God of War: Ragnarok and Elden Ring are the leading games for GOTY 2022 with ten and seven nominations, respectively. Here’s every nominee for The Game Awards 2022:
A Plague Tale Requiem Elden Ring God of War: Ragnarok Horizon Forbidden West Stray Xenoblade Chronicles 3
The two leading nominees shouldn’t come as a surprise. FromSoftware’s Elden Ring pulled in the highest scores from critics this year and God of War: Ragnarok is right next to it. But, while many consider Elden Ring as the “better” game - it already received a GOTY award in Japan - we’re surprised to find out that the God of War sequel out-nominated its chief rival. Elden Ring is also one of the nominees for Best Game Direction, Best Art Direction, Best Score & Music, Best Audio Design, and Best Narrative. On the other hand, Kratos’ latest outing received nominations for Best Game Direction, Best Narrative, Best Art Direction, Best Score & Music, Best Audio Design, Best Action/Adventure, Innovation in Accessibility, and Best Performance for Christopher Judge (Kratos) and Sunny Suljic (Atreus). Ultimately, we’d be surprised if neither one of Elden Ring or God of War: Ragnarok won the Game of the Year award at the Microsoft Theater in Los Angeles on December 8. Speaking of surprises, the nomination of Xenoblade Chronicles 3 wasn’t expected. Although the game was impressive when it came out in the summer, some felt that the nod should’ve gone to Bayonetta 3. The other nominees are quite understandable, albeit they won’t really stand a chance against God of War: Ragnarok and Elden Ring. A Plague Tale: Requiem improves on the first game and its narrative will stick with you after you finish playing the game. Unfortunately, it wasn’t quite the complete package as the gameplay felt underutilized and the final act left a lot to be desired. On the other hand, Stray is a one-trick pony (or is it kitty?) that didn’t have much staying outside power outside of the novelty of playing as a cat. The only other nominee that could’ve stood a chance if it came out in another year is Horizon Forbidden West. If it came out last year, as originally intended, the Guerilla Games sequel could’ve beaten It Takes Two. Having said that, this marks the third straight year that two games from a first-party Sony studio got nominated for Game of the Year at The Game Awards by Geoff Keighley. The last time that a PlayStation exclusive won GOTY was in 2018 with the God of War reboot.
