GTA 6 might've won the "Most Wanted Game" award at the Golden Joysticks, but The Witcher 4 wasn't far behind

Ciri in The Witcher 4
(Image credit: CD Projekt Red)

It's the most wonderful time of the year – with the Golden Joystick Awards 2025 behind us and The Game Awards coming next month, voting is in the air as players scramble to ensure their favorite nominees bag some wins.

Long-awaited new games like Grand Theft Auto 6 – a title that, much to fans' dismay, saw yet another delay recently – and The Witcher 4 are no exception there. The former game did end up nabbing the "Most Wanted Game" award at the Golden Joystick event, unsurprisingly, but the latter was hot on its tail, apparently. In a new thread discussing every game's wins at the ceremony, the official Golden Joysticks account reveals as much.

It starts by laying out just how many votes players cast in total: "We had 21 million votes across 22 different categories." That's a lot, and keeping this number in mind, it makes GTA 6 look like it came in clutch with the Most Wanted Game win. As per the Golden Joysticks profile, 18.03% of voters picked the hotly anticipated Rockstar Games title. On the other hand, the new CD Projekt Red RPG followed closely behind with 16.68%.

Although it might not seem like it at first glance, that's seriously close for comfort – just consider the sheer amount of hype surrounding GTA 6. Heck, developers are literally actively opting to avoid releasing their own games anywhere near the date of Rockstar's 2026 launch. This is the very same GTA 6 that has been described as "a black cloud that looms over everything" previously, so… take that as you will.

As one fan comments on the Golden Joysticks post, "The Witcher 4 getting this close to GTA 6 is a big deal." Another dubs it "sus," simply writing, "It's fucking GTA 6." I mean, yeah, I guess they do have a point – but I, for one, am more excited for The Witcher 4, as an RPG stan myself. It's no Elder Scrolls 6, of course, but of all the upcoming CD Projekt Red games, it might just be the biggest… and that's no small feat.

CD Projekt Red is cooking up other gems, after all, like the mysterious codenamed Project Sirius, another Witcher title that the team says will "differ from past productions" it's worked on, and Cyberpunk 2. Between all of them and GTA 6, the next few years look huge.

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Anna Koselke
Staff Writer

After spending years with her head in various fantastical realms' clouds, Anna studied English Literature and then Medieval History at the University of Edinburgh, going on to specialize in narrative design and video game journalism as a writer. She has written for various publications since her postgraduate studies, including Dexerto, Fanbyte, GameSpot, IGN, PCGamesN, and more. When she's not frantically trying to form words into coherent sentences, she's probably daydreaming about becoming a fairy druid and befriending every animal or she's spending a thousand (more) hours traversing the Underdark in Baldur's Gate 3. If you spot her away from her PC, you'll always find Anna with a fantasy book, a handheld video game console of some sort, and a Tamagotchi or two on hand.

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