The Game Awards are a yearly celebration of video games from the past year and previews games that will come in the next. With over 150 million viewers worldwide in 2024, this show is the biggest event in all of gaming – 2025 was no different. Gamers across the world look forward to this day every year. This year was an especially weird year for gaming. Dozens of studios, many well-known ones, and tens of thousands of jobs were lost in the gaming industry in 2025 alone. However, some of the biggest and greatest games came out this year too, so how do these massive changes in the gaming industry still result in great games?

Well, most of the exceptional games did not come from well-known studios, veteran developers, or multi-billion-dollar companies. In fact, the games that came from the massive companies were failures for the most part. The greatest games of 2025 came from small-scale teams and first-time game creators that decided to try their hand at innovating and creating video games, and these game-creating heroes took the entire industry by storm. They showed the multi-billion-dollar companies that great games can only come from passion and creativity, not badly put together franchise games that make a quick buck like gamers have seen so many times before. The 2025 Games Awards was most definitely a reflection of this reality. Of the 26 Gaming Awards, games from large companies only won four awards. The rest went to games from smaller publishers or independent studios. The most notable being Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, nominated for 11 awards and won nine of them, the most nominations and wins in gaming history.

Enough about the context though, here are all the awards and the winners:

Game of the Year – Clair Obscur: Expedition 33

Best Game Direction – Clair Obscur: Expedition 33

Best Narrative – Clair Obscur: Expedition 33

Best Art Direction – Clair Obscur: Expedition 33

Best Score and Music – Clair Obscur: Expedition 33

Best Audio Design – Battlefield 6

Best Performance – Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 (Jennifer English for voice acting Maelle)

Best Ongoing Game – No Man’s Sky

Best Fighting Game – Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves

Best Family Game – Donkey King Bananza

Best Strategy Game – Final Fantasy Tactics: The Ivalice Chronicles

Best Sports Game – Mario Kart World

Best Action Game – Hades 2

Best Action Game – Hollow Knight: Silksong

Best Role-Playing Game – Clair Obscur: Expedition 33

Best Multiplayer Game – ARC Raiders

Content Creator of the Year – MoistCr1tiKaL

Best Esports Game – Counter-Strike 2

Best Esports Athlete – Chovy

Best Esports Team – Team Vitality (for their Counter-Strike 2 team)

Best Adaption – The Last of Us Season 2

Players Voice – Wuthering Waves

Most Anticipated Game – Grand Theft Auto 6

Best Community Support – Baldur’s Gate 3 (Game of the Year winner in 2023)

Best Independent Game – Clair Obscur: Expedition 33

Best Debut Indie Game – Clair Obscur: Expedition 33

Best Mobile Game – Umamasume: Pretty Derby

Best VR/AR Game – The Midnight Walk

Games for Impact – South of Midnight

Innovation in Accessibility – Doom: The Dark Ages

All the games that won awards, and the nominees, are all great games, but it’s clear what game was the absolute best of 2025. Looking forward to 2026 and beyond, here are some of games announced at The Game Awards:

  • Divinity 2 – from the creators of Baldur’s Gate 3
  • Street Fighter Movie – starring Jason Momoa and other well-known stars
  • Tomb Raider: Catalyst
  • Mega Man: Dual Override
  • Warlock – A story based on the DND class
  • Lego Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight
  • Star Wars Galactic Racer
  • Star Wars: Fate of the Old Republic – sequel to Star Wars: The Old Republic
  • Control Resonant
  • Highguard – A hero shooter combine with the battle royale genre
  • Resident Evil Requiem
  • Phantom Balde Zero – similar to Black Myth: Wukong
  • No Law – an open world first-person shooter
  • Ace Combat 8: Wings of Theve
  • Saros
  • Decrepit – a souls-like horror game
  • Pragmata
  • Total War: Warhammer 40,000

And many more, but there were some of the stand-out announcements. There are a lot of games to look forward to in 2026 and beyond.