The Game Awards 2025 review: Between presentations and awards

The Game Awards 2025

 

It’s the end of the year once again, so it’s usually a good idea to look back on what happened throughout the year. For Geoff Keighley and his team, they like to showcase what the year brought in the form of an award show: The Game Awards. As every year, the Game Awards showcases some of the best of the best from the course of a year, mostly with quirky guest hosts. While also showcasing new trailers for upcoming games, expansions, and others in store. And the 2025 show has had a doozy of a show.

 

As every year, The Game Awards begins with a pre-show to set the stage for its main event. Announcing some small awards that were unable to be presented in the main show at hand. They also went ahead and announced some world premiere trailers, including the final release date for Capcom’s newest IP, Pragmanta, now revealed to be coming to the Nintendo Switch 2 as well as PS5, Steam, and Xbox Series X. Pragmanta is also getting a demo on Steam and all releasing systems, so make sure to check that out.

 

After a half hour to set things up, the main show begins as the show’s host enters the stage to talk about the year at hand, and then presents the first award. It was professional at times, much better at some of the previous years, and the awards were mostly fair at times. The show, while it has something for everyone, still felt very sluggish at times, so it was hard for some people to watch in certain time zones, like in the UK, where the show started at 11:30 PM at their time. I get that the main time zones are in the United States, but there should be something for those who can’t make it due to the late night/very early morning of other time zones.

The Game Awards also had some special guests showing up. They were in the form of presenters of the awards, like Todd Howard of Bethesda, Actors like David Harbour and Felicia Day, Directors like J.J. Abrams, and the tradition of the muppets Miss Piggy and Rowlf the Dog. They mostly had to do with gaming, so it’s not that weird to have stars like these on stage. 

 

The biggest guests of the night, without any question, were the entire cast of the new Street Fighter movie being made by Paramount Pictures, featuring Jason Mamoa as Blanka, David Dastmalchian as M. Bison, Cody Rhodes as Guile, and many other talented actors to flesh out this legendary gaming franchise. They even showed off a short trailer for the movie that captures its campy style while staying true to the game itself. They also announced that the movie premieres in theaters on October 16, 2026, and I’m excited to watch it. They even called out their biggest rivals, the cast of Mortal Kombat II, to a fight as a lighthearted joke, which earned some applause from the audience. 

What's a Game Awards show without the main attraction? I, of course, am talking about the world premieres that were announced during the show’s 3.5-hour time. Some of the world premieres that were showcased are Divinity, a new game made by the Baldur’s Gate developer, Deadpool and Elsa Bloodstone being announced for Marvel Rivals for their next season, Phasmophobia is headed to the Switch 2, South of Midnight being announced for the Switch 2 and PlayStation 5, Gang of Dragon, a new game by former RGG director Toshihiro Nagoshi, being announced to the public, a brand new look at PlayStation’s latest exclusive, Saors, finally coming out in April 2026, Resident Evil Requiem getting a new trailer featuring series staple Leon S Kennedy, and tons of other wonderful games that players can expect to see in the near future.

The biggest reveal, in my personal opinion, is the surprise announcement that Mega Man 12, officially titled Mega Man: Dual Override, is in the works now. The way they announced it was by orchestra and a mini trailer that builds up to some of the iconic themes of the franchise, all leading up to the reveal of the Blue Bomber himself. It holds a place in this review because Capcom has been giving alot of their IP’s a lot of love lately, from Street Fighter to Resident Evil, all the way to Monster Hunter, Ace Attorney, and Devil May Cry, to even Okami, whose sequel is in the works now. And giving some love towards Capcom’s mascot was just what the fandom needed. 

 

For every winner, there must also be a loser, and the Game Awards has put out some stinkers of announcements. This is especially true for a game like Highguard, which was the final world premiere of the night, and it did not land with me and a lot of people. It’s yet another hero shooter, and unlike Marvel Rivals, this game does not hold my interest in playing. It feels generic with it’s mideval theming. The combat is cut and paste, especially because the team that’s working on this game also made Apex Legends and Titanfall, with both games already having huge fan bases to back their game’s hype up. This game feels like it’s dead on arrival, especially when it comes out on January 26th, 2026.

 

While all of those announcements were happening, the Award Show actually presented some awards for all the games that came out in 2025. Unsurprisingly, Clair Obscure: Expedition 33 won the most awards of the show, as that game was just that good. Some of the awards that were not presented to them included Best Racing/Sports game, which went to Mario Kart World (but it should have gone to Sonic Racing Crossworlds), MoistCr1tikal won Best Content Creator of the year, and Uma Musume: Pretty Derby won Best mobile game. 

 

The biggest award of the night, despite all the awards they showed off, was the Game of the Year award, and this year was a battle to reach the top. And the one to reach such a peak was Clair Obscure: Expedition 33, which took home the most awards of the night.
 

At the end of it all, this year’s show was a mixed bag. Sure, there were some amazing announcements and entertaining guests, but without them, the Game Awards feels like a bore. I hope next year’s show is gonna be any different, like bigger announcements that shake the industry to the core. Like “Half Life 3” levels of shake. All in all, this was not worth watching for 3 and a half hours alone. For me, I watched with some of my closest friends, and we had a blast with the announcements and making fun of the slow parts. Besides that, Geoff and his team have a lot to work on before their 2026 show. 

 

6/10