With The Game Awards 2025 in full swing, discussions about which game deserves the GOTY crown are at an all-time high.
Individual fandoms rally behind their favorite games. Whether it’s Team Cherry’s Hollow Knight: Silksong or Kojima Productions’ Death Stranding 2: On the Beach, the debates on which game should take the crown are going to be interesting. One such game, however, creates an entirely different discourse: what makes an indie game indie?
Sandfall Interactive’s Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 has been the talk of the town since its launch back on April 24. It has garnered numerous accolades over the course of its run, with some players already claiming it to be this year’s best.
Fans are calling out that Clair Obscur’s inclusion in categories like Best Debut Indie Game and Best Independent Game is “unfair.” Like a “Hydrogen Bomb vs. Coughing Baby” situation, up-and-coming indie titles like Dogubomb’s Blue Prince or AdHoc’s Dispatch have a low chance against a giant like Sandfall Interactive’s magnum opus.
This has once again sparked conversations surrounding the legitimacy of indie titles. For context, Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 is published by Kepler Interactive, a multimillion-dollar company responsible for bringing games like Sloclap’s Sifu, as well as the New Caledonian action-adventure, Tchia.
It’s the same case with Kojima Productions’ Death Stranding 2: On the Beach. While it is heavily funded by Sony, the company largely remains independent, seeking aid from publishers to make ends meet. OD: Knock, their next game on the pipeline, will be a Microsoft-first product.
Megabonk, one of this year’s surprise indie hits, has withdrawn from his nomination not for the indie namesake but for a technicality involving his status as a debut developer. Sandfall Interactive should at least consider dropping one of its 12 nominations, but that seems like an impossible task considering the game’s widespread appeal.
The gaming community doesn’t have an answer to the age-old question of what makes indie games indie, but some have recommended that the industry should bring back the AA brand to at least create a distinction for the growing list of genres.
Of the six nominations for Game of the Year 2025, Nintendo’s Donkey Kong Bananza fits the AAA profile. The rest, including Warhorse Studios’ Kingdom Come: Deliverance, are from indie studios, and some rely on external funding to bring their passion projects to fruition.
There is no denying Clair Obscur: Expedition 33’s massive success, and they’re not in the wrong here. This has been a long and grueling discourse about genre distinctions as lines are being blurred by what makes indies indie. The Game Awards should at least rework some of their indie categories moving forward, highlighting budget and funding as factors, rather than pitting an obvious elephant in a room full of adorable cats.
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