It won awards, but it didn’t get the “overall game of the year” award from any of those 5 outlets. And, compared to baldurs gate 3 I think its quite easy to understand why. Totk was a well polished experience but it suffered quite a lot from “mile wide inch deep” syndrome IMHO. Probably one of the best games Nintendo has ever made, but it isn’t as good as baldur’s gate 3.
It says a lot about the passion of their team, I think. Larian was not even on my radar until a little while after DOS2 came out, and while I enjoyed dos2 I burned out in act 3. It was, however, plain to see that they poured buckets of care and attention into the game, even if it wasn’t exactly for me.
With Baldur’s Gate 3 made an upward trend in quality and kept the same love, care, and attention. If that level of care and attention is present in their previous titles (I have no idea), then I think it was all but inevitable that they’d find this critical success.