PC Gamer’s 2015 overall Game of the Year was Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain; The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt won the outlet’s Best Singleplayer award. Both results can stand—and my pick for the year is still The Witcher 3. PC Gamer valued the rival’s systems-driven play and mechanical ambition. I value the characters, quests and world that made Geralt’s journey feel like a story I wanted to stay inside.
What PC Gamer actually chose
PC Gamer’s awards page named Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain its “Game of the Year 2015” and The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt its “Best Singleplayer.” Those awards are not contradictory: the outlet’s Best Singleplayer explanation says its staff voted for multiple games, tallied the votes to agree on an overall winner, and shaped other categories to recognize games they loved. The distinction matters: PC Gamer did not name The Witcher 3 its overall winner, but it did single it out as its best single-player game (PC Gamer’s 2015 awards; Best Singleplayer).
Nor was there one universal 2015 GOTY. The Game Awards and Game Informer selected The Witcher 3 as their overall winner, while GameSpot readers chose it in that outlet’s People’s Choice poll. PC Gamer’s staff made a different overall choice. Each result belongs to its named organization or poll, not to every critic or player.
Why The Witcher 3 is my 2015 GOTY
Its characters and writing make the world matter
For me, the game’s strongest achievement is how its story makes the people in its world feel more important than the map’s size. Geralt’s work as a monster hunter gives the adventure a natural framework, but the memorable turns often come from learning what people want, what they fear, and what they have done to one another. The setting feels lived in because its troubles are not merely scenery between fights.
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PC Gamer’s own Best Singleplayer coverage praised the attentive writing, moral dilemmas, characters and vividly realized setting. Shaun Prescott described sitting down to play as “diving into a meticulously written fantasy novel,” while Andy Kelly praised the quests as among the best he had played in an RPG. That is close to my own reason for choosing it: the narrative is not a reward waiting after the gameplay; it is woven through the work of exploring and taking on jobs.
Side quests feel like stories, not chores
The Bloody Baron’s “Family Matters” storyline is a particularly clear example. It gives a seemingly local task emotional stakes and forces the player to follow a complicated human situation rather than simply clear a marker. Across the game, optional quests can reveal as much about the world and its inhabitants as the main plot. I often wanted to take one more detour instead of pushing straight toward the campaign’s next milestone.
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That kind of side content changes the rhythm of an open-world game. Exploration is not only about collecting rewards or discovering a new combat encounter; it can lead to a self-contained story with consequences for how characters relate to one another. Game Informer likewise praised the depth, polish, writing, activities and surprises beyond the main storyline when it named the game its 2015 GOTY (Game Informer’s 2015 awards).
The campaign makes time spent in the world feel worthwhile
A large world can become a checklist. The Witcher 3 works for me when its landscape, contracts, settlements and longer storylines keep drawing me into a coherent journey. The open-world shift gave players more freedom, while the narrative and characters upheld the standards associated with the earlier games, according to Game Informer. That combination—room to wander, but enough writing to make wandering meaningful—is more valuable to me than novelty in mechanics alone.
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The fair case for Metal Gear Solid V
Choosing The Witcher 3 does not require pretending that Metal Gear Solid V was the weaker game in every respect. PC Gamer’s comparison praised MGS V as more revolutionary and more fascinating to play, and characterized its overall win as a recognition of systems-driven design. By contrast, its praise for The Witcher 3 centered on its campaign and narrative, while noting that combat could feel imprecise and its open-world encounters were not groundbreaking (PC Gamer’s Best Singleplayer coverage).
That is a meaningful difference in priorities. MGS V’s appeal lies in the possibilities created by its interacting systems and the moment-to-moment play they produce. The Witcher 3 can be less exacting as a combat game, but I find its quests, writing and characters more affecting. I do not need it to win every category; I need the qualities it excels at to matter more to me than the rival’s mechanical strengths.
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Other 2015 honors show why the debate is real
There is no single award tally that settles a personal GOTY choice, but the reception helps explain why this preference is not an attempt to rewrite PC Gamer’s record. The Game Awards named The Witcher 3 its overall winner, as did Game Informer. In GameSpot’s 2015 People’s Choice poll, it received 62% of reported votes, compared with 9% for Fallout 4. Those percentages describe that poll’s participants, not all players or critics (GameSpot on The Game Awards; GameSpot’s poll results).
CD Projekt said in its 2016 Game of the Year Edition announcement that the game had won more than 250 Game of the Year awards and more than 800 awards overall. Those are the publisher’s own figures, rather than an independently audited count (CD Projekt’s edition announcement). They attest to broad recognition, but acclaim does not turn an individual preference into an objective verdict.
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- Cool Comfort: Enjoy a stable surface with our lap desk's dual bolster cushion, designed for comfort and airflow, keeping your lap cool during extended use.
- Durable Surface: Work with confidence on our lap desk's solid surface, featuring a blush pink color, ensuring optimal air circulation to prevent your laptop from overheating.
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Even PC Gamer’s later reflection leaves room for this choice
PC Gamer’s later retrospective did not revoke the 2015 award. Andy Chalk wrote that MGS V “won on its merits, as determined by the PCG team at the time,” then added that some staff who were there might argue harder for The Witcher 3 if they could do 2015 over. That is a useful way to hold both ideas at once: an award reflects a group’s judgment at a particular time, while looking back can make a different game’s strengths loom larger (PC Gamer’s 2025 retrospective).
The changing rankings also show why these judgments need dates. PC Gamer placed The Witcher 3 first on its 2016 Top 100 PC games list; its 2025 retrospective says the game held that spot until Divinity: Original Sin 2 displaced it in 2019, and that it ranked sixth on the list published in 2025. In 2016, game director Konrad Tomaszkiewicz said the first-place recognition meant a lot and validated the work on the game and its expansions (PC Gamer’s 2016 Top 100 report). These are dated editorial rankings, not permanent measurements of quality.
Why my answer remains The Witcher 3
If the question is which game offered the more systems-driven, mechanically fascinating play according to PC Gamer’s 2015 judgment, MGS V has the stronger case. If the question is which game I would call my 2015 Game of the Year, I choose The Witcher 3. Its characters, morally complicated stories, side quests and sense of place add up to the campaign I most wanted to inhabit. That is a personal verdict, not a correction to PC Gamer’s award—and it is precisely why its Best Singleplayer win still feels right to me.
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