Finished Saints Row the Third and put a lot more time into Batman: Arkham City, so new list, because...
1. Batman: Arkham City ; Holy fucking shit, this game. I feel like I can convince myself that any of my top 3 is my personal game of the year, and at several points have felt that way, but as of right now, this is it. I enjoyed just about every single thing this game had me do. Every great game I can think of has at least one section that dissuades me from replaying it, and Arkham City has no extended sequence where I felt like, "Fuck this game". Few games have made me want to do every sidequest and no game has ever made me want to do all the high level gameplay challenges like the AR training, but there were just few enough AR training challenges that I did them all. Additionally, this game takes two things that I don't really care for in most games--combat and story--and turns them into strengths. I like the combat so much that it actually made me seek out enemies to fight as opposed to avoiding them like I do in most games that have that option. As I played more and more, I came realized how brilliant the story is, considering how bad it should be. Imagine being tasked with writing this game, being told that Arkham has to take place in a sizable chunk of Gotham City, having to incorporate as many Batman villains as possible, and not making it come across as either bad fan fiction, or the kind of story a kid comes up when playing with his hodgepodge of action figures. It's a damn near consensus that these Batman games are far and away the best use of the Batman license (or any license for that matter) in video games. For me, I will take it one colossal step further and say that this Batman game is my favorite use of the Batman license period.
2. Portal 2 ; This game is nearly perfect, but I played the game over the course five or six hours split between two sittings in one day early in the year and haven't touched it since. This game, though, is practically perfect in every way. It is brilliantly written, and even if the puzzles aren't that challenging, they handled the ramp up in scope from Portal expertly. Batman gets the slight edge for now because it is more fresh on my mind and does more while making similarly few mistakes.
3. Skyrim ; Probably my heart's pick, since RPGs are my absolute favorite genre and it is exciting to see one that appeals to non-RPG fans without feeling compromised for it. This is by far the game I played the most this year (World of Warcraft excluded), clocking in at just under 120 hours. This game does so much, so right, that it more thank makes up for its many, many flaws, but when splitting hairs, this game has definite flaws that I feel neither Batman nor Portal can even come close to comparing to.
4. Assassin's Creed: Revelations ; A definite step back from a series that has been striding forward in every game since its bland first game. That being said, it didn't screw the pooch so badly that I didn't get sucked in just as much as I did by AC2 and ACB. The additions were bad, the game dropped a few of the more interesting side activities in AC2 and ACB, and the story is stuck in neutral (Overall story, that is. The Ezio story was on life support since AC2, but there is enough heart in the Sofia story for me to overlook the pointlessness--and creepiness, in Sofia's case--of it all), but Assassin's Creed games since AC2 have been some of the most fun I've had playing games this gen, and this is another of them.
5. The Witcher 2 ; The Witcher's strength is unfortunately in something that I don't value too highly in games: story. That being said, it's a deep enough RPG to hold my interest (though the magic feels too clumsy and limited for me to want to do anything but swing a sword most of the time) and the game is absolutely gorgeous. I feel like the first Witcher game is a bit overrated by people that I can only succinctly describe as "gaming hipsters", but The Witcher 2 is pretty damned impressive.
6. Saints Row the Third ; The only reason this game was even on my radar was because of Giant Bomb, and everything I know about my own tastes would lead me to believe that this is not a game for me, but I had to see what was behind their enthusiasm. What I found was some surprisingly great humor, awesome over the top insanity, and a truly impressive amount of mission variety that catapulted this game from my personal ignore list to my games of the year list.
7. Bastion ; The beauty with which this game is presented is absolutely stunning. The Proving Grounds are fun challenges that enhance the rest of the game. If I were a bigger fan of this sort of gameplay, Bastion would threaten to be much higher.
8. L.A. Noire ; I don't care about the facial performance capture tech, I just knew that this was a game that I had to try from its initial gameplay videos. There's a lot I don't like about this game: The action sequences weren't that well done (I admitted defeat and skipped one of them), some of the conversation logic is beyond me, and the side content isn't the least bit compelling (so I skipped all of it), but goddammit, it's an adventure game and it's extremely playable!
9. Dragon Age 2 ; It's become all too popular to trash this game because it is a significant step backward in a lot of ways from Dragon Age: Origins. But for what the game ended up being, I found enough to enjoy to finish it within a week or two of release and even start playing it again after completion (though I didn't get very far). There are even a few things I prefer over Dragon Age: Origins, but I know I won't be able to convince most people that this game actually isn't that bad.
10. Deus Ex: Human Revolution ; I have tried and failed many times to play the first Deus Ex past the initial few missions. This game seems to get the stamp of approval from fans of the original, but I found myself wanting more from this game. While a lot of the appeal seems to be the multiple paths one can take through areas in the game, I'm only concerned with the path that developed as I played the game, which was, frankly, a bit boring and repetitive. The quality is unmistakable, but I spent almost the entire time playing this game thinking about how I had way more fun playing janky-as-fuck Alpha Protocol.
2010. Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood ; I was ready to skip this game. First because I thought it was a multiplayer game and I have no interest in those. Later because I thought it was a pointless and rushed sequel, and how many of those end up being any good? But then, I heard that the ending was good and decided it was worth picking up a copy on the cheap to play. I couldn't be more glad that I did. I was so humbled by how good this game ended up being despite my predictions, that I gave Revelations a free pass to be bad in all the ways I anticipated this game would be.
x. Rayman Origins ; At this point, I've only played through the first world. The game is a lot of fun to play and simply oozes charm. If the platforming ramps up accordingly, this game will almost assuredly bump a game off the list.
x. Pokemon Black ; Part of me would put this in the top ten, but this game is really nothing special, just more Pokemon, which I happen to like a lot.
x. WWE All Stars ; Wrestling games are a guilty pleasure of mine, so while I'm not as relieved as some that someone finally made a decent one again after all these years, I'm glad they made a game that other people can enjoy, too.
x. You Don't Know Jack ; I tried to get my friends to play this with me, but they hated it, and it was a disaster, but I love the game's humor, its presentation, and the mind fucking ways it poses its questions. I didn't play that many games this year, since just about everything I had any interest in playing came out in the past three months and I waited until after Thanksgiving to pick up any of them, so You Don't Know Jack gets this spot.
Wish I had played:
Bastion ; There's no way this game can live up to what it's been built up to be for me, but I look forward to being wrong.
Rayman Origins ; I am a bad person and am waiting for the price on this to continue to plummet, but I should love it.
Super Mario 3D Land ; No interest in owning a 3DS aside from playing this game.
Uncharted 3 ; I find these games to be good dumb fun.
Xenoblade Chronicles ; I really hate playing games on the Wii for some reason, but I love JRPGs, will try almost any of them, and will forgive bad ones more easily than most as long as they are mechanically sound, so this has a chance to make me rethink my entire list, or set the bar for my 2012 list, since it will be released in the U.S. this year.
Sort of want to play:
Catherine ; Still never really got over that this ended up being a block pushing game.
Dead Island ; I think zombies are stupid, and this game didn't look like much of an RPG, which is my only interest in it.
Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword ; I hate motion controls and didn't actually have a Wii Motion Plus until, like, yesterday. The only Zelda I ever finished was Twilight Princess. On Gamecube.
Willing to give another shot:
Dark Souls ; I did not have fun playing Demon's Souls and stopped at roughly 75% through the game, but I'm a fool and am willing to try again with Dark Souls because of how beloved it is and because have read some people who felt the same was about Demon's Souls and really liked Dark Souls. This is, however, low priority.
Technically counts this year, but I played it last year:
Mass Effect 2 ; At this point it's been nearly two years since I played ME2 and I remember thinking at the time, "This may be my favorite game of all time right now". While I'm not sure about that, since Mario 3 and Pokemon have stood the test of time, it is still up there. As I think about where I would place it this year, I realize how good the games are this year that something that is one of my favorite games I've played has competition from three games this year, and there are a handful of games from this year that I wish I had played, but haven't yet.
