A lot of the expected happened at the Game Awards 2023, but there were also some surprises. This year, the award for the best ongoing game went to Cyberpunk 2077 despite strong competition. This causes a lot of joy among the community, but also confusion.
In which category did Cyberpunk 2077 win? At the Game Awards 2023, Cyberpunk 2077 was honored as Best Ongoing Game. In the category, the game from CD Projekt Red prevailed against the following competitors:
What are the requirements for best ongoing play? Best Ongoing is one of a total of 32 categories of the Game Awards 2023. The category is described on the award homepage as follows:
Awarded to a game for outstanding development of ongoing content that evolves the gaming experience over time.
This usually refers to games that have been constantly developed over the years and provided with fresh content. These usually include long-term supported games with regular patches. In recent years, winners include Final Fantasy 14 (2021 and 2022), No Man’s Sky and Fortnite.
Why was Cyberpunk 2077 named Best Ongoing Game if it’s already finished?
Is Cyberpunk 2077 an ongoing game? In fact, Cyberpunk 2077 is not an ongoing game like Final Fantasy 14 or Fortnite are. The AAA game was released in December 2020. Although it has received continuous patches since then, these mainly focused on bug fixes, quality-of-life features and content that was promised for release but was missing.
But CD Projekt Red stayed on the ball throughout: Patch 1.5 last year ironed out the worst problems. With version 2.0, Cyberpunk 2077 finally became the game that players had been looking forward to since it was announced. With the newly released and officially final patch 2.1, the developer even implemented a subway.
Update 2.1 in Cyberpunk 2077 shows subway and car racing in the trailer
More videos
The release of the DLC Phantom Liberty is more of the ongoing content that is needed for a nomination in the category. This in combination with patches 2.0 and 2.1 were the reason for the nomination.
Does Cyberpunk 2077 deserve an award? Short and sweet: Yes. Cyberpunk 2077 is an excellent game today that offers you many hours of high quality play.
Cyberpunk 2077 may not have lived up to expectations when it was released, but CD Projekt Red has really worked hard over the course of two years. They were able to eliminate most of the criticism, many bugs were resolved and missing content was added.
Personally, I still miss multiplayer in Night City, but even without it I’m very happy with what Cyberpunk 2077 is now.
The game and the studio definitely deserve an award for all the effort. The organizers of the Game Awards probably saw it that way too.
Unfortunately, there is no category like Best Comeback, which is a good thing – we want all games to be pure perfection when they are released. With that in mind, Best Continuing Game was probably the most appropriate nomination option considering Phantom Liberty and recent patches.
The reactions from the communities of the other games are mixed
What does the Fortnite community say? In a thread on Reddit about Fortnite in which exactly this is lamented, the most upvoted comment from user BloodyTears92 (via Reddit) says that Cyberpunk deserves it and Final Fantasy 14 probably would have been otherwise.
Many of the users agree here: MrTripl3M (via reddit) writes that CD Projekt Red can definitely be congratulated for their hard work, but Cyberpunk 2077 is not a classic ongoing game. BayleefMaser123 (via reddit) points out that Final Fantasy 14 recently won twice and the users were excited either way. Still others discuss whether Fortnite 2023 delivered enough good content.
What do Genshin Impact players say? In a similar thread from the Genshin Impact community (via Reddit), users celebrate the strong competition. Although Genshin has had a great year, Baldur’s Gate 3 absolutely deserved to win Game of the Year. The post itself also praises the great performance of its direct competitor Fortnite.
However, the comments below are clear: the players are not frustrated because their favorite lost. They are frustrated because they lost to Cyberpunk 2077. Others, however, agree with the praise for Baldur’s Gate 3.
Things are comparatively quiet in the Final Fantasy 14 and Apex Legends communities. The latter is currently primarily discussing the announced collaboration with Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth.
How do you feel: Do you think Cyberpunk 2077 deserved the award? Who was your favorite? Write it to us in the comments.
More about the Game Awards 2023: Game Awards 2023: Time for Muppets, advertising and Hollywood, but no time for the most important people in the show