Swen Vincke knew Clair Obscur would win GOTY 2025

The game is an all time great.
It not just the style, or the gameplay, or the music, or the story....it is ALL of those things.

GOTY
Sound Track of the Year
RPG of the Year
Best Game Direction
Breakout Studio Award
Independent Game of the Year
Best Narrative
Voice actor of the year: Multiple Ties: Jennifer English, Charlie Cox, and Kristy Rider.

It will also DEMOLISH most of the awards here on Gaf. While we are a rowdy bunch and love to crap on each other, BUT you can tell shit is getting real when you have the type of consensus this forum had in the OT and the spoiler thread.
 
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Mibu no ookami said:
Yeah, again, your reading comprehension is pretty worrisome.
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DS2 as mentionned, is pretty niche and there is a lot of hate for the first game, walking simulator and all.

Wait, you think the use of the word niche here meant a low selling thing?

That's pretty funny, especially in light of you trying to pass 'Player' numbers as sales a few posts after that O Ozriel caught. 🤭
 
Breaking it down:
  • Made by a fairly small team.
  • Launched at a reasonable $50 price point at a time where everything else is going up in price.
  • Brought French storytelling into the spotlight.
  • Fantastic voice acting.
  • Has a great story that's got people continue to talk and debate about it, well after they've completed it.
  • Banger soundtrack.
  • Great gameplay.
  • Has found great success due to very positive word of mouth.
  • 92+ on OC, may get to 93 when Edge review drops.
  • Attracted people who typically don't play turn based games, to play and enjoy it.

There's a lot working in this game's favor to win GotY. It's just an incredible game with a great success story behind it. It's the kind of game that gamers and people in the industry love to see win, because everyone loves a good underdog story. A small team of French devs broke off from a big company, and brought their own story into the fold that was loved by millions.

I don't see anything that's come out so far to be strong competition for it, nor do I see DS2 or GoY beind strong competitors either. Not everyone like Death Stranding, and it won some categories where it had relatively weak competition. It lost GotY against Sekiro. Unless DS2 is far superior to DS1, I don't think it'll be in conversation to beat out Clair Obscur. It DS2 does win, people will demand immediate investigation on Geoff Keighly and test whether or not Kojima's semen is detected in his stomach.
 
adamsapple said:
DS2 as mentionned, is pretty niche and there is a lot of hate for the first game, walking simulator and all.

Wait, you think the use of the word niche here meant a low selling thing?

That's pretty funny, especially in light of you trying to pass 'Player' numbers as sales a few posts after that O Ozriel caught. 🤭
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Explain how something can be niche and sold over 10 million and played by over 20 million?

Explain that...
 
I expect DS2 to get some nods. I hated the first one, so my expectations are low, but it's Kojima. Kojima always gets a nod. However Clair Obscur is a game of the generation quality game for me. Those are rare. I don't expect to get a 2nd of this quality this year.
 
Mibu no ookami said:
Explain how something can be niche and sold over 10 million and played by over 20 million?

Explain that...
Click to expand...

Niche things can also have a sizable audience, what's there to explain about?

Expedition 33 is also a 'niche' game reportedly catered to the turn based combat audience but it's also sold multi million units in less than a month since release.
 
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Mibu no ookami said:
Explain how something can be niche and sold over 10 million and played by over 20 million?

Explain that...
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As of July 2021, the game has sold 5 million copies worldwide for the PS4 and PC platforms. As April 2025, Death Stranding had reached over 20 million players worldwide.

Game launch was November 8 of 2019, it took 2020 and 2021 ( covid year that everyone was locked inside looking for something to do ) to reach 5Mil copies sold, E33 sold almost that in a month.

Also DS has Kojima name on it, what help to sell a lot of copies, E33 has no name to carry its weight, it has to carry itself on quality alone.

For a game that big and with Kojima name on it to sell 5 milion copies in the first 2 years i would say it is pretty niche for me, game just started to sell once it got on every discount bin on the planet.
 
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SILKYSMOOTH30FPS said:
I don't see anything winning over GTA6, including a new Zelda, Elden Ring 2, Half Life 3, and all of the big hitters.
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bigbird-one-of-these-things-is-not-like-the-others.gif


diffusionx said:
I dont even know a lot of games coming out this year
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Fixed, and true.
 
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I absolutely love the game. It is a game of the generation for me, but I have a feeling Split Fiction might take the award this year. Which this great speech would actually apply to as well.
 
Oblivion Remaster is the most fun but they won't give a remaster the GOTY so it might be

Mario Kart and even thought racing game doesn't usually win but Mario Kart World is different than the normal racing games.

But the actual GOTY would be something that hasn't been announced like a new Resident Evil game, Half Life 3, or a well made FFIX Remake, or something else.
 
Hawk The Slayer said:
Oblivion Remaster is the most fun but they won't give a remaster the GOTY so it might be

Mario Kart and even thought racing game doesn't usually win but Mario Kart World is different than the normal racing games.

But the actual GOTY would be something that hasn't been announced like a new Resident Evil game, Half Life 3, or a well made FFIX Remake, or something else.
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Luna Vachon Wrestling GIF by DARK SIDE OF THE RING
 
Lokaum D+ said:
Ubisoft dev detected :messenger_tears_of_joy:
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This is another hipsterism. All Ubi is slop, Doom with a shield is not Doom, modern games suck, Nintendo is for kids, using Steam CCU to prove a point.

This is all YouTube narratives. People parrot it without irony and its embarrassing to watch.

Swen Vicke made his company with publishers, leveraged that success to early access Baulders Gate, then when he has one hit without publisher pressure, turns around and tells all the developers that they need to "develop on their terms", to all the developers who would go bankrupt without publishers.
 
Miyazaki's Slave said:
The game is an all time great.
It not just the style, or the gameplay, or the music, or the story....it is ALL of those things.

GOTY
Sound Track of the Year
RPG of the Year
Best Game Direction
Breakout Studio Award
Independent Game of the Year
Best Narrative
Voice actor of the year: Multiple Ties: Jennifer English, Charlie Cox, and Kristy Rider.

It will also DEMOLISH most of the awards here on Gaf. While we are a rowdy bunch and love to crap on each other you can tell shit is getting real when you have the type of consensus this forum had in the OT and the spoiler thread.
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Anyone who played this game to the end knows it's got the awards on lock. Nothing comes close, DS2 remains to be seen (as a big fan of the original).
 
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Mibu no ookami said:
Define niche.
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Denoting products, services, or interests that appeal to a small, specialized section of the population.

Games like Call of Duty, FIFA, and Grand Theft Auto routinely have sales that absolutely demolish Death Stranding. Additionally, if Kojima's name hadn't been attached to it, the game almost certainly wouldn't have had the sales that it did. The game's impact is more artistic than cultural.
 
March Climber said:
Zelda isn't always a for sure win for GoTY. It's not like the others you listed.
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Zelda has an insane amount of simp millennials that glaze it no matter what, and many of them are the actual reviewers. It has as much chance of winning goty as the other two. I also don't expect ER2 to be anywhere near as massive as the first game was, if there is one in the future.
 
Platinumed COE33 a few hours ago, superb game and certainly the best game I've played in 2025.
I have grievances with it, the foremost being: Ben Starr is just playing Clive again, to the point that I just started calling his character "Not Clive."

But at the end, I was beyond impressed. It's a rare gem and I can only hope it generates renewed interest from the gaming public and development community in turn-based RPGs.
 
SILKYSMOOTH30FPS said:
Zelda has an insane amount of simp millennials that glaze it no matter what, and many of them are the actual reviewers.
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This is true, as with Mario, Pokemon, Mario Kart, etc.
SILKYSMOOTH30FPS said:
It has as much chance of winning goty as the other two.
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This is false. Zelda as a franchise has had either middling sequels or torn fanbases over multiple games. That's why it is not like the others you've listed.
 
Expedition 33 winning GOTY at the TGAs this year would be a scandal only comparable to if Control had won GOTY in 2019.
 
Mibu no ookami said:
Why are we pretending like the year is over already? It's going to have a lot of competition.
Click to expand...

Not to mention absolutely NOBODY had E33 on the radar as a GOTY contender even a few weeks before it came out.

Or how last year's big GOTY winner was announced in May and released in September.

I know people get all hot and bothered about "calling" the GOTY winner as early as possible for some reason, but let's settle down a bit here…
 
March Climber said:
This is true, as with Mario, Pokemon, Mario Kart, etc.

This is false. Zelda as a franchise has had either middling sequels or torn fanbases over multiple games. That's why it is not like the others you've listed.
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Well yes, if you mention something like Zelda SS, these weren't goty potential Zelda titles, but now that Nintendo has discovered the open world genre, i am not expecting any main entries to be anything but open world, and these will never approach the more middling sequels.
 
My only hope that it won't influence other devs to turn turn-based games into mindless qte click-click like this game. We already have enough souls garbage
 
Watching a few minutes of Death Stranding 2 footage should be enough to be pretty confident it's not going to be that. Kingdom Come in Men was not celebrated to the extent that Exp33 has been, but Vavra's bending of the knee has given it a small chance.

I expect Exp33 to dominate.
 
Clair Obscur : Expedition 33 is guaranteed to win several awards (music, art...) and pretty sure it will be GOTY.
I don't really see any game stealing it. (Maybe Death Stranding 2 due to Kojima hype but I really don't see it)

It will be my personal GOTY, at the exception maybe of Hollow Knight : Silksong if coming this year and is as good at the first one.
 
For me, it's definitely the game of the last few years.

Hell, I could argue the game of the generation for me. It's up there with the greats.
 
Thief1987 said:
My only hope that it won't influence other devs to turn turn-based games into mindless qte click-click like this game. We already have enough souls garbage
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Yes, I can already see it, the next CoD will be a turn based dark souls. Turn based extraction shooters and battle royales coming too. Then turn based Forza and Gran Turismo. We are so fucked.
 
I guess I should keep going with it. I found it to be boring or just stuck and unsure where to go. I'm probably an hour or less into it.

Way too early to be talking goty. There's gonna be some really good games this year.
 
Captain, it's only May

(I'm not saying it won't win, but in 2023 it was obvious that TOTK would win GOTY when it launched in May, before facing Baldur's Gate 3 in late August)
 
Jesb said:
I guess I should keep going with it. I found it to be boring or just stuck and unsure where to go. I'm probably an hour or less into it.
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If only 1 hour in you're probably still in the prologue. Keep playing till you get to the start of the game and see if the story grabs you. For gameplay I'd say play till you get another party member (not long after the prologue) and see a bit if you like the build/customization system and combat system (finish the first area). If after that you still don't see the appeal, it's probably not for you.

No game is made for everybody. It's maybe just not your jam.
 
DelireMan7 said:
If only 1 hour in you're probably still in the prologue. Keep playing till you get to the start of the game and see if the story grabs you. For gameplay I'd say play till you get another party member (not long after the prologue) and see a bit if you like the build/customization system and combat system (finish the first area). If after that you still don't see the appeal, it's probably not for you.

No game is made for everybody. It's maybe just not your jam.
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I just fired it up again and met my first party member. The story definitely has started now it has me intrigued now. That section with all the bodies and the dark tone here is not what I was expecting. The graphics and music in this game are incredible so far.
 
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