The best game to use a style, a combination of artstyle and sound design, that makes it stand out from the beige of normality
Please excuse the aesthetic choice of this year’s GOTY graphics. After the highs of 2024, it had to take a more subdued, simpler design for this year.
But that doesn’t mean we care less about aesthetics. No. Best Aesthetic continues to be one of the longer deliberations the team goes through. When the shortlist of nominees all carry a different aesthetic choice, defining what’s best each year is always a challenge we love taking on.
For 2025, the indie games are in full force, bringing in various choice of style and aesthetic.
Past Winners: Mullet MadJack (2024), Hi-Fi Rush (2023), Need For Speed Unbound (2022), Psychonauts 2 (2021), Cyberpunk 2077 (2020), Hypnospace Outlaw (2019), Dragon Ball FighterZ (2018), Persona 5 (2017)
Best Aesthetic Nominees
- #DRIVE Rally
- Blue Prince
- Easy Delivery Co.
- Mars First Logistics
- Skate Story
How The Winner Is Decided (Deliberations Summary)
It may surprise some of you how Blue Prince managed to sneak in here. While its use of cel-shading is admittedly down-the-mill, it’s the little details that makes it quite the aesthetic. From the handwritten notes to the posh early 19th century American luxury architecture. Just something about how it all adds up piqued the team’s interest, enough to have it be part of the nominees.
Mars First Logistics pops the brightest here for its jovial, optimistic space-age vibe, paired with that Moebius-like art shading that gives this handmade inking look. It’s also kind of a not-Lego game when you enter the editor with its light blue background and upbeat, whimsy music.
#Drive Rally gets a good nod for being the low-poly warrior in the party of five here. A modern style of Virtua Racing’s chunky (which at the time was high-fidelity) polygons certainly lends it a spot here, but not quite enough to win our hearts for the main prize.
Easy Delivery Co. holds the fort for nostalgic PS1/PS2 era vibes. It’s a crustier version of low-poly graphics, more faithful to the looks of a PS1 game, with the music sensibilities of that era too. Shout out to drum n bass and jungle, which are having a resurgence right now, right on cue too—it’s been 20 years or so since the days of games with this music genre were popular.
2025 has a clear winner for Best Aesthetic, the clearest since the award category’s inception. There’s just one game that just created its own brand of aesthetic. Inspired by various cultures and aesthetic choices of course, but it’s not recreation of a style, it’s a creation of style. The core visuals of skateboarding culture is mashed together into a NYC-iefied vision of hell, and it’s the most creative video game aesthetic of those in this list. And so it shall win.
Best Aesthetic Winner
Congratulations to Skate Story for winning Best Aesthetic! The trippiest trip a skateboarder can get is one hell of a looker, and a sounder. The music bangs too.
Check out the Gamer Malaya and Gamer Matters Game Of The Year Awards 2025 hub for full list of awards.