The 2025 Independent Games Festival Awards finalists have arrived, led by another deeply personal story about one's relationship with food.
Organizers of the 2025 Game Developers Conference have unveiled this year's finalists and honorable mentions for the 26th annual IGF Awards, part of the longest-running festival, summit, and showcase celebrating independent games their creators. This year's ceremony takes place on Wednesday, March 19 at 6:30pm PT. GDC attendees are invited (and encouraged!) to attend, no matter their pass level. It will also be available to watch on GDC Twitch.
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Jenny Jiao Hsia's Consume Me leads with five nominations: Excellence in Design, Excellence in Narrative, Excellence in Visual Art, the Nuovo Award, and the Seumas McNally Grand Prize. Developed with AP Thomson, Jie En Lee, Violet W-P, Ken "coda" Snyder, Consume Me is a darkly humorous personal game about Jenny Jiao Hsia's relationship with food. This game, which started as a collection of prototypes, draws from her past experiences with dieting and disordered eating. It follows last year's Seumas McNally Grand Prize winner, Venba, which was a narrative cooking game about food and family.
Panic's Despelote, from creators Julián Cordero and Sebastian Valbuena, is nominated in four categories: Excellence in Audio, Excellence in Narrative, the Nuovo Award, and the Seumas McNally Grand Prize. It's a slice-of-life adventure about childhood and the magical grip soccer held over the people of Quito, Ecuador in 2001.
Consume Me and Despelote are followed by three other titles with three nominations each: INDIKA (Odd Meter / 11 bit studios), Caves of Qud (Freehold Games / Kitfox Games), and Thank Goodness You're Here! (Coal Supper / Panic), which also has an honorable mention for Excellence in Narrative. All of these games have been nominated for the Seumas McNally Grand Prize, alongside Mossmouth's UFO 50.
This year's nominees were selected from a list of almost 500 entries, thanks to the hard work of our expert juries in each individual category, who chose the finalists after playing, discussing, and meticulously evaluating each of the games in consideration. Be sure to submit your vote for the IGF Audience Award! Voting will close on January 31 at 11:59pm PT.
The Independent Games Festival is part of GDC 2025, which will be held in San Francisco March 17-21.
Here is the full list of finalists for each category of the 2025 IGF Awards, along with the honorable mentions:
Best Student Game
A Dual Ascent (Mountain Toad Entertainment / Rubika Supinfogame)
DisplaceMen (Eversea Club / leafaleaves)
Growth Spurt: A Meandering Intermission into the Afterhours of a Miscalculation (Games for my Computer)
Slot Waste (Vinny Roca / pickpanpuck productions)
The WereCleaner (Howlin' Hugs / USC Games)
Year Unknown (Julian Heuser)
Honorable Mentions: Cards of Heart (GoodMind Games), Duck Paradox (Magic Games / Midwest Games), Lost Garden (Ori Shany, Yoni Pushett, Ramon Zerem), Perfect World (Michael Overton Brown), Timeworks (Starworks Studios)
Excellence in Audio
Anger Foot (Free Lives / Devolver Digital)
Despelote (Julián Cordero, Sebastian Valbuena / Panic)
INDIKA (Odd Meter / 11 bit studios)
ODDADA (Sven Ahlgrimm, Mathilde Hoffmann, Bastian Clausdorff)
Thank Goodness You're Here! (Coal Supper / Panic)
Utopia Must Fall (Pixeljam)
Honorable Mentions: Animal Well (Billy Basso / Bigmode), Mouthwashing (Wrong Organ / CRITICAL REFLEX), Pacific Drive (Ironwood Studios / Kepler Interactive), Rise of the Golden Idol (Color Gray Games / Playstack), UFO 50 (Mossmouth)
Excellence in Design
Balatro (LocalThunk / Playstack)
Blue Prince (Dogubomb / Raw Fury)
Caves of Qud (Freehold Games / Kitfox Games)
Consume Me (Jenny Jiao Hsia, AP Thomson, Jie En Lee, Violet W-P, Ken "coda" Snyder)
Pacific Drive (Ironwood Studios / Kepler Interactive)
Tactical Breach Wizards (Suspicious Developments)
Honorable Mentions: Animal Well (Billy Basso / Bigmode), No Case Should Remain Unsolved (Somi), UFO 50 (Mossmouth), LOK Digital (Letibus Design, Icedrop Games / Draknek and Friends), Eigengrau (Martin Mauersics), The Rise of the Golden Idol (Color Gray Games / Playstack)
Excellence in Narrative
Caves of Qud (Freehold Games / Kitfox Games)
Closer the Distance (Osmotic Studios / Skybound Games)
Consume Me (Jenny Jiao Hsia, AP Thomson, Jie En Lee, Violet W-P, Ken "coda" Snyder)
Despelote (Julián Cordero, Sebastian Valbuena / Panic)
INDIKA (Odd Meter / 11 bit studios)
No Case Should Remain Unsolved (Somi)
Honorable Mentions: Blue Prince (Dogubomb / Raw Fury), Miniatures (Other Tales Interactive), Mouthwashing (Wrong Organ / CRITICAL REFLEX), Tactical Breach Wizards (Suspicious Developments), Thank Goodness You're Here! (Coal Supper / Panic), The Thaumaturge (Fool's Theory / 11 bit studios)
Excellence in Visual Arts
Children of the Sun (René Rother / Devolver Digital)
Consume Me (Jenny Jiao Hsia, AP Thomson, Jie En Lee, Violet W-P, Ken "coda" Snyder)
Hauntii (Moonloop Games / Firestoke)
Judero (Talha and Jack Co, J. King-Spooner, Talha Kaya)
Nine Sols (RedCandleGames)
Thank Goodness You're Here! (Coal Supper / Panic)
Honorable Mentions: Crow Country (SFB Games), Death of the Reprobate (Joe Richardson), Miniatures (Other Tales Interactive), Tiny Glade (Pounce Light), Ultros (Hadoque / Kepler Interactive)
Nuovo Award
Consume Me (Jenny Jiao Hsia, AP Thomson, Jie En Lee, Violet W-P, Ken "coda" Snyder)
Despelote (Julián Cordero, Sebastian Valbuena / Panic)
Extreme Evolution: Drive to Divinity (Sam Atlas)
Ginger (Kevin Du / lizu ktap)
individualism in the dead-internet age: an anti-big tech asset flip shovelware rant manifesto (alienmelon)
Starship Home (Creature)
tapeçaria (tapestry) (mut/moochi (with help from plunderludics working group))
The Exit 8 (KOTAKE CREATE / Active Gaming Media Inc)
Honorable Mentions: Arctic Eggs (The Water Museum, cockydoody, abmarnie, Cameron Ginex / CRITICAL REFLEX) , Judero (Talha and Jack Co, J. King-Spooner, Talha Kaya), Onto Maizilind Unto Infinity (Kas Ghobadi, Julián Palacios Gechtman / Kasrah Ghobadi), Price of Flight (WATERBOX), Project Y (Project_Y Production Committee), Refind Self: The Personality TestGame (Lizardry / PLAYISM)
Seumas McNally Grand Prize
Caves of Qud (Freehold Games / Kitfox Games)
Consume Me (Jenny Jiao Hsia, AP Thomson, Jie En Lee, Violet W-P, Ken "coda" Snyder)
Despelote (Julián Cordero, Sebastian Valbuena / Panic)
INDIKA (Odd Meter / 11 bit studios)
Thank Goodness You're Here! (Coal Supper / Panic)
UFO 50 (Mossmouth)
Honorable Mentions: Animal Well (Billy Basso / Bigmode), Balatro (LocalThunk / Playstack), Blue Prince (Dogubomb / Raw Fury), Mouthwashing (Wrong Organ / CRITICAL REFLEX), Nine Sols (RedCandleGames) , Tactical Breach Wizards (Suspicious Developments)
The Independent Games Festival Awards will take place Wednesday, March 19 on the Main Stage at GDC 2025, and will be available to watch live for free via the GDC Twitch channel. For those eager to see the awards for themselves, make sure to buy a pass for GDC 2024!
GDC returns this March 17-21, 2025, and our Early Rate is currently live (for a limited time)! For more information, be sure to visit our website and follow the #GDC2025 hashtag on social media.
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