As one of the best games of the year, it deserved to be among the nominees for a major award in the video game category.

The 2026 Grammy nominations have been announced, including the five games competing in the Best Soundtrack category. This year’s nominees are as follows (with the composer listed in parentheses): Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora — Secrets of the Spires (Pinar Toprak); Helldivers 2 (Wilbert Roget); Indiana Jones and the Great Circle (Gordy Haab); Star Wars Outlaws: Wild Card & A Pirate’s Fortune (Cody Matthew Johnson and Wilbert Roget II), and Sword of the Sea (Austin Wintory). Despite being released before the 2024–2025 nomination period, Helldivers 2 is eligible because its music was released well after the game’s release.

The biggest surprise, however, is undoubtedly the absence of one title from the list. Clair Obscur: Expedition 33. The second-highest rated new game of the year topped the Billboard Classical chart for ten weeks, and its composer, Lorien Testard, recently won the WSA Game Music Award. Its publisher, Kepler Interactive, has nominated Clair Obscur for two Grammy categories: Best Game Soundtrack and Best Song Written for Visual Media.

2026 Grammy Submission: For your consideration – Clair Obscur- Expedition 33 (Original Soundtrack)
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This is the third year that the Grammy Awards will present the Best Music for a Video Game or Other Interactive Media award, which debuted in 2023. According to the Recording Academy, this award recognizes music albums consisting primarily of original tracks created specifically for a current video game or other interactive media or released as a supplement to them during the qualifying period.

In 2023, the first winner of the award was Assassin’s Creed Valhalla. The music for the Dawn of Ragnarök DLC, composed by Stephanie Economou, beat out Aliens: Fireteam Elite, Call of Duty: Vanguard, Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy, and Old World. The 2024 award went to Star Wars Jedi: Survivor, with music by Stephen Barton and Gordy Haab. It beat Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II, God of War: Ragnarök, Hogwarts Legacy, and Stray Gods: The Roleplaying Musical. In 2025, the Grammy Award went to Winifred Phillips for Wizardry: Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord, ahead of Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora, God of War Ragnarök: Valhalla, Marvel’s Spider-Man 2, and Star Wars Outlaws.

Source: VGC, Billboard, WSA