Over a Third of Viewers Rate This Years The Game Awards Low, Despite High Viewership Numbers

Nearly 39% of participants in Geoff Keighley’s survey on X rated this year’s Game Awards with a D grade or lower. Despite this, the broadcast once again attracted a substantial audience and achieved impressive viewership numbers.

The contrast with last year is quite stark. During that event, 44.4% of viewers rated the show as «excellent» (A), while only 16.1% expressed complete dissatisfaction (D and below). In the recent poll, which saw over 404,000 respondents, only 15.1% gave the highest rating, whereas a striking 38.9% opted for lower scores.

However, negative ratings did not prevent the ceremony from accumulating millions of views. At its peak, The Game Awards’ official YouTube channel garnered over 1.3 million concurrent viewers. As of the time of writing, the replay of the broadcast has nearly 11 million views. Keighley is likely to release the final figures soon, and the show is expected to surpass last year’s stats once again.

In the comments section of the survey, many praised the production quality and visuals but criticized the pacing, particularly toward the end. A user on X named Synth Potato, whose comment received over 26,000 likes, wryly observed that ending the show with an announcement for a hypothetically free hero shooter seemed questionable.

Some viewers felt that the last hour of the program dragged on and lacked exciting surprises, while the first two hours were regarded as successful and packed with events.

The audience at StopGame.ru also had mixed feelings about the recent show. In a poll concerning the award results, 28% of readers agreed with the outcomes, the same percentage believed that other nominees should have won, and 44% were only willing to accept the victors in a few categories.

Criticism of The Game Awards is not new. The ceremony is frequently accused of becoming more like an advertising showcase. Keighley himself acknowledges that finding the right balance between awards, trailers, and commercial integrations is extremely challenging. According to industry reports, featuring a single trailer during the show can cost over one million dollars, making it hard to strike a balance between engaging content and commercial interests at such prices.