, or is it just seen as a glorified participation award?

Its a recognition to the best project that comes to life during the year.
And so, it only take on account the things that happened that specific year.

So comparing Cacoward from different year is irrelevant, as probably one year has an awesome output, and this year not much, but still, the best of this year is awarded. Probably there is a consensus of what standar use for the selection, but that is just a matter of common sense to use while reviewing the projects.
Simply as that.
Doom community is almost 30 years old, if no cacoward or top 100 were ever made we would just have the mouth to mouth recolection of what is good and whats not. 
And certainly, not all as we know would be knowed this way.

Take the Cacoward as a subjetive recognition to what some people think are the best of the year. Some might agree, some might disagree.
But its a good starting point to measure things.

On a serious note, if Three is a Crowd doesn't receive an award, probably i will say something really different as what i'm saying today.

1 minute ago, P41R47 said:

On a serious note, if Three is a Crowd doesn't receive an award, probably i will say something really different as what i'm saying today.

I see you're a man of culture.

3IaC for Cacoward!

3 hours ago, Redneckerz said:

They are seals of quality.

LOL they're literally just what wads a few random dudes liked.  There's been plenty of trash that's gotten Cacowards over the years, and tons of classics that got ignored.  I mean, the single best wad of the last decade got ignored in favor of random ZDoom "let's make Doom pretty" wads that all got forgotten in a week.

18 minutes ago, Cynical said:

LOL they're literally just what wads a few random dudes liked.  There's been plenty of trash that's gotten Cacowards over the years, and tons of classics that got ignored.  I mean, the single best wad of the last decade got ignored in favor of random ZDoom "let's make Doom pretty" wads that all got forgotten in a week.

Ejem, not to contradict you, but...
https://doomwiki.org/wiki/Top_25_Missed_Cacowards

But maybe i missed the point :/

10 minutes ago, P41R47 said:

Ejem, not to contradict you, but...
https://doomwiki.org/wiki/Top_25_Missed_Cacowards

But maybe i missed the point :/

The wad he linked is literally on the list you linked. 

1 minute ago, Lucky_Edie said:

 

The wad he linked is literally on the list you linked. 

Yeah, seems we are missing the point :/

Doomworld really do be playing "Hot Take Telephone" lately

You mean that thing the community has been doing consistently for 15 years that awards the most outstanding achievements in creativity by its members that has garnered recognition outside of the Doomworld forum itself? Yes, really fucking obviously so. This is a very silly question and you should feel at least a little embarrassed for asking, frankly.

Yeah, the Cacos are definitely seen as special. Any WAD that's won or even been a runner-up is pretty much guaranteed to be quality and polished, even if the gameplay may not be everyone's cup of tea. Of course not every great WAD can get recognized, there's too many, but the Cacos are a great place to see a (relatively) short list of the community's best. 

Personally, I love reading them, and always look forward to when they come out. And maybe I'll win one someday, but I have to finish my project first...

I mean even Romero got a real cacoward...

Quote

Does anybody really value Cacowards?

I certainly do. :3

I do. As someone that discovered Doom within the last year, I don't know shit about community-made wads. Ergo, it's fantastic to have a resource advertising the best of the best. I honestly think anyone that would be vindictive of something like that is salty from envy or some other arbitrary reason... Lol.

They're a good place to find some of the best wads ever made, and when people bitch about them and say :"why didn't THIS ONE get a cacoward" you get to check that one out as well, can't see any problem here.

 I tend to prefer the ones  in the Runner-up category, less polished but more personal.

2 hours ago, Biodegradable said:

You mean that thing the community has been doing consistently for 15 years that awards the most outstanding achievements in creativity by its members that has garnered recognition outside of the Doomworld forum itself? Yes, really fucking obviously so. This is a very silly question and you should feel at least a little embarrassed for asking, frankly.

Yeah, really.

Not all of us may be deeply invested into them, but they play an important role and its a good method for newcomers to find good wads, although not all good stuff ends on the list sometimes, in the years where too many good releases come out.

Having a list of community achievements curated by competent people is invaluable for both record keeping and introducing new people to doom in general

They are fine and are great especially for us (regular Doomers) to give an overview of the main releases from the year, especially if there were something that went overlooked, like Erkatainne for me. They are also a nice way to reward mappers of the community and give them spotlight (although it don't seems that the "general public" gives that much attention)

I don't think they are great for recommending to newcomers though, because there's a big variety of styles and difficulty levels between the cacoward winners, unless they know what they are looking for (for example, if they know what a slaughtermap is, or the difference of main source ports and etc)