Spike VGA’s 2011: The fact Gears of War 3 didn’t get nominated maybe a step in the right direction

SchollA from Console ControllUs writes:
“Before you call for my head, this is not a “Gears doesn’t deserve to be nominated” article. This is merely looking at how easy it could of been for Gears to get nominated and the fact that it didn’t might actually mean there’s light at the end of the tunnel. Let me explain.”

[DonaldBeck]

it is a step in the right direction because it isn't goty material like portal 2, skyrim, uncharted 3 ect.

[Micro_Sony]

The argument is flawed because everyone has a diffrent taste in games. I did not like portal 2 or Skyrim but loved UC3 and Gears 3.

Why should a corporation have to choose the GOTY.

[undercovrr]

Your logic is flawed. The whole of the gaming media 'decides chooses the GOTY' based on their own opinion. Almost every gaming journalist has their own preferred list of GOTY. There is no way someone could choose nominees that would please absolutely everyone.

[Army_of_Darkness]

uncharted 3, killzone 3 and gears 3 are better...
Than skyrim and portal 2 hands down in my opinion as well.... And I also prefer resistance 3 and shadows of the damned better than those 2 games also;) just putting it out there heheh!

[Tr10wn]

@Army_of_Darkness your opinion is only valid to you, the mass and the facts point to Skyrim being better than most of those games you mention, hence why Skyrim will take GOTY and not UC3 or Portal 2, plus is pretty obvious that Skyrim will take GOTY.

[mikeslemonade]

Excuse me but VGAs have been legit since 2009 when they awarded Uncharted 2 the Goty. That was when the VGA opinion mattered. Before then it was the Call of Dutys and the GTAs winning left and right.

[IcarusOne]

lol @ VGA's only becoming relevant once UC2 won.

OT: I'm okay with Gears 3 not being nominated. It felt like a rehash of every other Gears game and really didn't add much of anything in the way of gameplay and especially story. (Haven't played the MP much so can't really comment on that.) Ultimately, it was a disappointing conclusion to the series.

But most of those same complaints could be leveled at UC3, too.

[jrbeerman11]

Disclaimer....I love Gears and Uncharted series. Two of my favorites....

but anyone who says gears is just a rehash and uncharted isn't needs to take off fanboy goggles.

In fact I think Uncharted 2 > Uncharted 3.

@IcarusOne

Most of the innovation for Gears 3 was toward the Multiplayer (Horde 2.0, Beast, new weapons and balancing, servers, etc.)

The multi is where Gears shines, while the single is where Uncharted shines.

[jessupj]

Just because you didn't like X game doesn't mean it doesn't deserve to be nominated.

For example I personally got a little bored of UC3 half way to getting the platinum, but I can still see the game objectively and feel it should still be nominated.

That's what these award commitees do. (Or at least I hope they do) Even if they didn't personally like X game they won't let that get in the way of their professional opinion and will try and be as objective as they can.

It seems like sooo many people can't wrap their heads around this simple idea that there's a difference between and personal and professional opinion.

[awi5951]

And spike tv is a joke you cant be nominated unless a company pays money to be in there little group.

[MaxXAttaxX]

Portal 2 bumped off Gears 3 and I found that hilarious.
I voted for Portal 2 for every single category it was nominated on.
It's a really good game, so I wouldn't mind it winning GOTY. It's one of my faves this year.
But it would also be funny because it would piss off a lot of fanboys :P lol

[bozebo]

I honestly didn't like Portal 2 or Skyrim all that much either.
Portal 1 was groundbreaking when it came out and 2 just used comedy to mask how little of an improvement it actually made and pull in some big dollars.
Skyrim is very good overall, but it is too flawed and the guild quests are boring (did they playtest it AT ALL?). It could have been 10x the game it is but no doubt they knew it would sell like sweetrolls so didn't bother (shareholders need their dividends).

I won't be buying Gears 3 (refuse to pay for XBL anymore, which means I won't be buying any xbox games with significant multiplayer components either - fix your business model M$, or er... just market to stupid people who like to pay for things twice like you have been doing thus far)

My GOTY would be TW2 because it didn't just follow a guaranteed cash pattern, so the game was actually fantastic and refreshing. Though I've still Dark Souls to get so I might change my mind (I havn't mastered Demon Souls yet).

Also: "GTAs winning left and right"
Yes... because GTAs are excellent - good fun and top production quality. I'm just hoping that 5 is going to have some actual extra content and awesome stuff in it like 1,2,3,VC and SA did, they can keep the main missions serious if they want - but why skimp out on other content? Oh wait, the game will sell anyway...

[GraveLord]

TBH Gears 3 deserves a nomination instead of Skyrim.
You can't reward developers who constantly keep putting out buggy/glitchy games.

[FlashBack]

They can reward developers who create huge games with hundreds of hours worth of fresh content.

[theonlylolking]

LBP2 should replace zelda. Gears 3 and skyrim I think could both be nominated but since Skyrim is part of Elder scrolls it gets insta nominated.

[Tr10wn]

Why the hell is everyone hating on Skyrim? i mean name one game that give you 300 hours of gameplay with awesomeness nonstop, GoW3 was awesome but it doesn't really fit in there maybe with portal 2 or uncharted 3 since it wasn't what people expected, in the other hand Skyrim have 300 hours of gameplay "at least" because the game is endless, has an excellent story pretty good graphics awesome music, what more people want? and the only bug i encounter was the one with the giant's and bethesda said that it was fun so they will leave it there, plus Skyrim is the most played game of 2011 beating even MW3, according to Raptr.

[Drake117]

The elder scrolls series is buggy and glitchy because of the fact that the games are so huge and ambitious. Its easy to bug test an on rails game like Gears 3 or Uncharted 3 because the developers know exactly what the player is going to be doing at all times. A game like Skyrim has an exponentially larger amount of data to keep track of then every other game on that list. Oh and i'm over 150 hours in on the 360 version and ran into one glitch where a giant knocked me into the air hundreds of feet. But that's it.

[bozebo]

"The elder scrolls series is buggy and glitchy because of the fact that the games are so huge and ambitious."

Errr... no. All the bugs are in isolated logic patterns.

Code isn't duplicated when a game is large...

Most of the bugs in Skyrim involve the AI (which breaks other things if it doesn't work - horrible programming practice that would get people fired in most studios) and untested scripts.

Skyrim isn't all that excellent either. The quests are massively dissapointing compared to Morrowind or even Oblivion. And a lot of the bugs should have been spotted within literally 5 minutes of testing.

The best thing Skyrim has done is massively improve the environment design, masking the tile-based nature of the dungeons (nothing wrong with it being tile based, it would take countless man-hours to manually model all the dungeons and it wouldn't fit on a DVD). The voice acting is also a lot better (but the AI bugs out and says the wrong thing way too often so it's spoiled). I also like the soundtrack and audio space of the game in general. Once I am done with Skyrim I will be playing Morrowind again, because I still havn't explored half of it or played many different "classes" after 500+ hours (100% Oblivion in about 120 hours).

[n4gisatroll]

Neither is skyrim, with all those bugs and glitches, it should only win worst launch of the year.

Gears deserves it much more.

[da_2pacalypse]

Coming from a gears of war veteran who still plays about 2 hours of gears a day, I'd take Skyrim over gears any day. However I wouldn't take U3 over gears, but that's just my opinion. Who cares anyways? VGA's have always sucked.

[MysticStrummer]

If I went by bugs to declare the worst launch of the year, Dead Island would win by a mile. I'm playing the PS3 version of Skyrim and not seeing nearly as many problems as with Dead Island.

[PetitPiPi]

Na. That should go to BF3 on Xbox 360. What a horrible launch!

[FunkMcnasty]

Haven't played Gears, Portal, or Skyrim, but I have played (almost finished with actually, just gotta kill Marlow I think) Uncharted 3, and as much as I love it, I don't think it's a GOTY contender either. Uncharted 2? Hell yes. Absolutley deserved the GOTY it received. But UC3 really only improved on UC2 in terms of some graphical enhancements and slightly re-vamped hand-to-hand combat mechanics. So far it's delivered the awesome story and character driven adventure that I'd expected, but this is something that's become a benchmark of the series. In fact, in terms of pacing between shooting, puzzle solving, and platforming sequences I actually think UC3 has slipped up in the pacing dept. where UC2 excelled so well. I couldn't put UC2 down and blazed through it in a few days.. I've had UC3 for about 2 weeks now, and I cant seem to sink in to it for more than an hour or so at a time, and I think it's because of the pacing.

EDIT: Now that I think about all the games I've played that came out this year, I think the one that most deserves, at the very least, a GOTY nomination is Deus Ex: Human Revolution.

[enfestid]

Co-sign. Uncharted 2 was amazing and worthy of GOTY awards and nominations. But the third title just fell flat for me. It doesn't grab you like the second.

[JBaby343]

I gotta disagree with both of you. I enjoyed the pacing of Uncharted 3 more than 2. UC2 was an excellent game no doubt about it but I got sick of it towards the end. I kept thinking "another gun fight when will this end" whereas Uncharted 3 varied it more by mixing smaller fights with intermingled platforming between and I loved the longer space between fights such as Cartegena and the Rub'al Khali where you could look around and take it easy for a while.

I also liked the story better with Charlie Cutter being added to the cast. Villains were the same with the main and his/her back-up.

The tech in the environments was also better evidenced by the ship levels and the cargo plane both being so dynamic (as well as the barges) and rotating 90° in the ship itself. Plus the horse riding was a step up from the chase scene in UC2.

I guess to sum up it seemed like UC3 didn't need to depend on constant action to keep things going but used more in total aspects to wow me.

[kneon]

'Familiarity breeds contempt'
Had UC2 not existed I expect most everyone would be gushing over how awesome UC3 is and declare it the undisputed GOTY. It improved on UC2 in many ways, but given the high bar set by UC2 there is only so much better you can get. There are a few areas where UC2 beats it, but not by much.

It's hard to do but games really need to be judged on their own merit, not relative to previous releases.

[tehnoob3]

@kneon
You have to look at that from both sides because if we never took familiarity into account then mw3 would be winning goty. This is because if mw2 and 1 were never released and mw3 was original mw then it would win goty all over the place

[JBaby343]

@tehnoob3: You have a point but then again had the other MW games not existed, MW3 would not have been near as hyped or have the strong fan following so I don't think it would get the brand loyalty acclaim we see it enjoy. While a decent game in its own right, it does receive a certain amount of its praise just off being a MW game so that argument can really go both ways and I think you and kneon could just go back and forth.

To be honest, if UC3 and MW3 were both released without any previous games, I think UC3 would be rated the better game for all it offers as a complete package. We'll never know though.

[otherZinc]

Its Ridiculous.
Someone should be fired.
Its why I dont trust the media scores!
Its why I wont watch the show!
Gears 3 definitely should be in the running!

Gears Of War 3:
1.Great SP:4 player co-op with replay value
2.Horde Mode:5 player co-op
3.Beast Mode:5 player co-op
4.Multiplayer
5.A new Skull feature to change your experience
6.and more!

Hater or not, that is added value everyone can respect from an already feature rich game.

VGA's should be ashamed of themselves!

[TheDivine]

Totally agree. Gears 3 is miles above any shooter fps or tps on the market in terms of the amount of polish and content. People bash gears over the story but imo the campaign in gears 3 was one of the best shooter campaigns ive played this gen. The story was great, emotional (for me at least), full of epic setpieces and bad ass levels like the sub which was beautiful. This game was a thank you to gears fans just watch the credits. It was flawless imo and i was never a huge fan i didnt even finish 2 or 1, the game is just that good.

It def the best shooter of the year for me so whatever f*** the awards, this game was the reward for 360 fans.

[Hanif-876]

I said it first
Battlefield 3 is gonna win best FPS Shooter of 2011 :-)

[aviator189]

It'd be more appropriate if the title read, "Spike VGA’s 2011: The fact Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 didn’t get nominated maybe a step in the right direction

[Scholla]

lmbooooo i actually mention that in the article, hee-larry-us, feel the same exact way.

[Scholla]

Excerpt from article - “Here’s another fact you can hang your hat on — to give you a glimmer of hope, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 the biggest selling, most popular franchise wasn’t nominated either!”

[aviator189]

Yeah, I know, I read it. I just think that Modern Warfare 3 not receiving a goty nomination is more significant than gears of war 3 not receiving one.

[Forbidden_Darkness]

I don't think any of the Call of Dutys since COD4: MW has been nominated for GOTY has it?

[FunkMcnasty]

@ Forbidden Darkness,

Not sure if it won GOTY, but it COD4 was nominated at some point because My copy is the GOTY edition that came with a map pack.

Edit: Derp.. I think that's kinda what you just said! :)

[Scholla]

U mite be right...I think tho the reason i went the gears route is because it's viewed as a more quality
title (perception)which in turn is more deserving of an nomination of an award like "GOTY" than COD...i think gamers know why COD is popular and just take it for what it is...GoW3 on the other hand I think more was expected. Thus being more of a surprise.

[xVeZx]

its a tie between mw3 and world at war for worst cod mp ever....so glad its not nominated....i hope it doesnt win anything at all...that game is pure garbage...and its only going to get worse...

[life doomer]

gears is overrated, and don't call me a fanboy because I have the game and it's not that good as everybody says.

[versusALL]

agreed

[Kingdom Come]

The Critical and Commercial Success of the entire franchise disagree's with you...

[Spenok]

You are right. The Critical and Commercial success does disagree with him. However i agree with him as well. It just depends on what type of gamer you are. I prefer a well writen, story that doesnt include BIG BUFF SPACE MARINES in it.

The game play, graphics, and multiplayer are great for Gears. But its the story that severely turns me off of the franchise. The first one was the most bareable for me, and ill take that simply because it took me 3.5 hours to complete.

Oh, and commercial success doesnt mean a game is good. It also doesnt mean a game is bad either though. It just could be like CoD where its really easy to pick up, and fun in
bursts... you know, like an arcade game.

Honestly it just comes down to opinion. Do you like Gears or not? Life Doomer doesnt, and neither do i. But there are over 8million people each time it comes out that do. So let them enjoy it, and let those who dont enjoy something else.

[PetitPiPi]

3.5 hours to complete?? How about trying the game on another diffuclity besides NOOB?

[cstyle]

gears 3 deserves a spot on that list IMO. I think Batman AC is more deserving than any other title though. Their last game release they won studio of the year. They almost won game of the year behind Uncharted 2 plus their game is more of an improvement than the first.

[Vandamme21]

I think it's either batman arkham city or uncharted 3 going to get game of the year.

[Spenok]

Definitly. Though i think simply because of the calibur of Uncharted, and just how amazing it was just barely edges out Batman.

[rob6021]

Well, we know Pachter voted for Portal 2, Gerstman voted for Skryim, they're both on the panel for Spikes VGA awards, I'm thinking skyrim will get it.

[Kingdom Come]

What next, Batman Arkham City being nominated for Best Graphics over Battlefield 3 and Gears of War 3 is a step in the right direction?

The VGA's are relatively biased in my opinion, despite being a fantastic game, Batman Arkham City does not deserve nominating for best graphics, why has it been? Well, I would say it's die to the exclusivity of the first 2 Trailers on the past 2 VGA's.

Gears of War 3 is MY personal Game of the Year...

[Zechs34]

Maybe its the fact that while it doesn't looks as technically sound as a BF3, Batman AC does gave amazing art style and dare I say, on some areas, Rocksteady handles the UE3 so well, parts of the game look better than Gears 3 itself. (A game developed by Epic with their own engine.)

Just my 2 cents.

[Kingdom Come]

So, you're saying that Batman Arkham City looks better than Gears of War 3 and Battlefield 3?

Related image(s)

[jetlian]

give up dude you and I know gears better. this a case of journalist having a thing against real games.

Batman as a game techniqlly is pretty weak

[maniacmayhem]

Gears 3 is a damn fun game but it's not GOTY. And there's nothing wrong with that.

(I think some folks get caught up in this game of the year thing a little more than actually enjoying a game for what it is.)

Anyways if there is any game I think should get the award its Batman:AC. Such a fantastic game, only complaint was the story was way too short...or maybe I just played it way too much.

[admiralthrawn87]

Dark Souls shouldve easily been GOTY. Does open world in a new way, amazing combat, great RPG system, great visuals, intricately detailed world and atmosphere.

Portal 2 and Witcher 2 come close, but the fact that Dark Souls isn't even nominated is a slap in the face to gamers. I enjoyed Skyrim, but it was buggy and not very innovative.

Thats the problem with Uncharted 3, innovation was out the window.

[LGIT1]

Did you actually say Skyrim isn't innovative? You deserve a slap in the face for that one. The ambitious nature of Skyrim alone which exceeds the previous titles 10 fold automatically makes the game innovative because its doing things not seen before. I could sit here and name sh*t for hours just highlighting all the things Skyrim does that you simply don't get on any other game currently on the market. Truth is, Bethesda, and Rockstar* really are in another league when it comes to innovation. Case you dumb fangirls haven't noticed, detail is what its all about. That's how you measure the amount of passion that was put in the game. And Skyrim does this better than any other. Only other game I see even touching Skyrim is GTAV...2012's goty.

[from the beach]

Gears 3 is easily worth a nomination - but then so are a lot of other worthy games that are also missing from this list.

Skyrim is the obvious champion and I think it'll clean up with these awards.

[Pyscho_Mantis]

Gears 3 does not deserve to be on that list. What does is the Witcher 2.... I mean how could they mess that one up.

[Simon_Brezhnev]

I dont know why you getting disagrees. Witcher 2 probably had the best story and best graphics this year. Well best graphics for a 3rd person view game.

[MizTv]

played alot of gears 1 hated 2 havent playes 3 kind of got turned off after 2

[enfestid]

This article is a load of crap. If Uncharted 3 is worthy of nomination, then so is Gears of War 3.

Gears of War 3 Metacritic Score: 91 -- http://www.metacritic.com/g...

Uncharted 3 Metacritic Score: 92 -- http://www.metacritic.com/g...

Gears of War 3 GameRankings Score: 91.89% -- http://www.gamerankings.com...

Uncharted 3 GameRankings Score: 92.07% -- http://www.gamerankings.com...

So less than one point in difference between the aggregate scores somehow makes Gears of War 3 a crappy game? It means award ceremonies "get it"? No, sorry. The argument this article makes is that because Gears of War 3 is widely popular among a large amount of people -- and not just hardcore gamers -- that it is somehow not worthy of adoration.

Nope, sorry, not buying it. A game's commercial success does not preclude it from critical success, as the aggregate scores prove. This article is absurd, bluntly. Maybe a large amount of N4G users don't like Gears of War 3. And that's fine. Just like anyone not liking Uncharted 3 is fine. But to say that one or the other doesn't deserve to be nominated? Yeah, sorry, no. I'm not saying either should surely win, but they're both worthy of nomination.

[kikizoo]

don't compare games from different consoles !

ps3 standards are highers, if uncharted could exist on xbox, it would be a 11/10 metacritic score..

by the way, if you count all the existing reviews, uncharted is more 9.7 than 9.2.

[humbleopinion]

Actually, you got the facts upside down: comparing multiplatform games show that PS3 standards are on average slightly lower (off by a few points)...

[BitbyDeath]

Actually you cannot compare any games score with others.

A game could get a 1/10 and still be better than a 10/10. Unlikely but possible.

Review scores are only merited against the game being reviewed that is it.

This is where meta-critic fails, you really think Pacman or Wii Sports is one of the best games ever made?

Don't use metacritic it is useless.

[Drake117]

Metacritic isn't useless it gives an honest score of a game based on significant publications scores. The thing that is useless are the people that cant tell the difference between platform/genre relevance to a score. No sh*t pacman and wii sports aren't the best games ever made but they get a good score on metacritic because they are good at doing what they do. Wii sports is a very well made family fun game made for the wii and is being reviewed as such.

[YodaCracker]

Wow. That comment is just about as delusional as it gets.

[Hueynewton2012]

It is a step in the right direction for the simple fact that gears of war isn't GOTY worthy plain and simple. They needed to do something to increase the integrity of the award show. Letting MS or even Sony dictate who should be nominated by either campaigning or through advert contracts weakens the GOTY show. TBH i have never watched the show, i just to gametrailers.com (a Microsoft subsidiary) just to see who nominated. Rather be online than wasting time watching spike tv.

[J-R]

These are all great games and Gear of War 3 should be right up there with them. That said, Skyrim will end up winning GOTY whether we like it or not.

[rickybadman]

Gears is definitely worthy of a nomination. The gameplay is unique, extremely fun and a welcomed break from all the other FPSs on the market. No other game that involved shooting a gun match Gears 3 when you take into consideration quality( how good it is compared to others)+quantity (how much content on the disc)....There is a sharp drop off from single player to multiplayer in UC3, that's not the case with Gears.

[spirited]

At least should get a nomination for the graphics Over batman ac. There is hardly any graphic improvement in batman game only now the environment is Bigger.and no killzone3 graphics nomination are u serious? Replace. LA noire and Arkham city with gears and kill zone 3 for graphics nomination.

[Jazz4108]

I agree with Gears but not kz3 as the game and story were lame with a splash of orange paint.

[killyourfm]

"Could of" ?
lrn2grammar

[_Aarix_]

So let me get this straigh....Gears of war 3, a game that put out an amazing trilogy full of action, and shooting galore that had me in the first 10 minutes, a game that showed what the xbox can do and what a company that cares does for a game so feature rich and all out amazing experience doesn't get nominated cause its "popular". BULLSHIT!!!!. Gears deserves a spot, especially if uncharted 3 does and skyrim. Theyre amazing games too but Gears 3 brought so much to the table as oppose to uncharted 2/3 and Skrim is a bug filled mess with the excuse "it has hundres of gamplay hours".

Gaming has now turned into a bias industry. I wouldnt be surprised if the only reason uncharted 3 was up there is becasue ps3 owners are more passionate. The whole gears of war franchise deserves ample supplies of awards and regonization because as an overall GAME!!!, Epic games did it right.

If gears not being nominated is a step in the right direction then its going torwards hell.

[ZippyZapper]

VGA's = pay us for an award

What do you expect it's from the same people that brought you the MTV awards.

[Dlacy13g]

The reality... VGA's mean nothing. The only reason why ANYONE gives a crap about the VGA's is because they (Spike) bought their way into making this show relevant by having a bunch of paid for "reveal" trailers. VGA's is nothing more than an hour long infomercial for upcoming Video Games. DICE is the only Awards ceremony that anyone in the industry cares about.

[StrongMan]

Get over it guys. Gears 3 is good but not GOTY material.

[_Aarix_]

A lot of those titles are less Goty material than gears of war.

[xJumpManx]

Uncharted 3 also is not GOTY material this year. To many issues with animations and shooting problems. I loved UC2 but UC3 was a letdown.

[Silly gameAr]

That seems to be the copy and paste comment that people are most familiar with.

[death2smoochie]

Uncharted 3 should not been nominated. GEARS OF WAR 3 not being nominated I agree with, however to nominate Uncharted 3 and Not Gears 3? Something there is not right. i agree with Gears 3 not being there, but then nominating Uncharted 3....

Anyways...

Portal 2 and Batman:City IMO are GOTY worthy.
Skrim is AMAZING game but does not deserve it either because of glitches. If not for the bugs, Skyrim wins hands down GOTY.

[kickerz]

I am hugely disappointed gears didn't get nominated :(
I know everyone has there opinions and all but I LOVE the game. I just wana keep playing it. Every day after work me and me mates hop online and team deathmatch to out hearts content :) very addictive and fun. (Kickerz is my gamer name) oh well other then that the only other game that I'm so hooked on is league of legends. Which didn't get nominated either :(
Oh well. Have a good day gamers :)

[bobrea]

Grammatical errors in the headline? I'll pass.

The fact THAT Gears....etc

[ZeroWil]

I think Batman: AC deserves the win. The story was incredible and left me saying "wow" a couple of times. Though seeing Gears 3 not nominated is a bit disappointing. I enjoyed the first 2, even if I couldn't really get into the multiplayer that much, but 3 is the best of bunch. It is also probably the most feature-rich game released this year as well, and it excels in all areas.
Oh well, I only watch the VGAs for the reveal trailers anyway.

[LNDCalling]

As much as I'm a tad Sony fanboy'ish.. the title makes me want to defend the game as many devs had good things to say about what was done technically!

That said I realise that looks / engine(s) don't make the game.. but rather the imagination!

On that note.. I'm glad to see Rayman getting good reviews and I think that should have been there but it got kind of swamped which is a great shame.. for such a beautiful game!

[Ulf]

It's sickening to see people claim Gears 3 deserves a nomination over Skyrim.

How much enjoyment has been reaped from one, over the other, I wonder? Shouldn't that be the measure? I sincerely doubt the playtime of all copies of Gears 3 could match the playtime of all copies of Skyrim, at the same point in its life cycle.

Gears 3 is "fun". Skyrim is "addictive" and "enthralling". There's a mighty big difference there, and Skyrim seems like the clear GotY choice, if it had to be one or the other. Bugs or no bugs -- FUN is FUN, and that's all that matters in the end.

If anything, Gears 3 and UC3 are the "cut and paste with a better (or just new) story" games in the list -- Skyrim is a clear GotY nominee over such games.

[tehnoob3]

*gets out gasoline to pour on fire*

I could say skyrim is cut and paste with more bugs and glitches dual wielding and shouts

*finishes pouring gasoline on the fire*

[CYBERHATER]

I think it is a flawed system period! Gears 3 is unbelievable and I was still playing it when MW3 was released! I'm sorry the game has been for me lag free competitive and simply addictive! I can't get enough. The campaign is 4 player coop and it is long. There is just so much to do in Gears of war 3! Every weekend the playlists change and are amazing. The fact that it wasn't even nominated is a travesty. Don't get me wrong Batman, Dark souls, and Skyrim are awesome and I'm sorry uncharted 2 is better than uncharted 3 but to not recognize this game is a travesty.