• News

Elden Ring & Stray lead Game Developers Choice Awards 2023 nominees

God of War Ragnarok is not far behind with five nominations.

Ozzie Mejia

January 26, 2023 9:00 AM

Game Developers Conference

1

Earlier this week, the Independent Game Festival award nominees were released. Now it's time for the other half of the GDC award puzzle. On Thursday, the nominees for the 23rd annual Game Developers Choice Awards were announced, celebrating the top titles across all of gaming in 2022.

Elden Ring and Stray lead the way with six nominations each, while God of War Ragnarok has five. All three are up for the Game of the Year category alongside Immortality, Pentiment, and Tunic. All of the Game Developer Choice Award nominees are selected by various developers from across the gaming industry. Any game released in the 2022 calendar year is eligible for nominaiton.

Here are this year's nominees, taken from the GDC Awards website:

Best Audio

• Elden Ring (FromSoftware Inc./Bandai Namco Entertainment)
• God of War Ragnarök (Santa Monica Studio/Sony Interactive Entertainment)
• Horizon Forbidden West (Guerrilla Games/Sony Interactive Entertainment)
• Metal: Hellsinger (The Outsiders/Funcom)
• Stray (BlueTwelve Studio/Annapurna Interactive)

Honorable Mentions: A Plague Tale: Requiem (Asobo Studio/Focus Entertainment), Neon White (Angel Matrix/Annapurna Interactive), Persona 5 Royal (ATLUS/SEGA), Splatoon 3 (Nintendo), Tunic (Tunic Team/Finji)

Best Debut

• Neon White (Angel Matrix/Annapurna Interactive)
• NORCO (Geography of Robots/Raw Fury)
• Stray (BlueTwelve Studio/Annapurna Interactive)
• Tunic (Tunic Team/Finji)
• Vampire Survivors (poncle)

Honorable Mentions: Chained Echoes (Matthias Linda/Deck13), Cult of the Lamb (Massive Monster/Devolver Digital), Marvel Snap (Second Dinner Studios, Inc./Nuverse), The Case of the Golden Idol (Color Gray Games/Playstack), Trombone Champ (Holy Wow Studios LLC)

Best Design

• Elden Ring (FromSoftware Inc./Bandai Namco Entertainment)
• Marvel Snap (Second Dinner Studios, Inc./Nuverse)
• Neon White (Angel Matrix/Annapurna Interactive)
• Stray (BlueTwelve Studio/Annapurna Interactive)
• Tunic (Tunic Team/Finji)

Honorable Mentions: Cult of the Lamb (Massive Monster/Devolver Digital), Dwarf Fortress (Bay 12 Games/Kitfox Games), God of War Ragnarök (Santa Monica Studio/Sony Interactive Entertainment), Immortality (Sam Barlow/Half Mermaid), Vampire Survivors (poncle)

Innovation Award

• Elden Ring (FromSoftware Inc./Bandai Namco Entertainment)
• Immortality (Sam Barlow/Half Mermaid)
• Neon White (Angel Matrix/Annapurna Interactive)
• Pentiment (Obsidian Entertainment/Xbox Game Studios)
• Stray (BlueTwelve Studio/Annapurna Interactive)

Honorable Mentions: Cult of the Lamb (Massive Monster/Devolver Digital), Dwarf Fortress (Bay 12 Games/Kitfox Games), God of War Ragnarök (Santa Monica Studio/Sony Interactive Entertainment), Horizon Forbidden West (Guerrilla Games/Sony Interactive Entertainment), Trombone Champ (Holy Wow Studios LLC)

Best Narrative

• God of War Ragnarök (Santa Monica Studio/Sony Interactive Entertainment)
• I Was a Teenage Exocolonist (Northway Games/Finji)
• Immortality (Sam Barlow/Half Mermaid)
• Pentiment (Obsidian Entertainment/Xbox Game Studios)
• Return to Monkey Island (Terrible Toybox/Devolver Digital)

Honorable Mentions: A Plague Tale: Requiem (Asobo Studio/Focus Entertainment), Citizen Sleeper (Jump Over The Age/Fellow Traveller), Horizon Forbidden West (Guerrilla Games/Sony Interactive Entertainment), NORCO (Geography of Robots/Raw Fury), Roadwarden (Moral Anxiety Studio /Assemble Entertainment)

Social Impact Award

• As Dusk Falls (INTERIOR/NIGHT/Xbox Game Studios)
• Citizen Sleeper (Jump Over The Age/Fellow Traveller)
• Endling - Extinction Is Forever (Herobeat Studios/HandyGames)
• I Was A Teenage Exocolonist (Northway Games/Finji)
• OlliOlli World (Roll7/Private Division)
• We Are OFK (Team OFK)

Honorable Mentions: Before Your Eyes (GoodbyeWorld Games/Skybound Games), God of War Ragnarök (Santa Monica Studio/Sony Interactive Entertainment), Hindsight (Team Hindsight/Annapurna Interactive), NORCO (Geography of Robots/Raw Fury), Terra Nil (Free Lives/Devolver Digital)

Best Technology

• A Plague Tale: Requiem (Asobo Studio/Focus Entertainment)
• Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II (Infinity Ward, Raven Software, Beenox, Treyarch, High Moon Studios, Sledgehammer Games, Activision Shanghai, Demonware, Toys for Bob/Activision)
• Elden Ring (FromSoftware Inc./Bandai Namco Entertainment)
• God of War Ragnarök (Santa Monica Studio/Sony Interactive Entertainment)
• Horizon Forbidden West (Guerrilla Games/Sony Interactive Entertainment)

Honorable Mentions: Dwarf Fortress (Bay 12 Games/Kitfox Games), Hardspace: Shipbreaker (Blackbird Interactive/Focus Entertainment), Immortality (Sam Barlow/Half Mermaid), Stray (BlueTwelve Studio/Annapurna Interactive), Teardown (Tuxedo Labs)

Best Visual Art

• Elden Ring (FromSoftware Inc./Bandai Namco Entertainment)
• God of War Ragnarök (Santa Monica Studio/Sony Interactive Entertainment)
• Horizon Forbidden West (Guerrilla Games/Sony Interactive Entertainment)
• Pentiment (Obsidian Entertainment/Xbox Game Studios)
• Stray (BlueTwelve Studio/Annapurna Interactive)

Honorable Mentions: A Plague Tale: Requiem (Asobo Studio/Focus Entertainment), Cult of the Lamb (Massive Monster/Devolver Digital), Neon White (Angel Matrix/Annapurna Interactive), OlliOlli World (Roll7/Private Division), Tunic (Tunic Team/Finji)

Game of the Year

• Elden Ring (FromSoftware Inc./Bandai Namco Entertainment)
• God of War Ragnarök (Santa Monica Studio/Sony Interactive Entertainment)
• Immortality (Sam Barlow/Half Mermaid)
• Pentiment (Obsidian Entertainment/Xbox Game Studios)
• Stray (BlueTwelve Studio/Annapurna Interactive)
• Tunic (Tunic Team/Finji)

Honorable Mentions: Citizen Sleeper (Jump Over The Age/Fellow Traveller), Cult of the Lamb (Massive Monster/Devolver Digital), Horizon Forbidden West (Guerrilla Games/Sony Interactive Entertainment), Marvel Snap (Second Dinner Studios, Inc./Nuverse), Neon White (Angel Matrix/Annapurna Interactive), Vampire Survivors (poncle)

The Game Developers Choice Awards and the Independent Games Festival Awards are expected to run during this year's Game Developers Conference week, which will take place from March 20-24. We'll keep our eye on both shows and we'll report on the big winners, so be sure to follow this story here at Shacknews.

Ozzie Mejia

Senior Editor

Ozzie has been playing video games since picking up his first NES controller at age 5. He has been into games ever since, only briefly stepping away during his college years. But he was pulled back in after spending years in QA circles for both THQ and Activision, mostly spending time helping to push forward the Guitar Hero series at its peak. Ozzie has become a big fan of platformers, puzzle games, shooters, and RPGs, just to name a few genres, but he’s also a huge sucker for anything with a good, compelling narrative behind it. Because what are video games if you can't enjoy a good story with a fresh Cherry Coke?