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The history (and secrets) of The Game Awards (Oli Welsh) (Patreon)

Published:
2025-12-05 20:17:19
Edited:
2025-12-05 20:31:00
Imported:
2025-12

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Content

The Game Awards isn’t the Oscars. It’s not the Tonys. If we’re being generous, it shares the same pop cultural status as the modern MTV Music Video Awards. But even if the show is a bit embarrassing and largely serves as an advertisement for future games, it matters.

It matters to big game publishers and tiny developers alike. All nominees stand to not only get a healthy dose of public praise, but a burst of press and a spike in sales. Especially if they win.

With more games released in 2025 than in any other year, awareness is invaluable. The Game Awards claimed a 2024 audience of 154 million streams, which would mean more people watched it than the Super Bowl. Even if the audience is actually half that number, then The Game Awards remains one of the most widely seen annual broadcasts in the world.

So this week on Post Games, we take The Game Awards seriously. My guest is the only year-round Game Awards beat reporter and analyst, Polyon's Oli Welsh.

Act 1: The history of The Game Awards

Act 2: How The Game Awards actually work

Patreon bonus: What The Game Awards got right… and very wrong

Act 3: The news of the week

Act 1: The history of The Game Awards

How Geoff Keighley Became Gaming’s Master of Ceremonies (The Ringer)

Cybermania ’94 - The Ultimate Gamer Awards (Vincent Dawn)

The Dark History Behind The Game Awards (Burback)

Rewatching the 2004 Spike TV Video Game Awards, a true time capsule of gaming (Polygon)

Act 2: How The Game Awards actually work

The 40 best video games of 2024 (Polygon)

GotY Watch (Polygon)

Golden Joysticks voting stats signal an incoming Clair Obscur sweep at The Game Awards (Polygon)

Game of the Year: Which of the 2025 Game Awards nominees will win? (Polygon)

Mario Kart World was never gonna get Game of the Year love even if it was a masterpiece (Polygon)

Patreon bonus: What The Game Awards got right… and very wrong

‘Walking Dead’ wins game of the year at Spike VGAs (AP)

Madden 2004 review (IGN)

The Orange Box review (PC Gamer)

Llamasoft: The Jeff Minter Story (Steam)

Act 3: News of the week

A PSA: Don't play games out of obligation

This week in video game links

How Denshattack! is making the morning commute radical (Shacknews)

2025 Set the Stage for an Action Game Renaissance (Inverse)

Marvel Cosmic Invasion is a Delightful Throwback Brawler | Quick Looks (Giant Bomb)

Somehow, The Musical Ghost Story Home Repair Genre Works (Aftermath)

The Making of Disco Elysium - Part One: Foundations (NoClip)

Anna C. Webster Declares This Year The Era Of The Blue Prince Sicko | Winter Spectacular 2025 (Startmenu)

Free game of the week: GREAT BI-WINTERLY TESTVILLE FLEEMARKET

From the itch.io summary: "Oh noo! You arrived a day early at Testvilles famous fleemarket oh no. Well, since they are already setting up things why dont you take a stroll anyways.

In this  ""game"" you can:

walk around

talk to characters

press continue without reading a single textbox

win

(Via Warp Door)

What else I’m enjoying

MF DOOM x Cookin Soul - DOOM XMAS (full tape) (Cookin Soul)

A Tribe Called Xmas (full tape) (Cookin Soul)

The Beguiling, Misunderstood Theremin (NYTimes)

Zlin City: Arch Moderna - Official Announcement Trailer (GameTrailers)

Files

Comments

EtherEli

I remember that Okami moment and, never having owned a PS2 or known what the game was, I picked it up on Switch when it conveniently went on sale like the week following the awards. I remember Oli having a short piece about it too. I appreciate it and don’t doubt Geoff’s sincerity, but just wish there was more runtime for the actual awards part. I understand that people are truly excited for the announcements and trailers and this episode framing how it is designed as a successor or usurper to E3 helps explain that, but I remember the first time I watched, and he just announced winners for indie game categories back to back with no acceptance by the nominees and it really irked me, because then why even call the show an awards show if you’re gonna skip the awarding part? That is a bit hypocritical because I wouldn’t be nearly as upset about them treating, say, fighting games that way, but still, being so dismissive about so many of the categories does more damage to the prestige of the show then any of the other easy suspects like people not taking games seriously or what have you. My two cents at least. I really appreciate Oli’s point too about how the diversity of the body ends up homogenizing the winners. It makes sense, but hopefully that diversity translates to more representation when selecting nominees, at least

Marcus

Listening to this now. Fun fact: Joel McHale officiated my wedding! My wedding was (I guess) officiated by a Game Awards host!

Josh Cauller

Thanks so much for tackling this, Chris! I’m sure others already send a message asking for coverage of this topic, but it feels like you answered just for me. :)

David Goldner

Chris I really appreciate the reassuring monologue at the end about the pressure we may feel to play the “important” games of the year. I needed to hear that. Like you said being intentional and mindful about what we play is important.

Jason Zenz

I can't help but feel that The Game Awards' reaction to the future class wanting to say something about Israel's genocide in Gaza undercuts Geoff's entire mission of making games seen as an art form that should be taken seriously. His reaction was very un-serious.