Shroud has accused The Game Awards of being “rigged” following its Game of The 12 months Arc Raiders snub.
The Game Awards confirmed the nominations for 2025 this week, with Sandfall’s Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 receiving 12 noms — probably the most in the Awards’ historical past. Embark Studios’ Arc Raiders, in the meantime, has only one nomination, in the Greatest Multiplayer class alongside Battlefield 6, Elden Ring: Nightreign, Peak, and Break up Fiction.
Game of the 12 months
- Clair Obscur: Expedition 33
- Loss of life Stranding 2: On the Seashore
- Donkey Kong Bananza
- Hades 2
- Hole Knight: Silksong
- Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2
Forward of the announcement, Canadian Michael ‘Shroud’ Grzesiek, who specializes in aggressive multiplayer first-person shooters, had referred to as on his followers to vote for Arc Raiders as Game of the 12 months 2025 over Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, saying multiplayer players have been “the minority.”
Shroud is a former skilled Counter-Strike participant who has constructed an infinite on-line viewers of 6.8 million subscribers on YouTube and 11.3 million followers on Twitch. He threw himself into Arc Raiders upon its explosive launch, and in a latest Twitch stream reacted to The Game Awards nominations divulge to recommend that the sport’s controversial AI-generated voice work had contributed to it lacking out on recognition for GOTY.
“The world is simply not prepared for AI in video video games, not but,” Shroud mentioned. “They’re simply not prepared. However, hey, at the very least they nominated it for one thing. I genuinely thought they would not nominate it for something as a result of they have been scared to get backlash. However at the very least they nominated it for one thing, in order that’s good.”
Shroud continued: “As soon as once more, one other 12 months, one other rigged 12 months. That is loopy.”
With the top of 2025 in sight, single-player role-playing recreation Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 has emerged as a frontrunner for GOTY. Nintendo Swap 2 unique Donkey Kong Bananza can also be up for GOTY, which Shroud actually took subject with.
“Think about Donkey Kong, too… if Donkey Kong would win, this award present is simply chalked,” Shroud mentioned. “Who the f*** is enjoying Donkey Kong Bananza? No person’s enjoying Donkey Kong Bananza. No person. That’s insane.”
Admitting Expedition 33 might be going to win GOTY, Shroud mentioned he hoped Kingdom Come Deliverance 2 would emerge victorious as an alternative. He believed Arc Raiders will win finest Multiplayer, and Battlefield 6 will win finest Motion. He expressed confusion that Arc Raiders was not nominated for finest Audio Design, given the plaudits it has acquired in that space.
Shroud had beforehand claimed that voting in The Game Awards doesn’t matter. “All of the f***ing awards are rigged anyway, who cares?” he mentioned. “When have you ever ever seen an award that’s really legit?”
Geoff Keighley’s The Game Awards makes use of a mix of votes from the video games media and influencers in addition to public fan voting. The voting jury has in the previous had extra of an affect on the end result. Keighley has mentioned he’s thought-about going all in on public voting for The Game Awards, however expressed issues about “social engineering.”
The Game Awards ceremony is about for December 11, 2025 at 5pm PT/8pm ET.
Wesley is Director, Information at IGN. Discover him on Twitter at @wyp100. You may attain Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.