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The Game Awards 2025 nominees have been revealed, and a lot of fans are miffed that Arc Raiders has been snubbed for Best Audio Design. YouTuber and Twitch streamer, MoiDawg, called out Geoff Keighley’s event as “not a serious awards show” because of his belief that “ARC Raiders has the most immersive audio in gaming and it’s not even close”.
In addition to MoiDawg, Jaqub Ajmal, player relations manager for Sharkmob Games, said, “No best audio nomination for Arc Raiders is a COMPLETE joke. It’s the best audio design ever made”.
YouTuber and Twitch partner, Bigfry, added to the uproar, criticising the nomination for Battlefield 6 over Embark’s extraction shooter. This is a sentiment echoed by many, with a lot of people feeling Arc Raiders’ sound design is massively superior to Battlefield 6.
Forbes journalist, Paul Tassi, shared his belief that Embark’s snub is “punishment” for their controversial use of AI. Design director, Virgil Watkins, has said there’s “no generative AI whatsoever,” but the game does use the same text-to-speech system used in The Finals.
Watkins clarified that Embark did “hire and contract voice actors,” and it was “part of their contract that we use [AI for] things like our ping system, where it’s capable of saying every single item name, every single location name, and compass directions”. Despite Watkins’ justification, Embark’s use of AI has been very divisive.
Eurogamer released a review full of praise for the extraction shooter, but they marked it down to a 2/5 score specifically because of its use of AI. This resulted in a lot of backlash and it prompted Nexon’s CEO to defend Embark and say, “it’s important to assume every game company is using AI,” which only resulted in more backlash.
Arc Raiders Game Awards 2025 Nominations
Although snubbed for Best Audio Design, Arc Raiders is nominated for Best Multiplayer Game. Geoff Keighley’s Game Awards is set for December 11th, and Embark will be competing against Battlefield 6, Elden Ring Nightreign, Peak, and Split Fiction.
You can vote for Arc Raiders in the Best Multiplayer Game category online. However, you should know that fan vote is only accounted for 10% of the final result with 90% belonging to a jury of industry professionals.
Regardless of what happens next month, right now Embark’s newest release has been a massive success. It’s once again broken its player count record on Steam, crushing both Black Ops 7 and Battlefield 6 in the process. Meanwhile, it has amazingly sold over four million copies since releasing on October 30th.
It’s also important to remember that the game is still very much in its infancy. Embark has teased “ambitious post-launch plans” for 2026, and they have also said they internally consider the game a “10-year” project.
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