2025 Steam Awards winners have been revealed

The best game of the year(*) is available natively for Linux!

(*) according to some voting

Compared to previous awards it is interesting that there is no classic AAA title among it this year, except for maybe Silent Hill f.

Quoting: JuliusCompared to previous awards it is interesting that there is no classic AAA title among it this year, except for maybe Silent Hill f.

Folks are definitely fed up with the status quo. Indies (and pseudo-indies) are where both innovation and quality seem to be thriving right now.

(Also, a lot of us are broke, so indies are all we can afford most of the time, especially outside of sales.)

Quoting: JuliusCompared to previous awards it is interesting that there is no classic AAA title among it this year, except for maybe Silent Hill f.

Not sure how surprising that even is, given that the overwhelming majority (tempted to say 'all', but I don't want to overgeneralize) of AAA titles in recent history are uninspired corporate slop, without any soul or substance. I wonder for how long the big game studios are going to sell people the same game every year before someone notices. Personally, I am not sure what makes people still buy Assassin's Creed, Battlefield, Call of Duty & Co. If they start AI-generating these games one day, nobody could tell the difference.

Last edited by Kimyrielle on 4 Jan 2026 at 4:51 pm UTC

I haven't played a single one of the winners and am only really interested in Silent Hill F which I'll play at some point. My GOTY is by FAR Where Winds Meet and It's so depressing that it didn't at least get nominated for that award.

I think BG3 winning Labor of Love is absolute BS. No Man's Sky has been releasing FREE expansions every year, sometimes multiple. I can't see BG3 having done anything deserving that award. 100% feel like people just vote for what's trending.

Last edited by Tethys84 on 4 Jan 2026 at 3:29 pm UTC

Quoting: Tethys84I can't see BG3 having done anything deserving that award. 100% feel like people just vote for what's trending.

Well, they did release a native version for Steam Deck. And I guess it won't make them lots of money... (I'm not saying this is the reason for the people to vote for it though.)

Quoting: Tethys84I think BG3 winning Labor of Love is absolute BS. No Man's Sky has been releasing FREE expansions every year, sometimes multiple. I can't see BG3 having done anything deserving that award. 100% feel like people just vote for what's trending.

Literally lying the people about the features of the game before the release, then subsequently adding them years later is not labor of love. It is called BS. No Man's Sky was released such a bare bones state that they had to use stickers on physical copies to cover non-existed features. I would call those free expansions lawsuit evasion at best.

BG3 devs kept listening its community, improving the game by the feedback and even offered a native Steam Deck port. Here is gamingonLINUX, ofc will care the game and its dev who cared them in the first place. Not to mention, almost all previous games in the series were updated for modern OS and received Linux native port. Now, THAT'S dedication.

Last edited by rea987 on 4 Jan 2026 at 3:55 pm UTC

Quoting: rea987

Quoting: Tethys84I think BG3 winning Labor of Love is absolute BS. No Man's Sky has been releasing FREE expansions every year, sometimes multiple. I can't see BG3 having done anything deserving that award. 100% feel like people just vote for what's trending.

Literally lying the people about the features of the game before the release, then subsequently adding them years later is not labor of love. It is called BS. No Man's Sky was released such a bare bones state that they had to use stickers on physical copies to cover non-existed features. I would call those free expansions lawsuit evasion at best.

BG3 devs kept listening its community, improving the game by the feedback and even offered a native Steam Deck port. Here is gamingonLINUX, ofc will care the game and its dev who cared them in the first place. Not to mention, almost all previous games in the series were updated for modern OS and received Linux native port. Now, THAT'S dedication.

Sorry, but COMPLETELY disagree with you. That argument is BS and EXTREMELY TIRED at this point. Move on already. You people are so f***ing ridiculous. I'm done with these conversations. I have better things to do, like trying to find reasons to keep living in a world that's completely falling apart more and more every day when I turn on the news.

Last edited by Tethys84 on 4 Jan 2026 at 4:11 pm UTC

Can't really connect the first part of last response to the last part. But as for the last part, we are all in the same leaky boat.

So keep paddling.

Quoting: Tethys84Sorry, but COMPLETELY disagree with you. That argument is BS and EXTREMELY TIRED at this point. Move on already. You people are so f***ing ridiculous. I'm done with these conversations. I have better things to do, like trying to find reasons to keep living in a world that's completely falling apart more and more every day when I turn on the news.

I do get that (later) mood.

But it's not the right mood to post in a gaming forum.

Larian is deserved regardless. They really do seem to want to do good, they listen, and just overall they're largely customer-facing. As long as they're profitable and Swen is calling the shots we're probably safe to assume that won't be changing.

Hello Games sort of got pushed into... needing to be that if they were to continue as a studio, the studio head's reputation and literal face was riding on this mess of a launch, and then they established a successful business model based on all this, i.e. full price game discounted on content updates, but never past roughly half off, and we did get a regional price bump to Valve suggested pricing - which is not the Good Guy thing to do. That loyal fanbase surely won't mind, though. Eh, Sean?

Quoting: Tethys84I'm done with these conversations. I have better things to do, like trying to find reasons to keep living in a world that's completely falling apart more and more every day when I turn on the news.

The first step to recovery would be to stop watching the news (especially mainstream media). If you're still doing television, cancel that too. Removing the news and advertising from your daily life will help immensely. You'd be surprised by how much it reduces your stress levels.
😊

Yeah, you will get ignorant and stupid af, but at least you're happy

Back to topic: SILKSONG! YEAH!

Last edited by Tevur on 4 Jan 2026 at 7:22 pm UTC

Quoting: EikeThe best game of the year(*) is available natively for Linux!

(*) according to some voting

To be fair, Silksong was in "platinum" for revenue while the other game of the year (E33) was gold. With a 20 euro / 50 euro price for those two, that also means Silksong wildly outsold E33. And that is a pretty relevant kind of voting, so deserved among Steam users.

Quoting: TevurYeah, you will get ignorant and stupid af, but at least you're happy

Nah. Most of it is just propaganda and fear-porn anyway. Just find a less manipulative, unbiased source for your news instead, and accept that a lot of the so-called "news" is not actually stuff you need to know -- especially opinion pieces. And, yes, you will be much happier less stressed. (Being ignorant does not make you stupid, btw.)

And now, back to the topic of this thread ...

Last edited by Caldathras on 4 Jan 2026 at 7:44 pm UTC

Quoting: TevurYeah, you will get ignorant and stupid af, but at least you're happy

"If you don't read the papers, you're uninformed. If you do read the papers, you're misinformed." -Mark Twain

i can't agree with arc raiders victory in the innovations category, because there were zero innovations in the game. to be honest i doubt there can be significant innovations in video games in general. in the last 30-40 years almost every possible idea has been already tried. not every possible combination of ideas, but combining existing ideas is not innovation. everything else looks okay, at least people voted for it.

Last edited by vic-bay on 4 Jan 2026 at 10:19 pm UTC

Quoting: vic-bayi can't agree with arc raiders victory in the innovations category, because there were zero innovations in the game. to be honest i doubt there can be significant innovations in video games in general. in the last 30-40 years almost every possible idea has been already tried. not every possible combination of ideas, but combining existing ideas is not innovation. everything else looks okay, at least people voted for it.

But there is. The innovation is the NPC AI. They adapt and learn how to get to you. They adapt if they have broken propellers etc. Now i'm sure there have been games trying to do that before, but in a multiplayer setting i think its the first in this area.

Quoting: Tethys84

Quoting: rea987

Quoting: Tethys84I think BG3 winning Labor of Love is absolute BS. No Man's Sky has been releasing FREE expansions every year, sometimes multiple. I can't see BG3 having done anything deserving that award. 100% feel like people just vote for what's trending.

Literally lying the people about the features of the game before the release, then subsequently adding them years later is not labor of love. It is called BS. No Man's Sky was released such a bare bones state that they had to use stickers on physical copies to cover non-existed features. I would call those free expansions lawsuit evasion at best.

BG3 devs kept listening its community, improving the game by the feedback and even offered a native Steam Deck port. Here is gamingonLINUX, ofc will care the game and its dev who cared them in the first place. Not to mention, almost all previous games in the series were updated for modern OS and received Linux native port. Now, THAT'S dedication.

Sorry, but COMPLETELY disagree with you. That argument is BS and EXTREMELY TIRED at this point. Move on already. You people are so f***ing ridiculous. I'm done with these conversations. I have better things to do, like trying to find reasons to keep living in a world that's completely falling apart more and more every day when I turn on the news.

Quoting: Xpander

Quoting: vic-bayi can't agree with arc raiders victory in the innovations category, because there were zero innovations in the game. to be honest i doubt there can be significant innovations in video games in general. in the last 30-40 years almost every possible idea has been already tried. not every possible combination of ideas, but combining existing ideas is not innovation. everything else looks okay, at least people voted for it.

But there is. The innovation is the NPC AI. They adapt and learn how to get to you. They adapt if they have broken propellers etc. Now i'm sure there have been games trying to do that before, but in a multiplayer setting i think it’s the first in this area.

Not just that but there really is absolutely no other game that combines everything like ARC Raiders does for PvPvE.