The Game Awards’ “Game of the Year” lineup broke a major record

17 Nov at 17:35

The 2025 Game Awards: Indies Dominate the Game of the Year Field

After weeks of speculation, The Game Awards has revealed its 2025 nominees. The Game of the Year list contains no shocking surprises, but it does deliver a historical first: indie titles occupy half of the six GOTY slots, a record for the ceremony.

The six nominees for Game of the Year are Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, Death Stranding 2: On the Beach, Donkey Kong Bananza, Hades 2, Hollow Knight: Silksong, and Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2. Notably, the three independent games — Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, Hades 2, and Hollow Knight: Silksong — also appear among the nominees for Best Independent Game. This is the first time the jury has included more than one title in both categories in the same year, and unprecedented that three do so simultaneously.

Since The Game Awards began in 2014, only five games had previously earned nominations in both Game of the Year and Best Independent Game: Inside (2016), Celeste (2018), Hades (2020), Stray (2022), and Balatro (2024). The jump to three indies contending for GOTY this year underscores how central smaller studios were to the conversation in 2025.

Historically, those dual-nominated indie titles have tended to win Best Independent Game rather than the overall prize. However, with three indies sharing both distinctions this year, at least one will finish the night without both honors — even if one takes GOTY and another claims Best Independent.

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 presents with the scope and runtime of a AAA release despite being produced by a compact studio founded by former Ubisoft developers. Since its April debut it has led awards chatter and amassed a record 12 nominations at The Game Awards — the most a single title has received in the event’s history. The game also earned three acting nominations (Jennifer English, Ben Starr, and Charlie Cox), which means it’s mathematically impossible for it to win every single category it’s nominated in, though it remains a strong contender to set a new record for total wins on the night.

After a long wait, Hollow Knight: Silksong finally launched in September with only about two weeks’ public notice. Its surprise arrival reverberated across the indie scene, prompting several publishers to shift release dates to avoid direct competition. That ripple helped create a launch window that Hades 2 capitalized on: following a well-received early access period, Supergiant rolled Hades 2 to a polished 1.0 release just weeks after Silksong hit shelves.

Price point and timing played large roles in 2025’s awards landscape. As some publishers pushed base prices toward $70–$80 amid broader cost-of-living pressures, lower-priced indies offered a more accessible alternative — the $20 Silksong, $30 Hades 2, and $50 Expedition 33 reached many players who were hesitant to pay premium launch prices. The year also lacked a new Grand Theft Auto release (Rockstar’s next entry is now slated for late 2026), leaving a cultural void that several standout indies were able to fill. Big fall launches such as Silent Hill f, Ghost of Yōtei, and The Outer Worlds 2 could not quite dominate the zeitgeist the way Sandfall’s, Team Cherry’s, and Supergiant’s releases did.

Each of the Game of the Year nominees has also collected nominations across numerous other categories, so multiple titles could walk away with several trophies. The Game Awards will air on Thursday, December 11, 2025, at 7:30 p.m. EST / 4:30 p.m. PST.

Nominees for Game of the Year: