The Game Awards have ended. Congratulations to Astro Bot’s Team Asobi on winning Game of the Year. In our review of Astro Bot earlier this year, we called it “one of the best games Sony has ever made,” calling it “one of the best games Sony has ever made,” and calling it “one of the best games Sony has ever made.” seems to agree with this.
As usual, the long stretch was a hybrid of awards ceremony, ad reel, and game announcement marathon.
Countless announcements were sprinkled throughout the awards period, including Naughty Dog’s Intergalactic: Heretic Prophet, CD Projekt RED’s The Witcher 4, and It Takes Two Studios’ Hazelight. It included completely new games such as “Split Fiction”. It was also a comeback show, with the return of long-dormant series like Okami, Onimusha, Ninja Gaiden, and Virtua Fighter.
All winning entries can be viewed on the official Game Awards website. If you missed it, you can watch Video Game Orchestra’s GOTY medley. It’s always a highlight of the show and this year it was a vibe to see them fit right in with Atom and Baratolo – kudos to the keytars!
Here, we will introduce the main announcements from the program in no particular order. Watch all the trailers below or click on one of the headlines for the full story.
To be honest, I don’t think anyone expected CD Projekt Red to release a preview of The Witcher 4 so soon, but nevertheless, the studio did just that and teased the upcoming sequel’s long movie at the Game Awards. A trailer has been released. Even if you can’t find any gameplay footage, fans of the series will love the footage.
Naughty Dog is pivoting from post-apocalyptic fungal drama to interstellar sci-fi bounty hunting with its latest game, Intergalactic: Prophet of Heresy. The studio announced the new game at The Game Awards on Thursday, along with a cinematic trailer. “Intergalactic” is set thousands of years in the future and stars bounty hunter Jordan A. Mann, played by “The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina” actor Tati Gabriel. Jordan is stranded on the planet Sempiria, which has been cut off from space for over 600 years. She’s on a mission to escape from Sempiria, but some brutal robots threaten to get in her way.
Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree is barely in the rearview mirror, and FromSoftware already has a new game in the works. First trailer for standalone co-op action game Elden Ring Nightreign at The Game Awards 2024.
Yakuza Studio delivered a powerful one-two punch at The Game Awards. First came the news that Like A Dragon studio was working on a revival of the Virtua Fighter series. Not only that, but the ever-busy studio (which, you may remember, has a Like A Dragon spin-off coming out in February) is also working on a Like A Dragon-style production set in the 1910s. We also make games.
There were some big surprise announcements at this year’s The Game Awards, but perhaps none came as suddenly as word of a sequel to Okami. Not only that, but the original game’s director, Hideki Kamiya, is at the helm.
It’s only been a few months since Gearbox announced Borderlands 4, the next installment in the company’s long-running router shooter series. Back in August, all we had was a cryptic teaser, but today at the Game Awards we got a proper look at the new game.
We told you in 2021 that The Outer Worlds 2 was a thing, and now, more than three years later, there’s evidence to support that claim in a gameplay trailer.
2K’s consistently sporadic Mafia series is returning in 2025. Mafia: The Old Country is set in 1900s Sicily and explores the origins of organized crime. Developer Hangar 13 has announced that a new Mafia title is in development for 2022, but revealed few further details. The first trailer for the game is melodramatic, with a chieftain talking to himself by candlelight, horses galloping across a plain, and operatic music as a backing track. Everyone, this is a drama.
Swedish indie studio Hazelight is synonymous with cooperative games, so naturally their next project is built for two players, but this time they also feature two genres. Split Fiction is a co-op adventure in which players jump between science fiction and fantasy worlds to escape the clutches of a greedy publisher. It supports local and online co-op play and can be played properly in split screen.
Brawlers Absolver and Sifu put Sloclap on the map thanks to their memorable looks, fluid action, and crunchy animation. So, naturally, the French studio’s next project is (check notes) a 5-on-5 arcade soccer game. Oh, sure! A rematch scheduled for next summer may perhaps make more sense for Sloclap than it first appears. The studio states that this title falls within its commitment to create a challenging action game with a stylized look.
Thick as Thieves is a new project from the iconic immersive sim and stealth action team at OtherSide Entertainment. The team includes Deus Ex creator Warren Spector, Looking Glass Studios founder Paul Neurath, and Thief: The Dark Project lead Greg LoPiccolo. Yes, we have a complete lineup. Together, the staff at OtherSide created or produced the System Shock, Deus Ex, Thief, and Ultima Underworld series, and are largely responsible (along with Doug Church and Ken Levine) for the existence of immersive sims as we know them. Masu.
One of the highlights of The Game Awards was the moment Breaking Bad star Aaron Paul and voice actor Laura Bailey took to the stage to announce Dispatch. Set to arrive in 2025, the narrative game is produced by AdHoc Studio, founded by former Telltale Games developers, and features Hollywood A-list talent and talent, including Paul, Bailey, Jeffrey Wright, Erin Yvette, and Jack Septiceye. A gorgeous cast that combines. A top-notch game voice actor.
There are two great pieces of news here. First, Ghost Town Games, the indie studio behind the Overcooked series, is working on a new title called Stage Fright, which will support both online and couch co-op play. Rad! Second, Stage Fright is published by No Man’s Sky studio Hello Games, which marks Hello’s first foray into publishing projects from other studios. Double rad! Stage Fright is built around co-op play, and its mechanics bring Overcooked-style chaos to a series of escape rooms in a creepy Luigi’s Mansion-like world.
Capcom has announced Onimusha: Way of the Sword, the first new Onimusha game since the original 2001 PS2 version was remastered in 2019. Announced at The Game Awards 2024, it reveals a modern take on the classic dark action game, minus the fixed perspective. The trailer for the single-player Wordplay action game shows an unnamed Samanosuke-like hero engaging in bloody combat with samurai zombies and collecting golden orbs just like before.
Reviving a popular game series like Ninjagaiden is always a difficult proposition. Those who worked on the series during its heyday may have moved on to other projects or left the industry altogether. But judging by the talent involved in the new series, Ninjagaiden: Ragebound, announced at the Game Awards, I think it’s safe to say the series is in safe hands. That’s because Ragebound brings together two companies that know a thing or two about creating quality games.
Updated Dec. 13 at 3:00 p.m. ET: This article has been updated to include several stories added since it was originally published. Enjoy the trailers for “Dispatch” and “Onimusha”! (The heading has also been updated from “13” to “15” because the math is important.) Also, a link to see all winners, comment on the Astro Bot review, and go to Game Award Orchestra’s GOTY I also added a link. Medley, just for that reason.
