Resident Evil Requiem bows to REANIMAL in the Horror Game Awards 2026 nomination race

Horror has always been the genre where a small team with one unsettling idea can stare down a franchise with a blockbuster budget. The fifth Horror Game Awards write that truth into the nomination count itself: the most-recognised game of the year is not Capcom’s Resident Evil Requiem but REANIMAL, the island nightmare from Tarsier Studios, the Swedish studio that made its name with Little Nightmares. Requiem trails by a single nomination, and the gap is small enough to read as a statement of taste rather than a verdict.

What began as a fan project now plays to a sold-out room. Phil Dickens and Will Penkeyman, the horror fans who founded the awards, return as hosts alongside co-producer Ash Millman, this time at 26 Leake Street, the industrial venue tucked beneath the railway at Waterloo, beside the city’s graffiti tunnel. Winners are decided by a mix of fan votes and specialist juries of developers, critics, accessibility advocates and other industry voices.

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The numbers are tight at the top. REANIMAL leads with 10 nominations, Resident Evil Requiem follows with nine, and Silent Hill: Townfall, Clive Barker‘s Hellraiser: Revival and Silver Pines each carry eight. Sixteen games compete for Game of the Year and the HGA Claw trophy, and the shortlist is a genuine cross-section of the genre: Rebel Wolves’ The Blood of Dawnwalker, Supermassive Games’ Directive 8020, Team Ninja’s Fatal Frame 2: Crimson Butterfly Remake and Lunar Software’s long-gestating ROUTINE sit beside micro-indie entries such as The Skin Stapler, Offering App and Endacopia.

The ceremony grows to 21 categories, five of them new: Best Cosy Horror Game, Scariest Horror Game of the Year, Best Ongoing Horror Game, the Critics’ Choice Award and Best Adaptation. A cosy category is the most telling of the additions. It concedes that horror is no longer measured only by how hard it makes you flinch, but by the moods it can hold, from dread to comfort.

Between the awards, the show promises more than 20 trailers for upcoming horror games. Most stay under wraps until the night, but the organisers have confirmed appearances from ILL, Sally Face 2 and Sker: The Bleeding Veil.

The presenters mix makers and critics. From the industry side come Grzegorz Like, lead writer of Cronos: The New Dawn at Bloober Team, Tara Bunker of Supermassive Games, Mazza Romero of Romero Games and Kirsten Riaa, the voice actress of Hollowbody. Mel Ramsey of the BBC and Harrison Abbott of Bloody Disgusting join from the media, with creators including SuperHorrorBro and Ryan Hollinger. Dead by Daylight, Miss Behaviour and Creative Assembly sponsor the night.

The Horror Game Awards 2026 take place on Friday, November 20, at 7:00 PM GMT (11:00 AM PST, 2:00 PM EST, 8:00 PM CET), streamed live on the awards’ YouTube, Twitch and TikTok channels and by hundreds of co-streamers. The full list of nominees is on the official Horror Game Awards website.

The trophies will crown the year that was. The trailers, as always at a horror show, will tell us what the genre plans to be afraid of next.

Tags: Horror games, Capcom, Resident Evil Requiem, Silent Hill: Townfall, REANIMAL, Tarsier Studios

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