The award is a testament to the ongoing achievements of developer Team Asobi. The studio is known for the Astro Bot series, a franchise of games that has historically been used to demonstrate PlayStation tech. The free game Astro’s Playroom showed off the unique capabilities of the PlayStation 5, and was released as a free game on the console. Astro Bot, a standalone title that built upon the team’s work in Playroom, showed that a smaller PlayStation studio was capable of creating a platformer that could rival the best Nintendo games.
There wasn’t a clear frontrunner for the Game of Year award in 2024. The list of nominations collected an eclectic group of games. This year, the jury nominated the indie card game Balatro, alongside the DLC for Elden Ring. Sony had a strong year since two first-party games, Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth, and Astro Bot were nominated. Astro Bot and Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth led the pack with seven nominations each. Before the show, Polygon predicted that the PlayStation-branded 3D platformer, Astro Bot, would win.