We are just a few hours away from the Steam Winter Sale, so if you are browsing the store for something new to play, we have the sale start times so you know exactly when you should actually hit the buy button. The Winter Sale is just half of the story this week though, as Valve has also announced all of the nominees for the eight categories in this year's Steam Awards.
The Steam Winter Sale is going live today (December 19th), in the UK, the discounts should be live at 6PM, which is 7PM CET, 1PM EST or 10AM PST. The sale will last for 14 straight days, ending on the 2nd of January 2020.
Now here are the nominees for this year's Steam Awards categories:
- Game of the Year: Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, Resident Evil 2, Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order, Destiny 2 and Devil May Cry 5
- VR Game of the Year: Beat Saber, Blade & Sorcery, Gorn, Borderlands 2 VR and Five Nights at Freddy's Help Wanted.
- Labour of Love: Warframe, Rainbow Six Siege, CS:GO, Grand Theft Auto V and Dota 2.
- Better with Friends: Risk of Rain 2, Dota Underlords, Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition, Ring of Elysium and DayZ
- Most Innovative Gameplay: Baba is You, Slay the Spire, My Friend Pedro, Oxygen Not Included and Planet Zoo
- Outstanding Story-Rich Game: Plague Tale Innocence, Disco Elysium, Far Cry New Dawn, Gears 5 and Greed Fall
- Best Game You Suck At: Mordhau, Code Vein, Hunt Showdown, Remnant From the Ashes and Mortal Kombat 11
- Outstanding Visual Style: Gris, Total War: Three Kingdoms, Astroneer, Katana Zero and Subnautica: Below Zero
The Steam Awards are particularly interesting as it is entirely made up of fan votes and nominations from the Steam Community, unlike The Game Awards, which uses a jury of industry voters in conjunction with a fan vote. Currently, the Steam Awards are still accepting votes on which nominee should win each category, then the winners will be announced on the 31st of December.
KitGuru Says: There are some solid nominations in the Steam Awards this year although there are a few key games I have yet to try myself, like Greed Fall and Disco Elysium. What are you voting for to win the Steam Awards this year?