The nominees for the 2025 Game Awards are here and, as expected, there aren’t too many shockers on the list. Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 is poised to have a big night, with Hollow Knight: Silksong and Hades 2 waiting in the wings. Most of the power players you’d expect to see are represented in some form, from Donkey Kong Bananza to Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2.
But as always, there are too many great games and not enough nominations, so snubs are an inevitability. This year’s field has its fair share of glaring omissions. You won’t just find them in Game of the Year, but even in niche categories like Best Mobile Game, which is dominated by heavily marketed, IP-driven gacha games. Here are just a small handful of games that didn’t get their due in categories that they likely would have been a shoo-in for in a less competitive year.
Game of the Year – Ghost of Yōtei
Usually, it’s a foregone conclusion that the biggest Sony-published game of a given year will inevitably make its way into a Game of the Year nomination, whether it’s deserved or not. The Last of Us Part 2, Ghost of Tsushima, God of War Ragnarök, Astro Bot, Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart, and even Horizon Forbidden West made the cut over the last five years. That trend dies with Ghost of Yōtei, it seems. Despite receiving its expected round of critical praise, Sony’s samurai epic didn’t make the top six this year at the Game Awards. That’s no surprise, really, when you consider how stacked the competition was compared to previous years. Yōtei didn’t go home empty-handed, though, as it still landed some big nominations in Best Performance, Best Action Adventure Game, and more. There’s a good chance that Sucker Punch still leaves the show with one award in hand.
Game of the Year – Split Fiction
Considering that It Takes Two won Game of the Year in 2021, you’d think that its critically beloved follow-up, Split Fiction, would be a shoo-in at this year’s show. It certainly helped that it’s one of the best-reviewed games of the year, and that its director, Josef Fares, is something of a Game Awards staple at this point. But despite having that momentum going for it, Hazelight’s genre-fusing co-op game couldn’t make the final six. It did at least grab some key nominations in Best Multiplayer and (weirdly enough) Best Family Game, so we’ll likely still get a signature Fares soundbite at the show anyway.
Game of the Year – Blue Prince
It comes as no surprise that Blue Prince didn’t make it into the Game of the Year field. The category was too competitive and a heady puzzle game is niche compared to the more bankable games that made the cut. Plus, as Blue Prince relies heavily on the English language for its puzzles, its lack of localization shot its chances in the foot. But all of that still doesn’t make the snub any less disappointing. The puzzle roguelike is one of the year’s most unique games, combining the first-person adventure vibes of Myst with a tactile board game, as players explore an ever-changing manor in search of its secret room. Few games released this year feel as complete or well-executed as a creative vision. To see it miss out on not just Game of the Year but every major category is a reminder that The Game Awards’ jury still has a very narrow idea of what a contender looks like.
Game of the Year – Indiana Jones and the Great Circle
Due to the Game Awards’ voting timeline, games that were released in late November and December 2024 weren’t eligible until this year’s show. If you release a big critical hit in that window, you’ll need to pray that time hasn’t softened enthusiasm or that the jury hasn’t forgotten about you at all. Indiana Jones and the Great Circle found that out the hard way this year. Had it made the cutoff for 2024’s show, there’s a very good chance that MachineGames’ Nazi-punching simulator would have made the cut for Game of the Year in 2024 with ease. Instead, it had to wait a full year to be considered, leaving it in a much more crowded field of contenders. At least Troy Baker got his nomination for Best Performance, though.
Best Narrative – The Hundred Line: Last Defense Academy
Traditionally, Best Narrative winds up going to whichever game most closely resembles a movie. Cinematic presentation goes a long way here, and this year’s nominees reflect that. That’s a shame, because it means that The Hundred Line: Last Defense Academy never stood a chance despite being one of gaming’s greatest creative feats in 2025. The narrative-heavy tactics RPG tells a dense sci-fi story about a group of students at an isolated school tasked with saving the world from alien invaders. Simple enough, but its magic trick is that it features 100 endings. And those aren’t short joke endings, either. Each one is a meaty conclusion that deepens your understanding of the central conflict and each character. It’s an absolute flex, and it’s a shame to see it go ignored by a mainstream show.
Best Direction – Donkey Kong Bananza
Best Direction is a bit of a weird category. It never quite seems like the Game Awards jury has a firm idea what “direction” means and tends to nominate the most cinematic, Hollywood-like games of the year for the award. That certainly was the case this year, with games like Ghost of Yōtei getting into the field. Donkey Kong Bananza missed the cut due to that dynamic even though it’s up for Game of the Year. That’s unfortunate for Nintendo, as Best Direction is the one category it really deserves to compete in. Bananza showcases a strong creative vision executed to perfection. It’s one of those classic Nintendo design masterclasses where every little detail sings. But hey, can’t really complain when you nabbed a Game of the Year nomination, can you?
Best Performance – Alex Jordan, The Alters
Best Performance was always going to be a hard one to break into this year. Between Troy Baker being a lock since December and Clair Obscur: Expedition 33’s strong ensemble, everyone else was going to be fighting over a couple of nomination slots. One of the year’s best performances missed the cut as a result: Alex Jordan in The Alters. Jordan doesn’t just play Jan Dolski, a desperate, lonely man left stranded on a hostile planet. He also voices an army of Jan clones pulled from alternate timelines in which he made different life choices. That gives Jordan plenty of room to create a nuanced, multifaceted version of The Alters‘ hero as he pulls off an impressive one-man show. Honestly, he could have been in this category five times in another timeline.
Best Score and Music – Mario Kart World
This one is a real shocker. Despite the fact that Mario Kart World hasn’t quite been as beloved as Nintendo was likely hoping it would be, fans seemed to agree that its music was a bright spot. It’s filled with wonderfully re-orchestrated versions of classic tracks from Mario history. There’s even a sexy jazz version of “Dire, Dire Docks” from Super Mario 64! That kind of soundtrack — fresh, lavishly executed twists on nostalgia — tends to get its due at The Game Awards historically. Last year, Final Fantasy VII Rebirth won Best Score and Music with its new take on tracks from the PlayStation classic. Mario Kart World seemed poised to follow in its footsteps this year, but there just wasn’t enough room for it.
Best Audio Design – South of Midnight
South of Midnight‘s absence from both of the Game Awards’ audio categories is perhaps the most bizarre quirk of this year’s show. Whether you love or hate its gameplay, Compulsion Games’ latest is a work of pure artistic craft. You can especially hear that in its fantastic original score, which fuses rustic southern folk into orchestral movements that border on theatrical. But what’s even odder to see is that South of Midnight didn’t nab a nomination for its fantastic audio design. Compulsion Games created a dense natural soundscape to capture the feel of the American south, one made up of authentic field recordings from the actual places the game is inspired by. Subtle audio design like that never tends to get nominated at The Game Awards, as the biggest, loudest games tend to get honored (see: Battlefield 6).
Best VR/AR Game – Lumines Arise
More than every category regularly featured at The Game Awards, Best VR/AR Game rarely feels in touch with the best the medium has to offer. The category is usually dominated by VR versions of existing big-budget games or games from major franchises that are familiar with mainstream voters. This year’s category broke that mold a bit by including excellent, original VR games like The Midnight Walk and Ghost Town. The only thing missing? Lumines Arise. The rhythm game is a transcendent VR experience on par with Tetris Effect. It seemed all but assured that it would nab a spot, but it’s nowhere to be seen in the final field. It’s not a matter of it being an ineligible release either; Marvel’s Deadpool VR launches tomorrow and it still made the cut. It’s just a good old-fashioned snub!
Best Mobile Game – Is This Seat Taken?
Best Mobile Game is another weird category that suffers many of the same problems that face Best VR/AR Game. The nominations tend to go to recognizable franchises regardless of the game’s quality. (Remember Game Award nominee Final Fantasy VII: Ever Crisis?) Free-to-play gacha games tend to clean up too, making for a narrow category. That continued this year with several great puzzle games getting overlooked in favor of flashier options. The most glaring absence among them is Is This Seat Taken? The indie gem has players creating perfect seating charts by listening to the needs of demanding little shapes and dragging them into chairs. It’s an ingenious game that’s especially perfect on mobile, but it stood no match against the likes of Persona 5: The Phantom X, regardless of how much it’s been lampooned by its community. Should have put Joker in it, I guess.
