Indie titles outshine big names at annual The Game Awards

LOS ANGELES – The video-game industry gathers for its annual awards show the night of Dec 11 in Los Angeles, and the favorite for the year’s top prize is not an epic from Ubisoft, Electronic Arts, Nintendo or Sony. It’s from a tiny 30-person studio in the south of France.

In Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, players set out in a dark Belle Epoque world to destroy the being behind an annual cull of people. The studio behind the title, Sandfall Interactive, opened its doors five years ago and made the game for less than US$10 million (S$12.92 million) – a tiny fraction of what blockbusters can cost today.

The world’s biggest gaming companies have invested in long games with high-quality graphics and blockbuster-movie marketing. But today, more people are playing

lower-budget titles on services like Steam

and Roblox.

While the number of gamers globally stays level, according to NewZoo, players on the youth-oriented Roblox platform nearly doubled to 150 million in 2024. Games on its service are cheap to make using the company’s tools and can be played on any device. 

“Ten years ago, most of the nominees and world-premiere participants at the Game Awards came from a relatively small group of large, established AAA publishers,” said Mr Geoff Keighley, who runs the show. “Today we’re seeing both a globalisation of big-budget development and real pathways to success for smaller independent teams.”

Consumer spending on video games fell by 3.5 per cent in 2022 and is little changed since then, according to Mr Matthew Ball, a strategic adviser for metaverse companies.

Playing premium games has become an expensive hobby. Modern consoles sell for US$450 – higher now with tariffs – and a major title is another US$70.

For big games, “most of the largest markets have shed players over the last few years and spending among the remaining players has dropped,” Mr Ball said. Meanwhile, labour costs are up by as much as 20 per cent or 30 per cent, he said.

The companies behind multibillion-dollar franchises like Call of Duty and Final Fantasy are cutting jobs and reining in spending. The industry eliminated 14,600 jobs in 2024, according to data aggregator Obsidian, on top of the 10,500 from the prior year.

The number of studios closing almost doubled to more than 25, creating a kind of doom loop for big-budget projects.

“There will be a shortage of supply of high-quality games for the next five years,” said Mr Simon Zhu, former president of global investments for NetEase, which makes Identity V, Eggy Party and Sword of Justice.

The China-based company has closed or spun off at least five studios in 2025. Other powerhouse gaming companies, including Amazon, Xbox parent Microsoft, and Embracer Group AB followed suit with cuts of their own.

In September, Electronic Arts agreed to be taken private by Silver Lake Management and Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund.

Ubisoft Entertainment SA announced in March that Tencent will acquire a 25 per cent stake in the new entity that’s home to some of its biggest games.

The changes wafting over the gaming industry are similar to those in the movie industry. As with Hollywood, a few major franchises continue to thrive.

The

new version of Grand Theft Auto

from Take-Two Interactive Software, in development for more than a decade, is expected to become the top-selling game of all time when it debuts in 2026.

But like Hollywood blockbusters, investors are getting weary of spending big on unknown franchises after some flops.

Electronic Arts spent an estimated US$125 million making and marketing Immortals of Aveum, which got mixed reviews. Sony’s Concord, released in 2024, cost US$200 million and shut down after two weeks. 

“Before the pandemic, even a not-great AAA game would sell three or five millions copies,” Mr Zhu said. “Now, if you are below the quality bar, you do a half-million or less.”

More young people are apt to be found instead playing the other tens of thousands of video games that were released in 2025, like the Roblox titles Steal A Brainrot and Grow A Garden. Instead of having to commit 80 hours to play a game through to its conclusion, gamers can pick up these titles for five or 10 minutes a day. 

“We’re going to start seeing the decline of AAA” games, said Mr Joost van Dreunen, chief executive officer of the video-game analytics firm Aldora.

Today’s younger gamers also aren’t necessarily looking for the realism that’s associated with big-budget games. Future games’ “aesthetic will be distinct for the generation, like punk music or grunge,” Mr van Dreunen said of the Roblox games, which sometimes rely on AI-generated images. 

“The graphical part of gaming isn’t driving adoption or play,” said Mr Mat Piscatella, an analyst at Circana. “It’s the social hooks, the easy access, the ability to pick up and play anywhere.” 

Mr Shawn Layden, former president and CEO of Sony Interactive Entertainment America, watched as his game developers increased the realism of their characters, the size of their virtual worlds and the quantity of quests and collectible items. 

The costs “started moving up,” he said, from US$20 million for a game to US$60 million, US$120 million. Sony’s Spider-Man 2, which was successful, cost more than US$300 million to make.

Mr Layden “wasn’t there to restrict someone’s vision” and wanted to empower creators, he said. BLOOMBERG