Resident Evil Requiem won Ultimate Game of the Year at the Golden Joystick Awards 2026, MECCHA CHAMELEON took four awards and The Witcher 4 was voted Most Wanted. Full winners list, plus why GTA 6 wasn’t eligible.
Resident Evil Requiem won Ultimate Game of the Year at the Golden Joystick Awards 2026, MECCHA CHAMELEON took four awards and The Witcher 4 was voted Most Wanted. Full winners list, plus why GTA 6 wasn’t eligible.
Stacey
Resident Evil Requiem is the big winner of the Golden Joystick Awards 2026. Capcom’s horror sequel took Ultimate Game of the Year at the 44th annual show in London on Nov. 11, plus Console Game of the Year, Best Game Trailer and Best Lead Performer, while Capcom was named Studio of the Year. Indie surprise MECCHA CHAMELEON matched it with four trophies, Crimson Desert won PC Game of the Year, and The Witcher 4 was voted Most Wanted Game. GTA 6 wasn’t on the ballot at all. Here is the full winners list and why Rockstar’s game sat this one out.
The Golden Joysticks are often called the “People’s Gaming Awards” because most categories are decided by public vote. This year 25 trophies were handed out, and 22 of them were voted on by players, according to FullCleared’s winners and nominees list. The ceremony was held at the Troxy in London, and GamesBeat notes it was presented by Pot Noodle.
TheGamer published part of the final Ultimate Game of the Year vote split, and it was close: Resident Evil Requiem finished first with 17%, just ahead of Phantom Blade Zero on 16% and Crimson Desert on 15%, with Control Resonant fourth and The Blood of Dawnwalker fifth.
Here is every category and its winner, based on the lists published by GamesBeat and FullCleared.
Streamers’ Choice, Developers’ Choice and Critics’ Choice are the three critically chosen awards. Everything else was a public vote.
Requiem’s four wins came across both the fan vote and the craft categories, and Capcom’s Studio of the Year win was backed up by Onimusha: Way of the Sword taking Best Audio Design and PRAGMATA’s Grace Saif taking Best Supporting Performer. Altogether, Capcom games and the studio itself collected seven trophies on the night.
GamesBeat called MECCHA CHAMELEON a “sleeper indie hit.” It won Best Multiplayer Game and Best Self-Published Indie from the public, then swept two of the three critically chosen prizes, Streamers’ Choice and Developers’ Choice. Dispatch was the only other game with more than one win, taking Best Storytelling and Best Soundtrack.
Before the awards began, host Alix Wilton Regan, who voiced characters in Dragon Age: Inquisition and Mass Effect 3, spoke in support of the now-closed BioWare. “So many of us watching tonight stand on their extraordinary shoulders,” she said, as reported by GamesBeat. The same report points out that DOOM: The Dark Ages winning Best Game Expansion landed with a bittersweet note, given the layoffs at id Software earlier this year.
CD Projekt Red picked up Most Wanted Game for The Witcher 4 and Best Remake / Remaster for The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt – Remastered. The Most Wanted vote is a crowded field every year; TheGamer’s breakdown lists Resident Evil Veronica second with 10% and Fable third with 8%.
If you watched and wondered where Rockstar was, the answer is the calendar. GamesRadar explains that games had to release between Nov. 1, 2025 and Sept. 25, 2026 to be nominated in the main categories, with the Ultimate Game of the Year window extended to Oct. 25. GTA 6 launches Nov. 19, eight days after the ceremony, so voters couldn’t have played it.
It was technically eligible for Most Wanted Game, but it wasn’t nominated. GamesRadar notes Rockstar had already won that award in 2024 and 2025, and the wait is nearly over. If you are getting ready for launch week, our guide to GTA 6 pre-load times and file size covers what you need before Nov. 19, and Rockstar’s GTA VI: The Festival in Miami follows on Nov. 21.
Missing the Joysticks has one consequence for award watchers. Polygon points out that GTA 6 now can’t win all of the “Big Five” Game of the Year awards (the Golden Joysticks, The Game Awards, DICE, GDC and BAFTA) in a single season, a sweep only Baldur’s Gate 3 and Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 have managed. It is eligible for The Game Awards on Dec. 10 and for the 2027 Golden Joysticks.
The Golden Joysticks are the first major Game of the Year show of the season, so fans treat them as an early signal. Resident Evil Requiem, Crimson Desert, Phantom Blade Zero and Dispatch all go into December with momentum. The difference is that The Game Awards are mostly jury-voted rather than fan-voted, and GTA 6 will be eligible there, which could change the picture completely.
Several of these winners are also easy to try right now through subscriptions. Our roundup of PS Plus Extra and Premium games for November 2026 and the Xbox 25th anniversary Game Pass lineup are good places to check what is in your library this month.
Resident Evil Requiem won Ultimate Game of the Year, the show’s top prize. It also won Console Game of the Year, Best Game Trailer and Best Lead Performer.
The 44th Golden Joystick Awards took place on Nov. 11, 2026 at the Troxy in London.
Resident Evil Requiem and MECCHA CHAMELEON tied with four awards each. Dispatch won two.
It releases on Nov. 19, 2026, after the eligibility windows (Sept. 25 for most categories and Oct. 25 for Ultimate Game of the Year) had closed. It will be eligible for the 2027 Golden Joysticks.
The Witcher 4 won Most Wanted Game, taking over from GTA 6, which won the category in 2024 and 2025.
Featured image: Troxy, Limehouse, London, by Doyle of London via Wikimedia Commons, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.
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