Game of the Year 2011

Atmos Duality

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Meh, Skyrim doesn't deserve it. Having actually played it a bit now, I'm not really impressed with anything beyond the environments.

The only appeal I can draw from it is its unfamiliarity relative to Oblivion and Morrowind, which helps the appeal to exploration a bit.
 

NerfedFalcon

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Omnific One said:
Perhaps, but one set of hype is actually based on about 10 million customers and glowing reviews across the board, while the other was based on marketing.
SirBryghtside said:
So your argument against Skyrim being praised is that Skyrim is being praised.
I have nothing against praise - in moderation. What's happening is that none of the 10 million fans of the game bring up the flaws, and almost all the reviewers pass them off as token. Which is not something everyone will be able to do.

Here's the thing: do you guys want to know a game that was even more deeply flawed than Skyrim?
 

Z of the Na'vi

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Personally, my 2011 GotY was Batman: Arkham City. I've sunk more time into that masterpiece than I have with a video game in a long time.

...and I used to play WoW.
 

NerfedFalcon

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SirBryghtside said:
leet_x1337 said:
Omnific One said:
Perhaps, but one set of hype is actually based on about 10 million customers and glowing reviews across the board, while the other was based on marketing.
SirBryghtside said:
So your argument against Skyrim being praised is that Skyrim is being praised.
I have nothing against praise - in moderation. What's happening is that none of the 10 million fans of the game bring up the flaws, and almost all the reviewers pass them off as token. Which is not something everyone will be able to do.

Here's the thing: do you guys want to know a game that was even more deeply flawed than Skyrim?
Yup. Totally in denial about those flaws over here. [http://forums.xkcd.com/viewtopic.php?f=21&t=66798&start=1760#p2855914]
Exception, not rule.
 

NerfedFalcon

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SirBryghtside said:
leet_x1337 said:
SirBryghtside said:
leet_x1337 said:
Omnific One said:
Perhaps, but one set of hype is actually based on about 10 million customers and glowing reviews across the board, while the other was based on marketing.
SirBryghtside said:
So your argument against Skyrim being praised is that Skyrim is being praised.
I have nothing against praise - in moderation. What's happening is that none of the 10 million fans of the game bring up the flaws, and almost all the reviewers pass them off as token. Which is not something everyone will be able to do.

Here's the thing: do you guys want to know a game that was even more deeply flawed than Skyrim?
Yup. Totally in denial about those flaws over here. [http://forums.xkcd.com/viewtopic.php?f=21&t=66798&start=1760#p2855914]
Exception, not rule.
Then we're in agreement. I have the opinion that everyone who considers Skyrim to be a perfect game is an absolute moron. Planning on doing a review once I've done my third playthrough (psycho-lesbian-stealth-ninja). And that's just reminded me of a thread I was going to do. Hooray!
Well, that wasn't suddenly pulled out of nowhere. Also, earlier I was talking about Oblivion, which got even higher scores across the board than Skyrim did.
 

Sylveria

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Assassin Xaero said:
This is the reason why I never cared much for GOTY awards popularity contests. Dragon Age 2, the sequel to the worst game I ever had to force myself to finish (which from play the demo and what I've heard, DA2 is even worse than DA:O) gets "honorable mention", while my three favorite games of the year (Rage, Duke Nukem Forever, and Bulletstorm) are no where on the list. Oh well, not like the awards make the games better or anything, I still get to have my fun with games that I actually enjoy.
DNF was one of your favorite games? Your opinion is invalidated as you obviously suffer from severe brain damage.
 

Sylveria

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leet_x1337 said:
Omnific One said:
leet_x1337 said:
SirBryghtside said:
leet_x1337 said:
Before I opened the article, I just knew you were going to keep praising Skyrim as the best game ever made, despite its numerous flaws (among them not one but two bad ports and the bugs in all three versions.) Either I'm psychic or every single game critic ever thinks that Plan 9 from Outer Space couldn't possibly be a better movie.
Because Azura forbid that a game has flaws! What's your favourite game, by the way, so we can poke a million and one holes in that? OK, fine. You hate it. Well done, your opinion is obviously better than everyone else's. Have a bloody sticker.
Guess what? Skryim is so praised by everyone there's no way future historians will see it the same way as the gaming press and critics these days. Just like Duke Nukem Forever was panned mostly due to 12 years of excessive media-generated hype and didn't hold up, Skyrim won't hold up in future generations due to the excessive fan- and critic-generated hype right now.
That is one of the worst comparisons I think I've ever heard. One is pre-release hype, one is post-release hype. Those are so incredibly different.
To people who haven't played it yet, it's still hype and it's still unlikely to live up to it.
If they have't played it yet, like me, they likely don't give a crap about the hype and thus have relatively average expectations of it. Clearly the vast majority of people who play this game are having an amazing time playing it, which if millions of people having a blast isn't a qualifier for game of the year, I don't know what is.

And yes, in 50 years after someone has played nothing but ultra-realistic virtual reality games on the iNINBOX-8000PS between fending off giant, mutant cockroach attacks, yeah, Skyrim isn't gonna wow them. Just like the people who play Star Fox now aren't really impressed by Mode 7 polygons as much as we were back in the early 90s.

Also, don't you see a difference between years of "The trailers make it look amazing!" and "I've put 500 hours into this game and it's amazing!"? Do you base the enjoyment of a movie or a meal on what you heard about rather than what you actually experienced? Man you must be the most suggestion-able human on the planet if you can be talked out of what you actually felt based on what you heard before hand. I could serve up some re-fried cow crap but if I talked it up before putting it before you, you'd swear it was the greatest meal you ever ate.
 

NerfedFalcon

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Sylveria said:
leet_x1337 said:
Omnific One said:
leet_x1337 said:
SirBryghtside said:
leet_x1337 said:
Before I opened the article, I just knew you were going to keep praising Skyrim as the best game ever made, despite its numerous flaws (among them not one but two bad ports and the bugs in all three versions.) Either I'm psychic or every single game critic ever thinks that Plan 9 from Outer Space couldn't possibly be a better movie.
Because Azura forbid that a game has flaws! What's your favourite game, by the way, so we can poke a million and one holes in that? OK, fine. You hate it. Well done, your opinion is obviously better than everyone else's. Have a bloody sticker.
Guess what? Skryim is so praised by everyone there's no way future historians will see it the same way as the gaming press and critics these days. Just like Duke Nukem Forever was panned mostly due to 12 years of excessive media-generated hype and didn't hold up, Skyrim won't hold up in future generations due to the excessive fan- and critic-generated hype right now.
That is one of the worst comparisons I think I've ever heard. One is pre-release hype, one is post-release hype. Those are so incredibly different.
To people who haven't played it yet, it's still hype and it's still unlikely to live up to it.
If they have't played it yet, like me, they likely don't give a crap about the hype and thus have relatively average expectations of it. Clearly the vast majority of people who play this game are having an amazing time playing it, which if millions of people having a blast isn't a qualifier for game of the year, I don't know what is.

And yes, in 50 years after someone has played nothing but ultra-realistic virtual reality games on the iNINBOX-8000PS between fending off giant, mutant cockroach attacks, yeah, Skyrim isn't gonna wow them. Just like the people who play Star Fox now aren't really impressed by Mode 7 polygons as much as we were back in the early 90s.

Also, don't you see a difference between years of "The trailers make it look amazing!" and "I've put 500 hours into this game and it's amazing!"? Do you base the enjoyment of a movie or a meal on what you heard about rather than what you actually experienced? Man you must be the most suggestion-able human on the planet if you can be talked out of what you actually felt based on what you heard before hand. I could serve up some re-fried cow crap but if I talked it up before putting it before you, you'd swear it was the greatest meal you ever ate.
Argumentum ad hominem; everything you just said is now invalid.
 

NerfedFalcon

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SirBryghtside said:
We're not blind, just accepting.
Is that going to keep happening after Call of Duty's bubble bursts and large fantasy RPGs with bad QA testing become the industry's most overused trend?
 

Assassin Xaero

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Sylveria said:
Assassin Xaero said:
This is the reason why I never cared much for GOTY awards popularity contests. Dragon Age 2, the sequel to the worst game I ever had to force myself to finish (which from play the demo and what I've heard, DA2 is even worse than DA:O) gets "honorable mention", while my three favorite games of the year (Rage, Duke Nukem Forever, and Bulletstorm) are no where on the list. Oh well, not like the awards make the games better or anything, I still get to have my fun with games that I actually enjoy.
DNF was one of your favorite games? Your opinion is invalidated as you obviously suffer from severe brain damage.
So me having an opinion that is different that others and me being able to understand that different people like different things (unlike some people) means I have brain damage? No, I think you are the one with brain damage. This might be a bit much for your weak mind to handle, but I also really liked Dirge of Cerberus.
 
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Pretty disappointed to find the two games I thought were the best (Portal 2 and Batman) only in the honourable mentions but oh well... to each his own I guess. Nice read.

PS Where's Rayman? I loved that game!!
 

pepitko

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While Skyrim deserves the game of the year stamp. I've put some 50 hours into that game and I am far from finished and I'm enjoying every moment of it. Also I think Dragon Age 2, shouldn't have made even the mentions list. The game was so lazily designed, I had to force myself to finish it. The 4 or 5 locales, which kept repeating over and over again, the quests, which started out of nowhere and finished with a "thank you" from a NPC with zero context. Escapist liked the story and I beg to differ, while the main story arch was good, there were details that were unreasonably left out, such as the head of the city guard going crazy because of the red staff. Worst of all most of the quests had failed to move the story foward.

I would have much rather seen LA Noire making the honorable mentions list. All around it was a much more complete game than DA2 and the overall experiences was more immersive and enjoyable.
 

veloper

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Comparing games of different genres is rarely useful, but I still cringe when a masterpiece of it's genre like Arkham City is put along side a complete turd of another genre, like DA2.

Dark Souls should have topped Skyrim though. Those action-RPGs can be compared. Most importantly, challenging combat vs unresponsive and dull combat.
 

ImSkeletor

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Glad Infamous 2 is on here since it is probably my goty.(still have to beat Deus Ex:HR and Batman:Arkham City. If those games improve in their second halfs they might take its spot.)
 

RedEyesBlackGamer

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LobsterFeng said:
Trishbot said:
Once again, the game my PS3 refuses to play wins a GOTY award.
So is it really that bad? I've been thinking about buying it, but all I have is a PS3.

OT: I really liked Skyward Sword, despite what people on this site may say. I'm glad it's at least up there in the list. I'm also glad Arkham City got an honorable mention.
Don't do it.
This is a PSA: If your only option to play Skyrim is on the PS3, don't waste the 60$. Buy something else.
 

Kahunaburger

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Sonic Doctor said:
Dragon Age 2
...
the party members actually feel like real people but unique from each other.
You know, I'm happy that this thread [http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3449674] exists. Because now I have something to link whenever someone says that DA2 had good characters, writing, or storytelling. Tragically, it was locked before its time and we will never get the chance to see the thrilling conclusion.