The year is nearly done and that means it’s time to look back at all the video games that have come out over the course of the last 12 months and give the good ones the acknowledgement and recognition they deserve. Thus, The Game Awards 2021 nominations have been revealed with a few surprises.
Games to receive a Game Award
Deathloop leads the pack with nine nominations in eight of the 30 categories. While that’s a lot, it’s not that much of a surprise, we were big fans of this one. The nine nominations include Best Game Direction, Best Narrative, Best Art Direction, Best Score/Music, Best Audio Design, Best Action Game and Game of the Year. Jason E. Kelley and Ozioama Akagha also received nominations for their performances as Colt Vahn and Julianna Blake respectively.
Deathloop is joined by Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart, It Takes Two, Metroid Dread, Psychonauts 2 and Resident Evil Village in the Game of the Year category.
Among the surprises for this year is the snub Returnal received. Although nominated for Best Game Direction and Best Audio Design, we think it should’ve got the GOTY nod as well. Cyberpunk 2077 also managed to nab a couple of nominations and this caught us a little off guard. After careful consideration, we think the Best RPG and Best Score/Music nominations are justifiable. Those weren’t really affected by the buggy mess that the rest of the game was on release.
If you want to see a full list of all the nominees in all 30 categories and participate in the public voting, head over to the site, sign in and cast your vote. The ceremony will take place on Thursday, 9 December and this time it’ll be both an in-person (invite only) event and broadcast live from the Microsoft Theatre in LA. For us here in SA that want to watch the show live, we’ll probably need a coffee or two. The official times haven’t been announced yet but historically the pre-show usually starts at around 6:30 – 7:00pm ET, which is about 1:30 – 2:00am SAST.