Game of the Year Reader Awards: The Results
Well, we asked for your votes, and you gave them. Now that we've finally tallied up the winners, cried on each other's shoulders over the losers, and yawned uncaringly at the middling wannabes, it's time to share them with the world. Read on to discover which game topped each category - and which was the Game of the Year for the games.on.net community. It might not be what you think...
Red Dead Redemption
Although "action" is a bit of a vague term, there's certainly nothing vague about a game where you can ride into town, lasso a helpless gringo, and then leave him tied to train tracks while you go off into the forest to punch bears in the face. That's action pal, and if you've got a mind to disagree then I suggest that you learn how to use a six-gun so you can back up your claim. But we'd better get this little disagreement over quick, because I'm just about to download the Undead Nightmare content and I've got some zombies to take care of.
Heavy Rain
This is a game that took the bar for interactive movies, melted it down, drank the resulting molten concoction and used it to embark on a spirit quest to a land of compelling characters, richly divergent storylines, and wonderfully lifelike graphics. Quantic Dream's offering easily blitzed the rest of the competition on its way to the top of this category, proving perhaps once and for all that although the Monkey Island-style adventure game might be dead, the spirit of adventure will never die. Unless the Origami Killer gets it, I guess. Watch out for that.
Battlefield: Bad Company 2
Although a close-run thing with Black Ops, there's no doubt where the loyalties of the games.on.net community lie, and they are apparently solely with the team at DICE. Delivering rock-solid multiplayer, smashing singleplayer, and backing it all up with the well-received Vietnam expansion late last year, Bad Company 2 redefined what a successful Battlefield game really is. Whether it was the meaty guns, the destructible environments or the selection of useful and diverse classes, this was one of the few games of 2010 to earn a perfect five-star rating from both you, the users, and us here on staff.
Mass Effect 2
Were there even any other RPG's this year? None at all if you believe the voting for this category, as Bioware's offering stole votes like a Collector vessel abducts human colonists. We'd blame Reaper indoctriniation but then again the game speaks for itself: with one of the most amazing, compelling casts of characters ever to grace a video game, an epic space opera of a campaign that just begs to be replayed, and set in a polished world of stunning visuals and perfectly scored music. There's no doubt at all that the games.on.net community still considers Bioware the king of the RPG, and rightly so.
StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty
No surprises there - you folks have been waiting eleven long years for this, and it seems like for most of you, the wait was worth it. Not only did StarCraft II proxy-barracks-rush to victory in this category, it also placed very highly in the overall tally for Game of the Year. With some of the best competitive RTS multiplayer around, as well a single-player campaign that blew everybody away with its depth and polish, this was truly a game to remember.
Battlefield: Bad Company 2
Although we can't rule out that a number of these votes may have been generated simply because DICE stood up for dedicated servers while everyone else was shunting them off a pier, there's no denying that Battlefield: Bad Company 2 offers one of the absolute best multiplayer experiences around. Whether you're hardcore or casual, run-and-gun, spray-and-pray or pack-a-lunch-and-snipe, BC2 gives you a game that lets you kill (and be killed by) your friends however you'd like. Being able to take control of a tank and demolish a building while your teamie mans the machine gun to cut down the fleeing, helpless survivors probably has something to do with it also.
Gran Turismo 5
Despite the rage, the complaints and the flame wars about whether this game really lived up to the expectations of five years of development, the figures don't lie: this is your racing game of the year. Praise for it was wide-ranging, with many people saying it felt like Polyphonic had poured their heart and soul into it, and that it was one of the most polished, finished experiences of 2010. Another person simply voted for it because it was the closest they'd ever get to really driving a '58 Subaru. Whatever your reason, with nearly 50% of the votes, GT5 is well ahead of the pack as the Racing Game of the Year.
Minecraft
Another one to file away in the "saw it coming a mile away" category: Minecraft built a castle out of the hundreds of votes it received in this category, and then stood on the top of it as the sun set, looking majestically out from its bastion as all the other games were attacked by skeletons and destroyed. But then again it's not surprise that Mojang's breakout viral hit was this popular with the community - after all, we've been running our own server since day one (mc-1.games.on.net) and have dedicated an entire, very popular subforum to it. We love Minecraft, and we're only too happy to make that love formal. Anybody know the crafting recipe for a ring?
Angry Birds
What's that you say, Angry Birds? You're not content with millions of sales and total market domination, you want to win the games.on.net Puzzle Game of the Year award as well? Well, I don't think we can... oh, my. No, there's no need for violence, I think we can all get what we want, without you having to launch yourself at my precariously constructed house. This egg? I have no idea what you mean, some pig just gave it to me. Just came up on the street and gave it to me out of nowhere. Please stop looking at me like that. Just... take the award and go. Okay.
Heavy Rain
You wouldn't think that simply adding PlayStation Move support to a game would be enough to push it over the edge against a game like Dance Central, which is built from the ground up to be motion-controlled, but you'd be wrong. That's not to say Dance Central didn't come a close second, but it seems like Heavy Rain wasn't content with simply winning your Adventure Game of the Year votes. Now thanks to the Move you can experience the delight of trying to mimic the motions of having tea, opening a door or lovingly patting the head of your child. It's not as much fun as doing it in real life, but fortunately in real life you don't have a serial killer after you, either. Life is full of trade-offs.
Just Cause 2
An absolute gem of a game, Just Cause 2 grappled onto the number one spot and refused to let go, raking in vote after vote until it had completely cleaned up. With a vast open world, hijackable aircraft and an infinite variety of amazing mods to try, Just Cause 2 deserved a better level of commercial success than it ended up with. The good folks at games.on.net recognise this too, and although winning the Underrated Game of the Year award doesn't really make up for that, it's something. We'll always have a special place in our hearts for any game where you tie a helpless pedestrian to a jumbo jet and ditch them both into the ocean.
Aliens vs Predator
Although hotly anticipated by LAN gamers, H.R. Giger fans and Arnold Schwarzenegger alike as an update to the classic game of yore, what we ended up with instead was a game with terrible level design, monstrously stupid A.I. and a rinse-and-repeat single-player campaign. For some reason the game also shipped without matchmaking, leaving many early adopters bashing their heads against walls and searching for peer-to-peer gaming at a reasonable latency. Even when matchmaking did arrive though the game's poor selection of maps had many players quickly abandoning the game in favour of a multiplayer experience that had more to offer.
Those weren't the only things working in Mass Effect 2's favour, though. Thanks to the magic of computers, I've put together this small graph that illustrates a breakdown of the reasons cited when voting for Mass Effect 2 as your Game of the Year.
It's probably safe to postulate that without the fourteen votes garnered solely by Miranda Lawsons's backside (which Bioware takes every conversation opportunity to show off) then Battlefield: Bad Company 2 would have coasted easily to victory in this category. Nice work, Bioware! Here's some more interesting facts about Mass Effect 2, plucked from your votes.
Thanks to everybody who voted in these awards, and thanks to our sponsors Acer and Epson for providing the grand prize!
Red Dead RedemptionAlthough "action" is a bit of a vague term, there's certainly nothing vague about a game where you can ride into town, lasso a helpless gringo, and then leave him tied to train tracks while you go off into the forest to punch bears in the face. That's action pal, and if you've got a mind to disagree then I suggest that you learn how to use a six-gun so you can back up your claim. But we'd better get this little disagreement over quick, because I'm just about to download the Undead Nightmare content and I've got some zombies to take care of.
Heavy RainThis is a game that took the bar for interactive movies, melted it down, drank the resulting molten concoction and used it to embark on a spirit quest to a land of compelling characters, richly divergent storylines, and wonderfully lifelike graphics. Quantic Dream's offering easily blitzed the rest of the competition on its way to the top of this category, proving perhaps once and for all that although the Monkey Island-style adventure game might be dead, the spirit of adventure will never die. Unless the Origami Killer gets it, I guess. Watch out for that.
Battlefield: Bad Company 2Although a close-run thing with Black Ops, there's no doubt where the loyalties of the games.on.net community lie, and they are apparently solely with the team at DICE. Delivering rock-solid multiplayer, smashing singleplayer, and backing it all up with the well-received Vietnam expansion late last year, Bad Company 2 redefined what a successful Battlefield game really is. Whether it was the meaty guns, the destructible environments or the selection of useful and diverse classes, this was one of the few games of 2010 to earn a perfect five-star rating from both you, the users, and us here on staff.
Mass Effect 2Were there even any other RPG's this year? None at all if you believe the voting for this category, as Bioware's offering stole votes like a Collector vessel abducts human colonists. We'd blame Reaper indoctriniation but then again the game speaks for itself: with one of the most amazing, compelling casts of characters ever to grace a video game, an epic space opera of a campaign that just begs to be replayed, and set in a polished world of stunning visuals and perfectly scored music. There's no doubt at all that the games.on.net community still considers Bioware the king of the RPG, and rightly so.
StarCraft II: Wings of LibertyNo surprises there - you folks have been waiting eleven long years for this, and it seems like for most of you, the wait was worth it. Not only did StarCraft II proxy-barracks-rush to victory in this category, it also placed very highly in the overall tally for Game of the Year. With some of the best competitive RTS multiplayer around, as well a single-player campaign that blew everybody away with its depth and polish, this was truly a game to remember.
Battlefield: Bad Company 2Although we can't rule out that a number of these votes may have been generated simply because DICE stood up for dedicated servers while everyone else was shunting them off a pier, there's no denying that Battlefield: Bad Company 2 offers one of the absolute best multiplayer experiences around. Whether you're hardcore or casual, run-and-gun, spray-and-pray or pack-a-lunch-and-snipe, BC2 gives you a game that lets you kill (and be killed by) your friends however you'd like. Being able to take control of a tank and demolish a building while your teamie mans the machine gun to cut down the fleeing, helpless survivors probably has something to do with it also.
Gran Turismo 5Despite the rage, the complaints and the flame wars about whether this game really lived up to the expectations of five years of development, the figures don't lie: this is your racing game of the year. Praise for it was wide-ranging, with many people saying it felt like Polyphonic had poured their heart and soul into it, and that it was one of the most polished, finished experiences of 2010. Another person simply voted for it because it was the closest they'd ever get to really driving a '58 Subaru. Whatever your reason, with nearly 50% of the votes, GT5 is well ahead of the pack as the Racing Game of the Year.
MinecraftAnother one to file away in the "saw it coming a mile away" category: Minecraft built a castle out of the hundreds of votes it received in this category, and then stood on the top of it as the sun set, looking majestically out from its bastion as all the other games were attacked by skeletons and destroyed. But then again it's not surprise that Mojang's breakout viral hit was this popular with the community - after all, we've been running our own server since day one (mc-1.games.on.net) and have dedicated an entire, very popular subforum to it. We love Minecraft, and we're only too happy to make that love formal. Anybody know the crafting recipe for a ring?
Angry BirdsWhat's that you say, Angry Birds? You're not content with millions of sales and total market domination, you want to win the games.on.net Puzzle Game of the Year award as well? Well, I don't think we can... oh, my. No, there's no need for violence, I think we can all get what we want, without you having to launch yourself at my precariously constructed house. This egg? I have no idea what you mean, some pig just gave it to me. Just came up on the street and gave it to me out of nowhere. Please stop looking at me like that. Just... take the award and go. Okay.
Heavy RainYou wouldn't think that simply adding PlayStation Move support to a game would be enough to push it over the edge against a game like Dance Central, which is built from the ground up to be motion-controlled, but you'd be wrong. That's not to say Dance Central didn't come a close second, but it seems like Heavy Rain wasn't content with simply winning your Adventure Game of the Year votes. Now thanks to the Move you can experience the delight of trying to mimic the motions of having tea, opening a door or lovingly patting the head of your child. It's not as much fun as doing it in real life, but fortunately in real life you don't have a serial killer after you, either. Life is full of trade-offs.
Just Cause 2An absolute gem of a game, Just Cause 2 grappled onto the number one spot and refused to let go, raking in vote after vote until it had completely cleaned up. With a vast open world, hijackable aircraft and an infinite variety of amazing mods to try, Just Cause 2 deserved a better level of commercial success than it ended up with. The good folks at games.on.net recognise this too, and although winning the Underrated Game of the Year award doesn't really make up for that, it's something. We'll always have a special place in our hearts for any game where you tie a helpless pedestrian to a jumbo jet and ditch them both into the ocean.
Aliens vs PredatorAlthough hotly anticipated by LAN gamers, H.R. Giger fans and Arnold Schwarzenegger alike as an update to the classic game of yore, what we ended up with instead was a game with terrible level design, monstrously stupid A.I. and a rinse-and-repeat single-player campaign. For some reason the game also shipped without matchmaking, leaving many early adopters bashing their heads against walls and searching for peer-to-peer gaming at a reasonable latency. Even when matchmaking did arrive though the game's poor selection of maps had many players quickly abandoning the game in favour of a multiplayer experience that had more to offer.
Those weren't the only things working in Mass Effect 2's favour, though. Thanks to the magic of computers, I've put together this small graph that illustrates a breakdown of the reasons cited when voting for Mass Effect 2 as your Game of the Year.
It's probably safe to postulate that without the fourteen votes garnered solely by Miranda Lawsons's backside (which Bioware takes every conversation opportunity to show off) then Battlefield: Bad Company 2 would have coasted easily to victory in this category. Nice work, Bioware! Here's some more interesting facts about Mass Effect 2, plucked from your votes.
- Two people literally voted for Mass Effect 2 because of the explosions.
- Another two people admitted, happily, that Mass Effect 2 made them cry while playing.
- Mordin's rendition of Gilbert and Sullivan also attracted a large number of votes.
- Two entirely separate people voted for Mass Effect 2 because it let them make a character who looked like Samuel L. Jackson.
- One very dedicated gamer outright admitted that they rescheduled their own engagement party just so that they could finish playing Mass Effect 2. "Worth it!", they added.
Thanks to everybody who voted in these awards, and thanks to our sponsors Acer and Epson for providing the grand prize!
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