In writing that last chist about the fuitilty of awards shows. I thought about hiw movies show award culture spawned an entire genre of movies made just to get the oscar for that year. I think it would be crazy if videogames had that same issue.
It's not exactly common now, but it does feel like there are a few oscarbait games. The Last of Us stands out as having huge oscarbait energy, but i also think Final Fantasy 16 may be a bit of and oscarbait game also.
It's not like the Keighleys have a backroom of game wizards you could make a game just to pander too, but i feel like GOTYbait may be a thing already, but probably just works a little differently.
the way to make the gaming equivalent of oscarbait is to have sony interactive entertainment spend millions of dollars to publish your game