The Game Awards announces nominees for Game of the Year 2025

The Game Awards revealed this Monday, during a live broadcast, the official list of nominees for Game of the Year 2025, highlighting a particularly strong outlook for indie titles. Among the surprises and confirmations, three indies managed to sneak into the top category: Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, Hades 2 and Hollow Knight: Silksong.

These well-known games are joined by three large-scale productions: Death Stranding 2: On the Beach, Donkey Kong Bananza and Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2, thus completing the six candidates for the top award. Interestingly, the lineup coincides with the most repeated predictions among the community and specialized analysts.

The leadership in nominations goes to Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, which positioned itself as the most outstanding title of the year by obtaining 12 nominations in 10 different categories. Meanwhile, Death Stranding 2 and Ghost of Yōtei also garnered a notable number of accolades, with seven nominations each.

With the list now official, the next stage of the process opens: the voting round. The Game Awards jury will have to choose among candidates in categories such as Best RPG, Best Narrative, Best Directing and many more. Meanwhile, fans will also be able to participate, as voting for Game of the Year is now available and will remain open until December 10.

The The Game Awards 2025 ceremony will be held on Thursday, December 11, with live streaming starting at 7:30 pm EST / 4:30 pm PST, where it will finally be known which of these six titles will be crowned as the best of the year.