Genshin Impact Steamrolls Through The Game Awards’ Player’s Voice Category Once More, Toppling Massive Franchises
Jack Coleman (He/Him) is a News Editor from Ireland. This is his third full year in games media, having previously worked freelance for various outlets, including DualShockers and NME.
Previously, he’s interviewed breakout indie developers, broken big news stories, reviewed massive releases and recounted his time living as a humble woodsman in Oblivion.
A lifelong gamer, Jack is primarily interested in RPGs and narrative experiences. He’s also been playing League of Legends for a decade, unfortunately.
The Game Awards’ Player’s Voice category is the show’s only award that’s completely decided by the public without input from any jury. There are also dozens of games nominated, with the field gradually being decreased to just five games before the show.
The results of the first round of voting have just been announced, with twenty games cut from the running. These cuts include Mario Kart World, Sonic Racing: Crossworlds, Fortnite and, unfortunately, Megabonk.
The Power of Genshin
The removal of Mario Kart and Sonic Racing led the artist JashuoN to draw a cartoon of Mario and Sonic nursing their wounds, lamenting the power of Genshin Impact.
Genshin Impact is a perennial top-five contender both because of the game’s popularity and because miHoYo offers in-game incentives in exchange for votes. Wuthering Waves, another gacha game, has also reached the second round. The following games are contesting the next round, with another five still to be eliminated before the finals.
Genshin Impact emerged victorious in the category in both 2021 and 2022, but fell short to Baldur’s Gate 3 and Black Myth: Wukong in 2023 and 2024, respectively.
Could this year be Genshin Impact’s return to the throne? Perhaps. The gacha faces stiff competition from fan favourite Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 and the long-awaited Hollow Knight: Silksong. Genshin will likely reach the finals once more, but does the community have enough power to snowball that into a victory?
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 won every single award it was nominated for at The Golden Joysticks, and broke the record for most nominations at the upcoming Game Awards. Sandfall’s debut mega-hit has to be the favourite to win every category in which the RPG is nominated. However, the Genshin Impact community is huge, as is the Chinese gaming community at large; perhaps there are enough fans out there to make it a competitive contest.
The second round of voting is currently open, and The Game Awards 2025 will air on December 11.
Teen / Alcohol Reference, Fantasy Violence, In-Game Purchases (Includes Random Items), Users Interact
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Hello Mr. Coleman,
you may want to check your sources for the claim that “miHoYo offers in-game incentives in exchange for votes”, because this is not true at all. There have been cases were freebies were handed out, after winning certain awards, but never for a purely player voted award. Precisely because that would be bribery.
So maybe correct this, to not slander a great game developer, wether you like these kinds of games or not.
2025-12-08 15:43:36
