Here are the Indie Games nominated for the 2025 Game Awards

Hot on the heels of the Indie Game Awards nominations are the nominations for the 2025 Game Awards. This year indie games are well-represented with half of the Game of the Year nominees being from independent studios — Hades 2, Hollow Knight: Silksong, and Clair Obscur: Expedition 33. The big news however is Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 which garnered a record 12 nominations this year.

Here are the games nominated for Independent Game of the Year:

• Absolum (Guard Crush Games/Supamonks/Dotemu)
• Ball x Pit (Kenny Sun/Devolver Digital)
• Blue Prince (Dogubomb/Raw Fury)
• Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 (Sandfall Interactive)
• Hades II (Supergiant Games)
• Hollow Knight: Silksong (Team Cherry)

Here are the games nominated for Best Debut Indie Game:

• Blue Prince (Dogubomb/Raw Fury)
• Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 (Sandfall Interactive/Kepler Interactive)
• Despelote (Julián Cordero/Sebastián Valbuena/Panic)
• Dispatch (AdHoc Studio)
  • Megabonk (Vedinad) had originally been nominated for Best Debut Indie Game but the creator asked to be removed from consideration as they do not consider it a debut as they have developed under other studio names in the past

The other category that tends to strongly favor independent titles is Games for Impact:

• Consume Me (Jenny Jiao Hsia/AP Tmson/Hexacutable)
• Despelote (Julián Cordero/Sebastián Valbuena/Panic)
• Lost Records: Bloom & Rage (Don’t Nod Montreal/Don’t Nod)
• Wanderstop (Ivy Road/Annapurna Interactive)
• South of Midnight (Compulson Games/Xbox Game Studios) — the only non-Indie title nominated

Unfortunately for the other nominees it’s beginning to look like a Clair Obscur sweep of the indie categories and possibly a Game of the Year win as well — it has already dominated the Golden Joystick awards winning all seven categories it was nominated in including Ultimate Game of the Year. Blue Prince won Best Indie Game and Hollow Knight: Silksong received the Best Self-Published Indie Game award, but Clair Obscur was not among the nominees for those two categories at the Golden Joystick Awards. It is feasible that some may split their votes to give another title a chance but the momentum is clearly on Clair Obscur’s side. We’ll find out when the Game Awards air on December 11 at 7:30pm ET, 4:30pm PT.