PS5 exclusives lead the Golden Joystick nominations!

https://www.gamesradar.com/games/golden-joystick-awards-2024-shortlist-categories-revealed-vote-now/

There's plenty to get through, but here are some highlights you might find interesting. Astro Bot and Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth lead the shortlist with five nominations each, followed by Helldivers 2 with four nominations and Balatro with three nominations. Naturally,Dragon’s Dogma 2andElden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtreemade the shortlist, as well as scores of other amazing games.

Best Storytelling

• 1000xResist
• Emio - The Smiling Man: Famicom Detective Club
• Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth
• Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth
• Lorelei and the Laser Eyes
• Tactical Breach Wizards

Best Multiplayer Game

• Abiotic Factor
• EA Sports College Football 25
• Helldivers 2
• Sons Of The Forest
• Tekken 8
• The Finals

Best Visual Design

• Astro Bot
• Black Myth: Wukong
• Harold Halibut
• Metaphor: ReFantazio
• Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II
• Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2

Best Indie Game

• Animal Well
• Arco
• Balatro
• Beyond Galaxyland
• Conscript
• Indika
• Lorelei and the Laser Eyes
• Thank Goodness You’re Here!
• The Plucky Squire
• Ultros

Best Indie Game - Self Published

• Arctic Eggs
• Another Crab’s Treasure
• Crow Country
• Duck Detective: The Secret Salami
• I Am Your Beast
• Little Kitty, Big City
• Riven
• Tactical Breach Wizards
• Tiny Glade
• UFO 50

Still Playing Award - PC and Console

• Apex Legends
• Counter-Strike 2
• EA Sports FC
• Dota 2
• Fortnite
• GTA Online
• Minecraft
• Naraka: Bladepoint
• Roblox
• Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six Siege
• Valorant
• Warframe

Still Playing Award - Mobile

• Call of Duty: Warzone Mobile
• Free Fire
• Honkai: Star Rail
• Roblox
• Marvel Snap
• Monopoly Go!
• Mini Motorways
• PUBG: Battlegrounds
• Squad Busters
• Star Wars: Hunters
• Subway Surfers
• The Sims Mobile

Studio of the Year

• 11 Bit Studios
• Arrowhead Game Studios
• Capcom
• Digital Eclipse
• Team ASOBI
• Visual Concepts

Best Game Expansion

• Alan Wake 2 Expansion Pass
• Destiny 2: The Final Shape
• Diablo IV: Vessel of Hatred
• Elden Ring Shadow of the Erdtree
• God of War Ragnarök: Valhalla
• World of Warcraft: The War Within

Best Audio Design

• Astro Bot
• Balatro
• Robobeat
• Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II
• Star Wars Outlaws
• Still Wakes the Deep

Best Soundtrack

• A Highland Song
• Astro Bot
• Final Fantasy VII Rebirth
• Hauntii
• Silent Hill 2
• Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance

Best Lead Performer

• Cody Christian as Cloud Strife in Final Fantasy VII Rebirth
• Kaiji Tang as Ichiban Kasuga in Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth
• Humberly Gonzalez as Kay Vess in Star Wars Outlaws
• Luke Roberts as James Sunderland in Silent Hill 2
• Melina Juergens as Senua in Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II
• Sonequa Martin-Green as Alvilda in Asgard’s Wrath 2

Best Supporting Performer

• Abbi Greenland & Helen Goalen as The Furies in Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II
• Briana White as Aerith Gainsborough in Final Fantasy VII Rebirth
• Dawn M. Bennett as Aigis in Persona 3 Reload
• Debra Wilson as Amanda Waller in Suicide Squad
• Matt Berry as Herbert in Thank Goodness You’re Here!
• Neve McIntosh as Suze in Still Wakes the Deep

PC Game of the Year

• Animal Well
• Balatro
• Frostpunk 2
• Satisfactory
• Tactical Breach Wizards
• UFO 50

Console Game of the Year

• Astro Bot
• Dragon’s Dogma 2
• Final Fantasy VII Rebirth
• Helldivers 2
• Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown
• The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom

Best Early Access Game

• Enshrouded
• Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor
• Hades 2
• Manor Lords
• Lethal Company
• Palworld

Best Gaming Hardware

• Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 (2024)
• Backbone One (2nd Gen)
• LG UltraGear 32GS95UE
• Nvidia GeForce RTX 4070 Super
• Turtle Beach Stealth Ultra
• Steam Deck OLED

Best Game Trailer

• Caravan Sandwitch - Launch Trailer
• Death Stranding 2 On The Beach - State of Play Announce Trailer
• Helldivers 2 - “The Fight for Freedom Begins” Launch Trailer
• Kingmakers - Official Announcement Trailer
• Sid Meier’s Civilization VII - Narrator Reveal Trailer
• The Plucky Squire - Launch Trailer

Most Wanted Game

• Atomfall
• Assassin’s Creed Shadows
• Sid Meier’s Civilization VII
• Clair Obscur: Expedition 33
• Deadlock
• Death Stranding 2: On The Beach
• Doom: The Dark Ages
• Exodus
• Fable
• Ghost of Yotei
• Grand Theft Auto VI
• Hollow Knight: Silksong
• Indiana Jones and the Great Circle
• Kingdom Come: Deliverance II
• Light No Fire
• Mafia: The Old Country
• Monster Hunter Wilds
• Skate.
• Slay the Spire 2
• South of Midnight

Wowza, 2024 was a great year for the PS5, despite all of the criticism it gets. Thoughts, SW? If I recall, the Golden Joystick awards were heavily touted by certain people here in previous years. So it must be valid, right?

As a reminder. LOL

@loudheadphones: 😆

The golden what? It sounds made up.

How can PlayStation lead the nominations when they have no games? 🤔

And there was SO much ado about Xbox's 2024 from both xbox and "the PC guys" on this board.

Console Game of the Year

• Astro Bot
• Dragon’s Dogma 2
• Final Fantasy VII Rebirth
• Helldivers 2
• Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown
• The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom

Xbox...???

lol

My votes would be:

Best Storytelling

• Final Fantasy VII Rebirth

Best Multiplayer Game

• Tekken 8

Best Visual Design

• Senua's Saga: Hellblade II

Studio of the Year

• Capcom

Best Game Expansion

• Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree

Best Audio Design

• Senua's Saga: Hellblade II

Best Soundtrack

• Final Fantasy VII Rebirth

Best Lead Performer

• Cody Christian as Cloud Strife in Final Fantasy VII Rebirth

Best Supporting Performer

• Briana White as Aerith Gainsborough in Final Fantasy VII Rebirth

Console Game of the Year

• Final Fantasy VII Rebirth

Best Game Trailer

• Death Stranding 2 On The Beach - State of Play Announce Trailer

Most Wanted Game

• Monster Hunter Wilds

Yeah, was gonna say this. Not sure I've ever heard of it.

Out of those nominations, only Prince of Persia is available on Xbox.

EDIT: Dragon's Dogma 2 as well.

Best mobile game is like voting for best STD you've gotten after you've committed adultery.

@Jag85: Dragon’s Dogma 2 is also on Xbox.

The most blatant snub is Black Myth: Wukong. It's been snubbed from every category besides Visual Design. It appears the nominations were chosen by Western game industry professionals, who are clearly biased against Wukong. The only reason they nominated it for Visual Design is because the bias would be too obvious if they snubbed the best-looking game.

@Archangel3371: Noted.

@Jag85: seriously. Wukong absolutely deserves to be up there. It's my GOTY

And Xbox Series doesn't have Black Myth: Wukong. Really a bad time to be an Xbox console player.

My thoughts exactly. Can't say I'm surprised by the obvious bias here and IGN is still salty about it. What's criminal is the fact it's not even listed on PC GOTY is a huge insult. Even Stellar Blade was sub as well and I too enjoyed that PS5 game.

Edit: Now I'm curious as to how VGA will treat Black Myth: Wukong.

biggest flop is Sony's too....lets never forget that!

The Western game industry's irrational disdain for Wukong and Stellar Blade is bizarre. There are some theories floating around for why this is, some claiming it's "wokism" and others claiming it's xenophobia. But it might have something more to do with professional jealousy, due to 2024 being such an embarrassing year for Western AAA games.

Alan Wake 2 got its expansions already? I'll have to fire it up again then.

That's a tough category. It's also bizarre how Balatro and Animal Well arent in the top console game category, and they somehow forgot to put Infinite Wealth on either.

Them snubbing Wukong and Stellar Blade is such a dumbass thing to do. They're being bias against Wukong and Stellar Blade. What a mid award list. I don't think I've ever heard of this award show.

@SolidGame_basic: Why do you celebrate Sony's moneyhatting all the time? it's sad that you have to say "PS5 exclusives" and not Sony first party, remember third party games don't count, oh that's right I forgot, the do count for Sony, but not anybody else 🤣🤣🤣

On a side note, why is there nominations for GOTY awards out when there is still 3 months of the year left for games to release, just dumb all round.

The man loves to slurp up every drop from that Sony utter...quite sad really how attached and loyal he is to his plastic box...lol

"Best PC game of the year"

"Best console game of the year"

Why a distinction? Why not just "game of the year"?

I mean, a game is a game, no matter the platform. Seems redundant to me

You are correct. It is a bit redundant especially when the majority of console games overlap with PC.

Why do you have a hard time with the truth? Astro Bot and FF7 Rebirth can only be played on PS5 in 2024!

Why did you have a hard time reading the truth in his comment?🤭

Where did I say anything about you not being truthful?

See you and your kind used to shit on Xbox for relying third party when their first party production line grinded to a halt, until your beloved Sony's first party grinded to a halt and has to heavily rely on third parties for the foreseeable future.

It's you having the hard time here twisting yourself into a pretzel for a Sony "win"

Sony has both. Astro Bot is first party, 94 MC!

Golden Joysticks have had separate console and computer categories for the last 40 years.

Golden Joysticks are far too early, every year.

What should be the favorite for Best Lead Performer and even Best Supporting Perfumer, their game comes out this month. For example.

@SolidGame_basic: Sony is leading the nominations for the Sony golden joystick awards...Quelle surprise.

Space Marine 2 also got snubbed.

these awards didn't mean much to cows when starfield won it last year for xbox and Res 4 a for PS....now its the Golden joysticks or bust.

Cows...making tits of themselves all for the sake of Sony

Fake news, fake reviews, fake awards. ;o

They can all go Fake off!! lol :P

what else is new lol? sony always win. just wait xbox has 2020 just wait xbox has 2021 just wait xbox has 2022 just wait xbox has 2023 just wait xbox will have 2024 just wait xbox has 2025.

@SecretPolice said:

Fake news, fake reviews, fake awards. ;o

They can all go Fake off!! lol :P

Apparently they had them last year, maybe they are real? It does sound made up though TBH

@girlusocrazy said:

@SecretPolice said:

Fake news, fake reviews, fake awards. ;o

They can all go Fake off!! lol :P

Apparently they had them last year, maybe they are real?

They knew the winners this year (Phony) before the year even started. ;o

Real alright, real phony. lol :P

@SecretPolice: I guess these awards were probably phony and people were right not to trust them before

But who cares about awards TBH it's about if the game is fun for you

But eh, its SW and I understand how it works.

Just playin the SW game. ;o

Boast about your system if you can. ;)

@SecretPolice: Maybe one day the SW process will be automated by AI!

How does helldivers get a nod for game of the year on the platform that didn't support it, but nothing on the platform that did? Makes no sense.

Huh… without Sony, this game wouldn’t even exist

That's great that they helped fund the game. I am a customer. That's a side topic though.

It was named a top game for consoles but not pc despite pc gamers having a much bigger community. Meaning the game was more well recieved on pc. Did pc have that much of a better year than Sony?

2024 looks to be the year for Xbox Game Studios and first party development! WOWZERS.

Xbox Game Studio's developed games: 11

PlayStation Studio's developed games: 8

But but Xbox has no games!! LOLOLOL. I am glad Phil has chosen not to moneyhat third party developers to pad their line up.

And 2025? It's looking like a BLOOD BATH. Xbox is already overflowing with games for 2025!

Saying console gamers didn't support it is a stretch. But yes, why isn't on the PC list? You're right!

Sounds more to me like a reading comprehension part on your side. I didn't need a lesson on who funded the game. I've been following helldivers since the launch of the first game. I was referring to the population of gamers who did and didn't really support it as a game of the year game on their platform. You don't see the obvious irony?

@TheEroica: I agree with you that it should be a PC nominee as well! Kind of weird that they separated them to begin with.

PC Game of the Year

• Animal Well
• Balatro
• Frostpunk 2
• Satisfactory
• Tactical Breach Wizards
• UFO 50

Console Game of the Year

• Astro Bot
• Dragon’s Dogma 2
• Final Fantasy VII Rebirth
• Helldivers 2
• Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown
• The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom