Quick answer: Resident Evil Requiem won Ultimate Game of the Year at the Golden Joystick Awards 2026 on November 11 in London. It also won Console Game of the Year, Best Game Trailer and Best Lead Performer for Angela Sant’Albano, and Capcom was named Studio of the Year. Meccha Chameleon tied Requiem with four wins. Current as of November 11, 2026.
Resident Evil Requiem is the Golden Joysticks’ Ultimate Game of the Year. GamesRadar+ crowned Capcom’s survival horror sequel on Wednesday at the Troxy in London, where the 44th Golden Joystick Awards handed out 25 trophies. Requiem beat 11 other finalists for the top prize, including Phantom Blade Zero, Crimson Desert, 007 First Light and Big Walk.
It was close. TheGamer’s winners list puts Requiem on 17% of the Ultimate Game of the Year vote, Phantom Blade Zero on 16% and Crimson Desert on 15%. One point separated first and second in the one category every publisher wants on the box.
Capcom’s big night
Requiem walked away with four awards: Ultimate Game of the Year, Console Game of the Year, Best Game Trailer and Best Lead Performer for Angela Sant’Albano, who plays Grace Ashcroft. Capcom also won Studio of the Year, and TheGamer reports it took 57% of that vote, the most lopsided result of the night. Pragmata’s Grace Saif won Best Supporting Performer and Onimusha: Way of the Sword won Best Audio Design, so Capcom games collected six trophies before you even count the studio award.
That caps a strong year for the publisher. Requiem had already reached 8.51 million copies by the end of September, and the Resident Evil movie passed $400 million at the box office.
The two person game that matched it
Requiem did not win the most awards outright. Meccha Chameleon, the viral hide and seek game where you paint yourself into the scenery, also won four: Best Multiplayer Game, Best Indie Game (Self-Published), the Streamers’ Choice Award and the Developers’ Choice Award. GamesRadar+ says it was made by just two developers. Two of those wins came from the fan vote and two from jury panels.
Golden Joystick Awards 2026: every winner
- Ultimate Game of the Year: Resident Evil Requiem
- Console Game of the Year: Resident Evil Requiem
- PC Game of the Year: Crimson Desert
- Studio of the Year: Capcom
- Critics’ Choice Award: Big Walk
- Most Wanted Game: The Witcher 4
- Best Storytelling: Dispatch
- Best Soundtrack: Dispatch
- Best Visual Design: Control Resonant
- Best Audio Design: Onimusha: Way of the Sword
- Best Lead Performer: Angela Sant’Albano (Resident Evil Requiem)
- Best Supporting Performer: Grace Saif (Pragmata)
- Best Game Trailer: Resident Evil Requiem
- Best Multiplayer Game: Meccha Chameleon
- Best Indie Game (Self-Published): Meccha Chameleon
- Best Indie Game: Valheim
- Streamers’ Choice Award: Meccha Chameleon
- Developers’ Choice Award: Meccha Chameleon
- Best Game Expansion: Doom: The Dark Ages, Revelations
- Best Remake or Remaster: The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt Remastered
- Best Early Access Game: Subnautica 2
- Best Game Adaptation: Iron Lung
- Best Gaming Hardware: Steam Controller
- Still Playing Award (PC and Console): Minecraft
- Still Playing Award (Mobile): Balatro
Winners are from GamesRadar+, which runs the show. Vote shares are from TheGamer’s live list.
What it means for The Game Awards
Last year Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 won almost everything at the Golden Joysticks and kept winning all the way through awards season. This year looks nothing like that. Requiem won by a single point, and more than a dozen different games took home a trophy. Phantom Blade Zero came within a whisker of the top prize despite only launching on October 29, one day before voting closed, and it won nothing else on the night.
Our read: Requiem goes into December as the safest Game of the Year pick, since it now has a fan vote and a big early sales number behind it. But the Golden Joysticks are mostly a player vote, while The Game Awards is mostly decided by a media jury, and that jury has a new giant to think about. GTA 6 made The Game Awards 2026 cutoff by a single day, and it was not eligible here. If Rockstar’s game lands the way everyone expects, Requiem may end up as the year’s best horror game rather than its best game.
Did the right game win? Phantom Blade Zero fans will say a one point gap is basically a tie. Tell us who you voted for.
