As we predicted, AstroBot was named Game of the Year at the 2024 Game Awards. This was a relatively open race with no runaway leader, adding a little extra excitement to the 2024 awards. But in reality, Team Asobi’s delightful platformer was perfectly positioned to find an easy path through the middle to gaming’s grand prize. AstroBot took home four awards – it also won Best Game Direction, Best Action/Adventure Game and Best Family Game – making it the night’s biggest winner.

While some price watchers will be disappointed – Chinese action game Black Myth: Wukong and indie card game Balatro particularly had vocal supporters – it’s a victory that few will seriously object to. And that’s exactly why it caught on. Impeccably polished, infectiously cheerful and 100% uncontroversial, AstroBot was the only game in 2024 that everyone could agree on.

That doesn’t mean that the victory contains no element of surprise. Games nominated in the Family category rarely win Game of the Year; The only other time it’s happened was when It takes two won the main prize in 2021. The Game Awards jury generally prefers games that are aimed at an adult audience and have more “mature” themes and presentations. The jury also prefers games with strong narrative elements AstroBot it just doesn’t have it. But it’s worth pointing out It takes two is a friendly co-op platform game about divorce, namely AstroBotNot only does it appeal to children with its adorable characters and cheerfully anarchic atmosphere, but it also appeals to nostalgic gamers with its heavily promoted and collectible celebration of PlayStation’s 30th anniversary. Both games have a sentimental and emotional appeal to adults – more so than, for example Super Mario Bros Wonder – and that might have helped AstroBot hit a deeper nerve in the hearts of the election jury.

Still, it’s gratifying to see such widespread acclaim for a title that aims to engage some of gaming’s most overlooked and underserved audiences: kids. All these deep references to obscure Japanese-only releases in the 1990s may upset fans, but they’re no barrier to the innocent, genuine enjoyment of a video game that’s relentlessly creative and just extremely fun . (Just ask my 8 year old who was in the credits AstroBot three times already.)

In all other ways AstroBot is a classic GOTY winner. It’s a technically brilliant console game with high production values. It received great reviews and built a significant level of critical consensus. And it has an accessible, non-specific universality that can easily overcome cultural barriers to reach every corner of the international TGA jury.

All other nominees had a significant asterisk before their names. Elden Ring: Shadow of the Earth Tree was hamstrung by his enlargement status even before the public outcry over his nomination. Black Myth: Wukong had tremendous international and popular support, but it’s simply not a critics’ game, and the last 10 years have shown us time and time again that only games with widespread critical support (in other words, a high Metacritic score) will prevail.

It was tempting to spin a narrative BalatroThe chances are good, especially after we at Polygon named it our own Game of the Year. It received good reviews and was played very frequently for indie standards. But it’s time for a reality check. The last time an indie game could seriously compete for Game of the Year at the Game Awards was Hades‘ run in 2020. This year it took the GOTY titles from many high-profile media outlets, and some of us expressed shock when it lost The Last of Us Part 2. But a look at this handy global tracker of games of the year – which tracks games that either won GOTY awards or topped journalistic outlets’ year-end lists – tells the sobering true story. The Last of Us Part 2 has been named Game of the Year 326 times Hades‘ 75. It wasn’t even close. An appreciation for indie games that considers them on the same level as AAA titles only exists within a certain bubble, and there is no way to compare a game Balatro can build the broad coalition of support needed for a GOTY win at the Game Awards. It just doesn’t happen. Despite it, Balatro Developer LocalThunk can look forward to three awards and is therefore in second place AstroBot.

AstroBotshould have been the biggest challenger Final Fantasy 7 Rebirthanother shiny console game with broad appeal. But RebirthLunch was eaten by Atlus. Metaphor: ReFantazioa niche but similarly epic RPG that ended up just having a bit more seriousness and more critical credibility. metaphor‘s three wins and his triumph over Rebirth in the Best Role Playing Game category suggests that it probably came in second place AstroBot regarding GOTY votes.

AstroBotThe win solidifies Sony’s position as the most successful publisher in The Game Awards history. He now has three GOTY victories to his name, more than any other publisher. (EA has two, Nintendo has one, and Microsoft has none.) Sony also topped the overall award winnings chart for the fourth time, with AstroBot‘s four wins were supplemented by two more for Helldivers 2. Not bad for a company that warned earlier this year that there would be no major exclusive games in 2024.

While the Game Awards are undoubtedly the most prestigious event of gaming’s awards season, it is also one of the earliest – a contrast to the film awards, which culminate with the Oscars after a months-long round of so-called precursors. That also applies AstroBotDoes the TGA win foreshadow Team Asobi’s run for the rest of the major awards in the coming months? Not necessarily. The industry’s DICE Awards often follow TGA’s lead, but the UK’s BAFTA Games Awards have only twice followed the same path as TGA and pride themselves on presenting lesser-known titles such as: return And Outer Wilderness in the “Best Game” category. Maybe there is an opening for it Balatro There.

For now, though, the Game Awards have done what they do best: choose a mainstream consensus winner that everyone can agree with. I mean, just look at little Astro, his cute waddling limbs, his adorable blinking LEDs. You’d withhold some silverware from him, wouldn’t you?