GTA 6 Avoids an Awkward Situation by Officially Qualifying for 2026 Game Awards

I wish success to everyone who released games this year.

Good luck to everyone who released a game this year

Grand Theft Auto 6 Grand Theft Auto VI GTA 6 Rockstar Games TGA 2026 The Game Awards

There was confusion as to whether Grand Theft Auto 6, the most anticipated game release ever, would be eligible to compete at the show hosted by creator Geoff Keighley until the 2026 Game Awards. That's because it comes out on November 19, and the nominations for the awards ceremony are usually around the same time. If GTA 6 didn't make it to the finals, it would have been pushed to next year's Game Awards and would have had to contend with the 2027 games, roughly 12 months after the initial announcement. Here's why it won't end.

A section on the Game Rewards FAQ page lists the eligibility restrictions for the 2026 show, and it seems to be pretty much tailor-made for GTA 6:

Games should be commercially available to customers on Friday, November 20, 2026 at 9 p.m. PT. In the Player Voice category, games must be submitted on or before November 30, 2026.

As GTA 6 launches on November 19, it clears the first hurdle. It is worth noting that this cutoff date is much later than last year. For the 025 Game Awards, the nominations had already been released by November 17, so the entire voting phase was pushed back.

There is still another part of time to consider. Reviewers who vote on the awards (Kotaku does not participate) must also be able to play the games they vote for in order to comment on them. Each outlet handles this differently. Some distribute ballots and do so quite democratically. Others have specific senior people who choose which games to support. However, no one can play everything that's offered in a year, so it's often left to the one or two people who have actually reviewed or finished a game to decide whether it deserves a nomination for a particular category or whether it wins overall.

Rockstar Games has promoted GTA 6 as a long game with a huge map that will inspire multiple playthroughs, a huge task for any reviewer, but especially for any media outlet that wants to get multiple opinions on a game before giving their final vote for the game's awards. According to industry whistleblower NateTheHate, game codes may be released to media and developers before the end of October. This provides another piece of the puzzle in terms of outputs that have actually had enough time with GTA 6 to truly assess its quality.

By sneaking in just under the deadline, GTA 6 has entered one of the weaker GOTY fields in recent years. While Resident Evil Requiem and Control Resonant both received rave reviews, there aren't necessarily clear frontrunners like the past few years with The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, Elden Ring, and Baldur's Gate 3. People who waste their money on prediction markets are already giving GTA 6 a 68% chance of winning before anyone takes action.

There's only a month left to find out if Rockstar's latest release can live up to the hype.

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