Critics, journalists and industry people aren’t the only ones who get to vote for the best game of the year during The Game Awards. The Category Voice of playersrecognizing players’ favorite game of the year, is voted on exclusively by fans. TGA has announced the 30 nominees for the first round, which you can vote on until December 4 at 3:00 PM EST. Each voter receives 10 votes for the first round. There will be two more rounds to determine players’ most favorite game of the year, which will be announced at The Game Awards on December 12.
While the list of nominees largely reflects games nominated for the jury-voted Game Awards categories, which are listed with a weight of 90% on jury votes and 10% on fan votes, there are a few titles with huge followings fans but less critical acclaim appear in the first round of Players’ Voice. There is The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdomwhich was only nominated for Best Family Game and Best Action/Adventure; Palworldwhich received zero nominations; And Dragon Age: The Veil Guardwhich was only nominated for Accessibility; And Sonic X Shadow Generationswhich received zero nominations, to name a few.
No one’s heaven is another surprise nominee: the game was first released in 2016, but received two major updates this year, including the literally game-changing Omega update. Perhaps less surprising is that only one nominee comes from an independent developer: Balatro from LocalThunk.
The nominees for the Game Awards Players’ Voice, in full:
The Game Awards will take place on Thursday, December 12 at 7:30 PM EST.