Indie Not on PlayStation Beats PS5, PS4's Biggest Hits to BAFTA's Game of the Year

Yes, I have been offline in 2022.

@StrawberryWave
Xbox does that on the scale of entire publishers, too, which is somehow "better" than when PlayStation buys timed exclusivity on individual games.

"Living under a rock", eh? LOL, I read online almost every day about video games and I'd never heard of it until just now. But I only look at Playstation stuff, and from the looks of it, it doesn't look like anything I'd ever have any interest in.

Vampire Survivors is better than Ragnarok and Elden Ring, not really a surprise

I’ve yet to meet an industry darling that I’ve liked so back under a rock for me.

Well congrats to them. I will join the others heading back under a rock with Patrick Star and continue to enjoy God of War Ragnarok, which remains one of my favorite games of all time!

neither Microsoft or Sony should do paid for timed exclusivity its a disgusting practice.

Guess I was living under a rock then. I've legit never heard of it but hey congrats!

Sony do paid for timed exclusivity with AAA games Microsoft do it with gamepass indies. if you buy the studio fine its yours to with as you please but paying just so someone else cant play it is abhorent

I was snug under my boulder cuddled up with hogwarts,cyberpunk and other really crap games that i should not enjoy or support and decided to crawl out for a bit of spring air...aaagghh the british weather and general reporting of games nobodys heard of prompted a swift return under my boulder...balance has been restored..

@trev666 i cant agree more 👍

I spent some 34 hours in this game and barely scratched the surface. Maybe one of these days I’ll go back in and truly 100% it. I seen some sink over 200 hours in the game.

The game is just simply raw fun.

Wow, there really is no accounting for taste... or gaming preferences.
I don't see any appeal in that collection of pixels, but that's just me...

Vampire Survivors is an awesome game. It’s the first and only game I’ve bought for my Series S so far so it’s basically just become my console for that.

Its certainly one of my favourite games of last year and its very additive.

I'll take an AAA superb game like God of War 2 over any indie any time of the day. Indie games can be fun, innovative, etc but they can never quite reach the highs of excellent AAA games (in terms of music, graphics, voice acting, cinematic cutscenes, etc). .

I didn't know I was living under a rock. Aw well its quiet comfortable 😀😀

Never heard of it either, guess I’ll head back under my PS-only rock 😹

(I mean, good on it for winning and it must be “something”, I just have nothing to comment about the quality of the game itself so won’t disparage it or indie games in general etc)

I've never been interested in games like vampire survivors where it feels like I've gone back to the 90's but each to their own, visuals alone doesn't make it a bad game and there must be a good reason it's got a 95 on metacritic (although only 6 reviews) so fair play to them, the devs must be chuffed.

Personally nothing was better than Elden Ring or HFW last year so disappointed they didn't win much.

Also it's 100% coming to playstation at some point. This is an interview with the games creator via IGN.

“We’re always thinking about what’s next and we generally go where the flow takes us, the beauty of being independent is we can do pretty much anything so long as everyone in the team is onboard,” he says. “Sadly I’m not allowed to specifically say about other platforms as our marketing team might tell me off… actually, who cares about them, let me tell you that one day I hope to launch on Vita!”

Seems like I'm not living under a rock, happen to have access to multiplatform gaming, and have not been enchanted by this game.
For some reason presentation style never quite clicked with me. I love indies, I do, but VS just feels like a weekend project using stock assets (it isn't, I know).
Doesn't take away from the award, it is obviously loved and appreciated by gamers.

Seriously!!!!! This is absolute rubbish. And I'm not saying that because I'm a Sony fanboy but I've seen the game and it has nothing to compete with the likes of GOW or Elden Rings

Great game, though reading some comments here still not surprised to see the usual basic bland AAA crowd is disparaging indie and pixel games.

Maybe it’s a generational thing. Shuhei Yoshida and PS have their work cut out for them in doing better by indies and getting them into the hands of their shallow minded core audience.

My eyeballs like graphics. They would never have noticed this.

Never heard of Vampire Survivors and after a quick Google, I never want to again. It looks like something made for the Commodore 64.

@UltimateOtaku91 check it out on Gamepass. It’s the sort of game thats so addictive you can play it on Xbox for the achievements, and would want to go back and get all the trophies when it finally comes to Playstation and play it through again.

Actually loved this game; and the DLC.

And anyone dismissing it because of the graphics? Thick and I guarantee if it was on Playstation you wouldn’t be so quick to overlook it.

I didn't even know VS was on Xbox. It's free on iOS and it plays great on mobile. Simple but effective design, reminds me of what games used to be (and to be clear, I'm not saying it's what games should be today but one of these every once in a while is great)

@trev666 every company in this world does some form of exclusive this how they get u to their platforms.

Man some of these salty comments. Vampire survivors is great. The amount of enemies on screen couldn't work on the old 8 and 16 bit machines. So in many ways it is a modern game.

I'm currently playing it. Loads of fun but I wouldn't award it goty. Lacks gameplay for me, you just use the left stick. I was actually watching a youtube video yesterday whilst playing and got 6 achievements with half an eye on the screen. Still had another go though.

@Sakisa Totally agree it does seem that sony has bred a bit of snobbery this gen. Vampire survivors is probably one of the few games I would play if I had an xbox. I might be given an xbox one this weekend so maybe able to have a go. Shame there is no word on whether this is coming to Playstion or not.

Vampire Survivors is an interesting choice; it is a FANTASTIC game (I have it on iPhone) but I would've preferred ER to take it personally.

But really if anyone hasn't tried VS and doesn't have an Xbox it is FREE on mobile phones!

EDIT: Also the soundtrack is... ughh.... it's unbelievably good.

Nice game...

but both GoW2 & Elden Ring are much, much better (as we all know).

Seriously Never heard of it until now and I'll probably never hear of it again unless it comes playstation ha ha

it was a fun game for a week, after that its pretty repetitive and boring in all honesty.

solid title but other smaller titles werebetter imo

Ugh really 🙄 so a game that looks like its been typed into a spectrum, from crash magazine ,wins best game ,well thats nice for them i suppose,bit of a kick in the teeth for all the other,far far far far better games.

@K1LLEGAL but its really really boring

@tallythwack at least you tried it to come to that conclusion. Obviously most people disagree. Just a shame when someone writes it off without trying it!

@ItsBritneyB_tch you basically move about trying to avoid various different coloured blobs ,that slightly resemble creatures of the night ,each level increases more creatures of the night,and you get different weapons,to move about the screen with,I found it very tedious ,but fair play to the fella that made it, he's made some cash ,and his next game will also ,then its back to stacking shelves at asda ,because people wouldve had enough.

@C25CLOUD like i said in comment 10 " if you buy the studio fine its yours to with as you please"

thats fine you own the game

@Sakisa ive played it ,been playing games for decades ,use to play games like this when I was a kid ,its monotonous crap in my opinion, but hey ho,some people like it,because you know,retro and that,its a high score game ,thats it,its very tedious, again in my opinion.

@K1LLEGAL yeah I gave it a go ,cant have an opinion on something if you don't experience it, it hurt my eyes,ive been playing elden ring lately ,im actually getting ok at it ,I dont really see what all the fuss is about ,its an incoherent mess ,with basic combat ,ive no idea what I'm doing,no idea where I'm going most of the time ,but the creature designs are superb ,the atmosphere and music are top notch,so ill stick with it ,until ff16 comes out anyway 😁

No kidding it's popular! Feels like half of the new games on Steam these days is a VS clone.

Breaking news!
The large smug cloud was just seen passing through the Push Square comments section. Experts are advising everyone stay indoors & keep their windows closed.

All the ppl saying it doesn't look like my type of game .....I thought that too , 60 hours later and a 100 % completion ....yeh I was very wrong

If this had been a ps exclusive everyone here would be prasing the crap out of it

If the so called gamers want to miss a amazing game because of what console it's on that's your choice

I said this would be a GOTY contender last May when I first played this on Steam during it's early access. People thought I was crazy. I feel pretty satisfied right now.

Loadsa hate for an indie game that not many have played or heard of.. MAYBE it won because it's better than the rest,MAYBE the best game of the year?? I think we should at least play it before we slag it off folks..

@StrawberryWave boohoo. A small indie game thats done well, thats not on playstation.
This is outrageous and the xbox/activision deal should not go ahead because of this!

I downloaded this on my phone, tried it, it didn't hook me. Not at all sure how it's meant to be better than Elden Ring but oh well.

I don't think games like this should win game of the year.

@STOBO why? That’s horribly unfair to indie developers.

Chris and Dustin on Sacred Symbols were gushing about Vampire Survivors. I looked at gameplay footage and screenshots before and I had the same first impression a lot of people have — it looks so basic and forgettable. But Chris said he felt the same and then absolutely fell for it once he started actually playing it. Apparently the garlic attack is awesome? 😅
Anyway, seeing it’s free on mobile, I actually think I’ll try it out. I detest mobile gaming and free-to-play nonsense, and am not at all enamored with retro-style gaming, but I’m willing to be convinced.

I read the title and thought it was Tunic. Could have sworn Tunic won something, and I’ve heard of Tunic. May b a Switch exclusive?🤷🏻‍♂️

Going back under my rock now…

It's quite refreshing that such a game can win best game over some big budget AAA release. Personally my only experience of it is on mobile and I didn't get on too great with it, although that's a personal preference thing on not liking touchscreen controls. I feel I would quite enjoy it with a controller.

The game is addicting, yes, but for a console hardware there's no way that game is game of the year 😕

Where are people getting their information on VS being a paid exclusive? Just because a game is on one platform and not the other, doesn’t mean it was a timed exclusivity deal.

@NinjaNicky Vampire Survivors is a "proper" game

It is one of the most addictively fun games I have ever played. I don't have a problem with it winning over the "technically advanced" games.

Very entertaining game all round.

Admittedly, growing up with a few similarly styled, albeit much smaller scale equivalents back in the C64 and Speccy days, I did wonder if this was just a "retro love-in" than a genuinely good game, but they have taken that "old" style and added modern gaming methods to create a genuinely enjoyable title, one that rewards improvement and progress.

Would I personally have it as game of the year? maybe not, with some of the technical feats also out there, but the amount of gatekeeping going on, is quite something..

I'm so glad BAFTA finally got around to awarding the 1985 GOTY! Atari exclusives do it again!

Seriously though, I apparently live under a rock, I'd never heard of this game. Maybe I saw the name here or there but otherwise never saw much about it. Or just didn't notice it. Even on PXB. I had to google what it was from this article. Kind of laughed when I saw it. This can't seriously be the BAFTA winner?! So I decided to try it on GP, had to search for it, it doesn't even show up in the "most popular" list....it's not as popular as is implied here apparently.

Honestly.....it's good. It's really good, and I would not have seen that coming. It's simple. You just move the stick, you don't even push buttons to attack, it's automatic on timer. Visually it's terrible, but the gameplay loop is hard to describe it's basically a classic arcade game designed to get you putting another quarter in for "one more try", it's not a game you play for 4 hours a day for months. But it's that arcade machine you stick a quarter in every time you're waiting for a pizza and then try again and again after your pizza comes out. Kind of a blend of a rogue-lite, a bullet hell shmup, Diablo 1, tower defense, and a slot machine? and a beat-em up too?

Weird game, ugly game, but disturbingly addictive game. This is the kind of thing that made arcades what they were. I still don't know if BAFTA is out of their minds or not giving it GOTY, good as it is, there's a lot of other games that are probably a lot better.....but....it's a really fun arcade game regardless.

@rjejr Wrong year, Tunic was last year, but it wasn't on PS until later. Personally I didn't find Tunic to be as good as the hype. Same for Hades which has cool elements but it's still the same basic roguelike as all the others though. This game is pure arcade sugar high. I didn't expect that when I read this article.

This is probably up there with Elden Ring for me too. Both have their merits but it’s nice to see this win.

@clvr sorry, not gonna take the bait.

@naruball They ain't wrong though, thinking indies are inferior because they aren't comprised of bloated and drawn out cinematics or voice acting is a s*** take.

Also, most AAA music is ass, it's indies that pick up the slack in the music department if anything.

@naruball " can never quite reach the highs of excellent AAA games (in terms of music, graphics, voice acting, cinematic cutscenes, etc). ."

Sure, that's literally what defines "AAA", not the quality of the game but the elements you mention. Yet 35 years later people are still arguing and filing lawsuits about high score integrity over Donkey Kong cabinets, and and playing blackjack with a stack of 7 painted cards is a multi-trillion dollar industry causing actual psychological addiction. In fact the most popular and most played, and most profitable games are Candy Crush and Minecraft which have none of the above. AAA presentation is fun but it's really just one broad genre, and it's only one niche under the much larger gaming tent.

@Wheatly I don't think it has it's claws into me yet, But I only
knew of it's existence late last night when this article appeared and I checked it out to see what it even was, so I squeezed in a few rounds before bed and that's all I know of the game so far. The day is still young! I don't see it as something I spend a whole evening grinding for hundreds of hours, and yet I see myself picking it up and giving it "one more try" more regularly. I was pretty excited surviving for like 14 minutes in my third run, out of a 30 minute max, so I'm off to a good start. or it wants me to think I am, but I haven't even bought any upgrades yet. This was a new addiction I didn't know I needed until this article though. I'm interested in seeing how it plays as you start upgrading and unlocking characters.

I'm surprised you're so into it! I remember we were talking about VR and you weren't really excited about addictive indies and all, but you're a genuine VS addict!

@Wheatly If you find yourself drawn to games like Vampire Survivors, Stardew, Axiom, Dead Cells, etc, I think you'd probably find more to do than you think you would with VR, tbh.

People's complaints about VR having "no games" come mostly from people that don't think of those kinds of games as "real games", only GoW scale games. There's some short games, some medium games, almost no "long" games that aren't VR modes for 2D games (NMS, GT7). If you can be enamored by VS, you'd be enamored at those "short" VR games that are just as "short" as VS. In some ways thats the charm, these kinds experience are the big experiences, and there's a lack of interactive movies which I see as a plus.

I'm still trying to get myself into HFW, and I will be glued to TotK when it launches, but right now my gaming schedule has been consumed by playing those "small" PSVR games, plus the two " big" ones (NMS and GT7 make hours feel like minutes in VR....I've started not hitting the pulse drives and just spending the 10 minutes flying at impulse between planets and just gazing at the sights lol) but the roguelites (Cave Digger 2, Light Brigade) have that same "one more round" feel that VS does. In that sense I feel like VS is going to be a really good cloud streamed to my Kishi/phone/Retroid (like your Deck) addictive game to suppliment my VR addictive games

Obviously the barrier to entry is the true limiter....getting addicted to a $15 game versus spending $550 got get addicted to a $15 game is a whole other matter.

Game Pass made me relearn to appreciate indies, but VR has really put them ahead of AAAs for the most part for me of late.

I've completed Vampire Survivors in one breath. Never played better game on mobile. It is balancing on the edge with Hades, but while Hades is still bit random, Vampire Survivors can be pretty customizable at endgame. I think Playstation base (and especially PushSquare) can say nothing else than TLoU, GoWR and HFW like these are some kind of Gods in gaming Olympus. No, they aren't and there are thousands better games than these three, so don't be surprised...

This is ridiculous. It seems like a fun game but there are a ton of games of this exact same design on phone. I just so happened to start playing one called Heroes vs Hordes a few months before this game came out so I didn't play it because I had no need to. I understand really enjoying it because I was addicted to HvH for a couple weeks and still play a game or two every day but game of the year? I don't think so.

I live under a rock, I've never heard of it at all till now, either was I inclined to Google what it is lol.

@Unlucky13 It's so much better than it looks, and it looks like a charming, pixel castlevania. It's also free, so you may as well try it.

@Sakisa "They ain't wrong though, thinking indies are inferior because they aren't comprised of bloated and drawn out cinematics or voice acting is a s*** take.

Also, most AAA music is ass, it's indies that pick up the slack in the music department if anything."

Gotta love the irony. Thanks for the laugh.

@NEStalgia true, but if you think about it, Power Rangers is still talked about, even though it was a mediocre show. The acting was average to bad, the budget was small, etc (and don't get me started on the Kardashians, McDonald's etc). Just because something is popular or loved over the decades, it doesn't mean it's better than other things.
Popularity =/= quality
Some of the (arguably) best video games and movies were flops or underperformed

I've watched a lot of great indie movies. Many infinitely more interesting than big productions. But they could never compete with something like Lord of the Rings, which wouldn't have been the same without the enormous budget.

For me (emphasis on me, something that people are missing out for some reason), no indie movie can offer the complete experience that Lord of the Rings does. In video games, that's God of War. It has an excellent story (some don't like it, fair enough), which hits differently because of the immersion created by the amazing graphics, music, atmosphere. The action is top notch. The relationship between Kratos and Atreus is enhanced thanks to the overall presentation.

There is a game that I played years ago called "Thomas was alone". The narration is beautiful. The game is fun. But even when it talks about serious matters, like people being insecure about their appearance, I'm still looking at a square that is supposed to be a female with body issues.

So, between two great games (one indie, one AAA), I'd choose the one with the bigger budget. If the indie is more fun, then I'd definitely play that, obviously, unless the graphics are simply awful.

@naruball hollow knight and hades very much disagree with you

@LordBakemono in what sense?

People crapping on a game just because it's an indie and not a AAA game. People crapping on people for liking and/or prefering AAA games over indies. People thinking indie games are instantly inferior to AAA games. People thinking AAA games and their fan base are shallow and bland. People thinking it's dumb to want to play indie games on their powerful console. Gotta love comment section and appreciate the fact that they're snobs on both side of the Indie/AAA fence.

Add me to the list of people who has never heard of this game until reading this article, but good for it. All these awards are subjective not objective at the end of the day whether you agree with the winners or not so it's not something to get worked up over.

@naruball in the sense that indie games are incredible games capable of going toe to toe with AAA games, hades and hollow knight (just to name two examples) are excellent games in terms of gameplay, graphics, voice acting and story, more so than a lot of supposed AAA titles

A proper video game win GOTY and some gamers try to claim it’s not a proper video game even though they haven’t played it.

Yep that sounds about right.

@LordBakemono sure, buddy.

@K1LLEGAL I just never heard of it.

@LordBakemono

Yeah I don’t get that take. Indie music is usually very good.

Cadence of Hyrule has the best soundtrack I’ve listened to in years and it’s an indie title using the Zelda license.

That Dark World theme remix is AMAZING. It’s perfect club music.

@RonCorleone

The voice of reason.

By the way, love the profile picture. Sisko was the best captain.

I’ve never heard of this game but it looks very interesting.

If it comes to PlayStation I’ll give it a try.

@NEStalgia I went away for a week and forgot Vampire Survivor was a thing. 😂