The 2026 Gamescom Awards went out on Friday, August 28, across 19 categories at the Gamescom Studio powered by IGN. CD Projekt Red and SEGA finished tied at the top with three trophies each. Capcom and Ubisoft followed with two. The special HEART OF GAMING Award went to Games Done Quick, which ran its first European event on the show floor the same weekend.
The surprise of the night was not a brand-new IP. It was The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, an 11-year-old RPG still pulling crowds in Cologne through its remaster and the Songs of the Past expansion. Fans voted the remaster and DLC trailer Best Trailer / Announcement from Opening Night Live. They also voted the pin and medallion sold at the DLC booth as Best Merch. The jury separately named the Witcher booth Best Booth. That is a show-floor sweep more than a gameplay sweep. None of those three trophies is Best Game. All three say the same thing: the booth, the trailer, and the merch were the presence people remembered. Check out the Songs of the Past below:
The remaster for The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is scheduled for September 29, 2026. Existing owners on PC, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, Switch 2, and Battle.net are set to receive the upgrade at no extra charge, with Hearts of Stone and Blood & Wine included. Songs of the Past is slated for 2027 and points Geralt toward a new realm called Letten. That calendar helps explain why a 2015 game could still dominate a 2026 awards stage. The floor was selling a current product, not a museum piece.
SEGA matched CD Projekt Red’s count with a wider spread. Alien: Isolation 2 won Best Audio. Total War: WARHAMMER 40,000 won Best PC Game. The jury then handed SEGA Best Lineup for the range of titles it brought to the show. That third trophy is the one that separates a single hit from a publisher week. Creative Assembly supplied both of the individual game wins, which also says something about where SEGA’s Cologne strength sat this year.
Capcom’s Onimusha: Way of the Sword took Best Gameplay and Best Sony PlayStation Game. Those are the two categories that most directly reward what people actually played at the stand, and they landed on the same action title. Ubisoft split its pair between platforms and business. Rayman Legends Retold won Best Nintendo Switch 2 Game. The Ubisoft Business Lounge won Best Business Booth. One trophy is for a consumer platform pitch. The other is for how the company hosted partners behind the public halls.
The rest of the platform group filled in the map. Playground Games and Xbox Game Studios won Best Microsoft Xbox Game for Forza Horizon 6. Everstone Studio and NetEase Games won Best Mobile Game for Where Winds Meet. Consumer voters gave Best Booth to Arknights: Endfield from GRYPHLINE, which means the floor’s favorite stand and the jury’s favorite stand were not the same exhibit. Witcher won the judges. Endfield won the attendees.
The arts group spread further. METRO 2039 from 4A Games and Deep Silver won Best Visuals. Wanderburg from Randwerk and Sidekick Publishing won Most Entertaining. Tides of Annihilation from Eclipse Glow Games won Most Epic. Finding Polka from lidlocks and Parco Games won Most Wholesome. Games for Impact went to SOKO 1977: Anti-Terror Task Force from Paintbucket Games and Germany’s Federal Agency for Civic Education.
Games Done Quick’s HEART OF GAMING Award sat outside the usual publisher race. GDQ has raised more than $50 million for charity over the years through speedrunning marathons. Gamescom GDQ ran August 28 to 30, the first time the organization has staged a European event as part of the Cologne show. Donation and sponsorship proceeds this time go to Gaming for Democracy, an initiative tied to Bertelsmann Stiftung and Stiftung Digitale Spielekultur that uses games to push civic engagement. The award is a jury special, not a Best Game trophy, and it fits a Gamescom that has been leaning harder into public-facing programs around culture and democracy.
The awards themselves are a snapshot of the show, not a forecast of holiday sales. They reward what was playable, visible, or loud in Cologne that week: trailers, booths, merch, audio, and platform-specific demos. A remaster can win those categories without winning the year. A lineup award can flatter a publisher whose biggest games are still months away. That is why the Witcher haul and the SEGA haul can sit next to each other without contradiction. One studio owned the floor. The other owned the slate.
Full list of 2026 Gamescom award winners:
- Best Visuals: METRO 2039 (4A Games / Deep Silver)
- Best Audio: Alien: Isolation 2 (Creative Assembly / SEGA)
- Best Gameplay: Onimusha: Way of the Sword (Capcom)
- Most Entertaining: Wanderburg (Randwerk / Sidekick Publishing)
- Most Epic: Tides of Annihilation (Eclipse Glow Games)
- Most Wholesome: Finding Polka (lidlocks / Parco Games)
- Games for Impact: SOKO 1977: Anti-Terror Task Force (Paintbucket Games / Federal Agency for Civic Education)
- Best Microsoft Xbox Game: Forza Horizon 6 (Playground Games / Xbox Game Studios)
- Best PC Game: Total War: WARHAMMER 40,000 (Creative Assembly / SEGA)
- Best Sony PlayStation Game: Onimusha: Way of the Sword (Capcom)
- Best Nintendo Switch 2 Game: Rayman Legends Retold (Ubisoft)
- Best Mobile Game: Where Winds Meet (Everstone Studio / NetEase Games)
- Best Lineup (Jury): SEGA
- Best Booth (Jury): The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt – Songs of the Past (CD Projekt Red)
- Best Booth (Consumer): Arknights: Endfield (GRYPHLINE)
- Best Business Booth (Jury): Ubisoft Business Lounge
- Best Merch (Consumer): The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt – Songs of the Past pin and medallion (CD Projekt Red)
- Best Trailer / Announcement (Consumer): The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt Remastered and Songs of the Past DLC (CD Projekt Red)
- HEART OF GAMING (Special Jury): Games Done Quick
The next date that matters for the night’s biggest winner is already on the calendar. The Witcher 3 remaster hits September 29. Songs of the Past follows in 2027. Everything else on this list now has to turn a Cologne trophy into a launch.
What games or studios stood out the most for you at this years Gamescom? Do you agree with the votes and award winners? Let us know your thoughts in the comments.