The Game Awards went down on Thursday night. And then a relatively underdog RPG, “Clair Obscur: Expedition 33,” dominated the entire ceremony, taking home a record-breaking number of awards.
Sandfall’s title was the undeniable kieang, winning nine awards out of 12 nominations, including the big one: Game of the Year. The crowd was roaring, those too.
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The King of the Night: Clair Obscur
What draws people there? It’s the combination of sharp originality and passion, according to developers.
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The Influence: Technical artist Dineth Meegoda praised Sandfall for not being afraid to “remix things,” noting obvious influences from existing games like Persona, but blending that with their own cultural influences.
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The Experience: The narrative role-playing game, centered around turn-based combat, was hailed for its gorgeous worldbuilding and artful combat system. Gaming producer Su Dural raved about the soundtrack, which won Best Score and Music and was performed live by an orchestra at the show.
Outside of Clair Obscur publisher Kepler Interactive, the only other publisher to win multiple awards was Nintendo, taking two trophies for Mario Kart World and Donkey Kong Bananza.
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Big Reveals and Surprises
The ceremony played host to some massive announcements, which is kind of the secondary Game of the Year.
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New Sequels: New entries were unveiled for some beloved series, including Control, Mega Man, and Tomb Raider. Aspiring voice actor Alex C was most excited about Mega Man and Monster Hunter, being a “huge Capcom fan.”
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The Larian Surprise: A new entry in the Divinity franchise, simply titled “Divinity,” was announced by Larian Studios, who won Game of the Year just last year for Baldur’s Gate 3. The reveal followed days of speculation over a mysterious statue outside the Peacock Theater, a payoff that attendees loved.
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The Hype Machine: The release date for “Phantom Blade Zero”—a highly anticipated PlayStation 5 game centered on Chinese mythology—was finally unveiled. A content creator who tried it early said the game, which uses motion capture from the “best kung fu artists,” is going to “take over the world.”
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The Final Act: The final announcement was the reveal of “Highguard,” an original player-vs-player (PvP) first-person shooter made by developers behind classics like Titanfall and Apex Legends.
The honorary Game Changer award went to the gaming education company Girls Make Games, acknowledging their work in increasing diversity in the development field.
Overall, the celebration left fans and developers inspired, but the success story of Sandfall’s passionate, indie-style development of Clair Obscur was clearly the most resonating narrative of the night.
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End…
