All 2025 Canadian Game Awards Categories & Nominees

The Canadian Game Awards celebrates gaming’s greatest achievements created by developers in the Great White North in 16 categories, with contenders ranging from AAA games like Dragon Age: The Veilguard to indie titles like this year’s surprise hit Balatro. The ceremony will occur on February 15, 2025, at 8:00 p.m. Eastern time. The Awards have previously been shown on Amazon Prime Video, though they may not be available in every region.

In addition to celebrating games and their developers, the Canadian Game Awards also highlight some of the gaming community through their Esports and Content Creator categories. This is a nice way to honor the people who create meaningful ways to engage with gaming as a hobby outside of just playing games. At the very least, the Canadian Game Awards is a great way to learn about some new games that may have been overlooked by other awards ceremonies this past year.

Best Art Direction

Games With The Best Art Styles

The award for Best Art Direction is given to games with top-quality visual presentation. This doesn’t necessarily mean the game with the most photo-realistic graphics, but instead, the one that has a unique and consistent style. It also helps if the game’s visual style blends well with its story and themes.

This year’s nominee Été is a great example of great art direction that is not trying to be true to life. Instead, the game opts for a water-color style which fits perfectly for a game about working as an artist.

In fact, most nominees that made it into the list available on the Canadian Game Awards website, as shared by the ceremony's X account, similarly go for a more highly stylized presentation style than a photorealistic one, giving these games a stronger identity through their unique graphics.

Best Game Design

Games With The Best Mechanics

The Best Game Design category judges games primarily on their gameplay elements. It looks at how the game fits into its chosen genre, what unique ideas it introduces, and whether or not it is innovative enough to be considered a completely new style of game. Games are judged on their own merits based on the type of experience they are going for, so a nominee like Été won’t lose points for being less difficult than Balatro, as it is meant to be a cozier experience.

Balatro being nominated in this category makes a lot of sense when discussing innovation. It uses the widely understood rules of poker to easily onboard players, but its unique deck-building aspects and roguelite gameplay give it a lot more depth than a typical poker game.

It’s these types of inventive choices that make games stand out in this category, as well as the ability to implement those innovations in a way that feels polished and engaging.

Best Score/Soundtrack

Games With The Best Music

Best Score/Soundtrack rates games based on their music. This doesn’t just mean the quality of the music itself, but how it blends with gameplay to enhance the experience. A game’s score and soundtrack can be integral to setting the mood and putting players in the right mindset.

Spirit City: Lofi Sessionsis an excellent example of what the Canadian Game Awards are looking for in this category. The game serves as a tool to help players focus on being productive in real life, so its easy-going and unobtrusive soundtrack is perfect for what it’s trying to achieve.

In contrast, Dragon Age: Veilguard’s grand swells of music perfectly match its high-fantasy adventure tone. It’s all about games that understand the mood they’re trying to communicate and doing so effectively through music.

Best Narrative

Games With The Best Story

Best Narrative focuses on games with the highest quality of storytelling. This includes everything from mechanical parts of storytelling like the quality of its dialogue, to more abstract qualifiers like the game’s themes and emotional impact.

Lil' Guardsman represents this category well. It has a massive cast of unique characters that the player interacts with and whose fate they will decide. The game leans heavily on its narrative elements to fuel the player’s deductive reasoning and decision-making. 1000xRESIST also has strong narrative elements and its story about the results of a catastrophic pandemic feels very poignant. While both games have very different tones, they both show how well narrative elements can impact a game.

Best Performance

Best Voice Acting And Motion Capture Performances

Best Performance honors voice actors for their roles in video games. Performers are rated based on how distinct and impactful their work as a character was, as well as the quality of their voice work. Consideration is also given to their physical performance when motion capture was used for their role.

Humberly González’s nomination makes sense, as her work as Kay helped carry players through their Star Wars: Outlaws experience by giving them a strong lead character to connect with. Players probably won’t be too surprised to see veteran voice actor Matthew Mercer nominated here, as he consistently delivers some of gaming’s most iconic character performances.

Best Audio Design

Games With The Best Sound Effects

Best Audio Design focuses on the sound elements of a game. This category differs from the Score/Soundtrack category because it is more about the rest of the sounds involved with a game than with the music. Judges consider how well a game's sound effects improve the experience and whether they blend seamlessly to help preserve and enhance immersion.

This category is one that is largely dependent on the style of the game. Something like Dragon Age: The Veilguard’s sound effects try to keep players immersed in a fictional world, whereas Balatro’s sound effects are there to help gameplay feel more satisfying and engaging.

Best Technology/Innovation

Games With The Most Unique Mechanics

The Best Technology/Innovation Award will go to the game that does the best job of taking advantage of available technology. This means games that have standout mechanics or that innovate on existing styles of games.

Nominee Moving Houses fits nicely into this category because it takes the well-explored genre of cozy organizational games and flips it on its head. The game’s descent into psychological horror is a fun inversion of the typical feelings these types of games like to evoke.

Best Debut Indie Game

Best New Game From A Small Studio

The Best Debut Indie Game celebrates new games from smaller developers. Games are scored on a combination of metrics from the more specific categories to reward games that are an overall great experience. To qualify, studios must have fewer than the equivalent of 50 full-time workers.

This category is a great way to celebrate smaller and emerging studios by not forcing them to compete with big games like Dragon Age. While games like 1000xRESIST and Balatro still snagged a lot of nominations despite their indie status, it’s nice to see games like Nightingalealso being recognized thanks to this category.

Best Debut Studio

Best Studio That Launched Its First Game

Best Debut Studio celebrates new gaming studios whose first game came out in 2024. There is no distinction here between smaller indie studios and new AAA studios; all that matters is that they are new and delivered an interesting first game. That said, this year many of the studios are smaller.

Many of the studios nominated here are also those responsible for the year’s Best Debut Indie Game nominees. It’s interesting to see that some of the best indie titles from the year were made by first-time studios, and these will likely be developers to watch in the future.

Most Innovative Studio

The Studio Making The Biggest Waves

Most Innovative Studio awards developers who are pushing game design forward. This could mean interesting new mechanics or integration of new technologies in a way that stands out. Developers are nominated on the strength of a given game from this year; for instance, BioWare was nominated for its work on Dragon Age: The Veilguard.

Red Barrels’ work on The Outlast Trials is a good example of innovation. The game is a huge departure from the style of gameplay in previous Outlast titles and does a great job challenging players on an intellectual level. Rarely does a game’s character creation screen force so much existential thought.