More than in past years, the 2023 Game Awards felt chock-full of world premieres, trailers, and updates on some of the biggest games in the industry. There were also, of course, awards given out and some great speeches from the evening’s winners (even if they weren’t given the time they deserved). But even with all that going on, there were still several conspicuous no-shows. Here are the six biggest games that surprisingly didn’t appear at the 2023 Game Awards, despite how hotly anticipated they are and their history of showing up at the Game Awards.
Death Stranding 2
The sequel to Kojima Productions' first game was revealed at the 2022 Game Awards with a luxurious four-minute trailer. But it has been a year with no more information on the game being released, leaving fans to anticipate a potential trailer at this year’s awards. Kojima did show up during the show to reveal a new trailer, but the big surprise was that it wasn’t for Death Stranding 2. Instead, Kojima announced OD, a new project in partnership with Xbox and Jordan Peele, starring actors including Hunter Schafer (Euphoria).
Hades 2
Supergiant Games' next project has a very similar situation to Death Stranding 2. Hades 2 was announced during the 2022 awards show, but we haven’t seen anything from the game since then. While the original reveal trailer promised we would learn more about early access in 2023, that came in the form of a development update on the studio’s blog revealing early access is planned for Q2 of 2024. Like Death Stranding 2, fans expecting to hear more about Hades 2 at the 2023 show were left wanting. The game was nominated for Most Anticipated Game but lost out to Final Fantasy VII Rebirth.
Fable & Perfect Dark
Ahead of the 2023 Game Awards, Xbox told fans in a newsletter to expect “important announcements.” Ahead of the awards, many fans theorized that this would mean more news about the upcoming Fable reboot that we last saw at this year's Xbox Games Showcase in June. Fable has been in a very long development process and the Games Showcase trailer felt like the start of a new push signaling the game may be coming out sooner rather than later. However, with no trailer at the 2023 Game Awards, there is no telling when the game may be released.
Another (much less likely) candidate to appear was the Perfect Dark reboot in development at the Initiative and Crystal Dynamics. Announced at the 2020 Game Awards, the reboot has had a troubled development and — according to an IGN report from June — “is still years away.”
The big Xbox announcements that did appear at the 2023 Game Awards were Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II and the reveal of OD.
Hollow Knight: Silksong
It wouldn’t be a big gaming event without the absence of Hollow Knight: Silksong. It’s been four years since Silksong was announced and since then information on the hotly anticipated sequel has been infrequent at best. It has become somewhat of a meme to expect an update on Silksong at the next big gaming showcase only to be disappointed by its inevitable absence. But surely the 2023 Game Awards would be different!?
Well, they weren’t. Silksong did not appear. The latest update we have from developer Team Cherry is that Silksong was intended to be released in the first half of 2023 but that development is still continuing and the project does not currently have a release date.
Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree
Last year, FromSoftware’s Elden Ring won Game of the Year, and on top of releasing Armored Core VI this year, the studio also announced DLC for Elden Ring. Shadow of the Erdtree was announced in February and we haven’t seen or heard anything about the expansion outside of a single piece of concept art. Considering FromSoftware’s constant presence at the Game Awards, many expected to see the first trailer for the DLC at the 2023 show. Alas, we Tarnished must continue to wait.
