On November 13th, The Game Awards announced the finalists in 31 categories for 2022. The award show has been highlighting achievements and innovations in the video gaming world since 2014.
To ensure the awards have a global perspective, the nominations are submitted by a panel of 100 media and influencer outlets from around the world. Notable names in the jury include Entertainment Weekly, IGN, PC Gamer, LA Times, and The Guardian. This year there are 31 categories: Game of the Year, Best Game Direction, Best Narrative, Best Art Direction, Best Score and Music, Best Audio Design, Best Performance, Games for Impact, Best Ongoing, Best Indie, Best Mobile Game, Best Community Support, Innovation in Accessibility, Best VR/AR, Best Action Game, Best Action/Adventure, Best Role Playing, Best Fighting, Best Family, Best SIM/Strategy, Best Sports/Racing, Best Multiplayer, Content Creator of the Year, Best Debut Indy, Best Adaptation, Most Anticipated Game, Best Esports Game, Best Esports Athlete, Best Esports Team, Best Esports Coach, and Best Esports Event. Of course, the biggest bragging rights will go to the winner of Game of the Year. This year’s nominees include some big names. God of War Ragnarök and Elden Ring are both nominated for Game of the Year as well as battling head-to-head in many other categories such as Best Game Direction, Best Score, Best Art Direction, and Best Narrative. They are joined in the Game of the Year Nominations by A Plague Tale: Requiem, Horizon Forbidden West, Stray and Xenoblade Chronicles 3. Stray is a particularly surprising nominee as it is a Debut Indie game from developer BlueTwelve Studio and publisher Annapurna. Stray has also been nominated for multiple categories this year, including Indie.
Voting has begun and fans can vote for their favorites in every category by visiting thegameawards.com before 9 pm EST on December 7th. This year The Game Awards has also teamed up with Discord in a multi-faceted partnership that includes voting in all categories on the TGA Discord server at http://discord.gg/thegameawards. Users will also be able to watch the event live in the server with Watch Together, including the presentation of the Community Support award by Discord themselves. However, Discord will not have exclusive rights to the broadcast.
This is due entirely to Geoff Keighley, the current producer and host of The Game Awards. Keighley helped build the awardsceremony, dubbed the “Oscars of gaming” by the New York Times, from the ground up. Coming from a multiple decade background in entertainment and the gaming industry, The Game Awards was not Keighley’s first involvement in gaming industry awards ceremonies. He was heavily involved in the Spike Video Game Awards which ran from 2003 to 2013. The Spike Awards, like many other awards shows, were heavily sponsor driven and focused primarily on marketing, rather than recognizing creators. In its final year, it seemed to mostly poke fun at their primary audience, gamers.
Keighley had a vision for something more. He thought artists, creators, and players deserved to be honored for their achievements and not mocked. He also recognized the value of broadcasting on digital platforms rather than the stagnant medium of network television. Since 2014, The Game Awards have stayed true to that vision and still “recognizes and upholds the creative and technical excellence in the global video game industry.” The ceremony itself has become an eagerly anticipated event and a platform for huge industry reveals each year. This has fueled Keighley’s ambitions to make The Game Awards the best awards event in any industry and it seems he is succeeding. As the viewership of other awards celebrated shows is declining (this year’s Oscars had 29.6 million viewers by their accounting), The Game Awards audience is growing. Its 2014ceremony had a modest 1.9 million viewers, growing quickly to 26 million in 2018 and reaching 85 million viewers last year. Despite its growth and popularity, Keighley has resisted the current trend of streaming platforms and refused to sign any exclusivity contracts. He is committed to keeping The Game Awards for everyone and using it to bring people together.
The Game Awards will air live and free on Thursday, December 8th at 7:30 pm EST across all major digital, social, and gaming platforms around the world.
If you would like to watch the replay of the 2022 Nominee announcement on YouTube visit https://www.thegameawards.com/news/watch-the-nomination-announcement-monday
