Game of the Year 2010 Winner

NoobFeed Game of the Year 2010.

We’ve finally arrived at our choice for Game of the Year 2010. It was a taxing process, having to sum up the good and bad points of each game, what has done more for its respective genre and indeed the industry as a whole and the decision wasn’t entirely unanimous amongst the NoobFeed outfit. It isn’t entirely surprising how difficult we did find it though, with so many great titles being released in the space of the calendar year.

We have made our decision though with a majority vote and after listing the final ten nominees we can announce our winner:
Bayonetta (360, PS3)
Red Dead Redemption (360, PS3)
Heavy Rain (PS3)
Rock Band 3 (360, PS3, Wii, DS)
Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit (360, PS3, Wii, PC)
GoldenEye 007 (Wii, DS) 
Super Mario Galaxy 2  (Wii) 
Pac-Man Championship Edition DX (XBL, PSN)
Mass Effect 2 (360, PS3, PC)
Call of Duty: Black Ops (360, PS3, Wii, PC, DS)
FIFA 11 (360, PS3, Wii, PC, PS2, PSP, DS)
StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty  (PC)

And the winner is...

Heavy Rain

It’s no coincidence that Heavy Rain has been met with critical acclaim across the board, because upon its completion you haven’t just played another game that is idly discarded into a pile, or traded in for a newer model. You have lived through a story along with its four leading characters and later a fifth, who we shan’t name.

It’s not all a bed of roses though, as the game has come in for criticism from a few sources, claiming the game to be “one big quick time event, with no real gameplay value,” but to those you have to smirk and shrug it off, because they clearly haven’t grasped the concept of what the game is about. It’s about the experience, rather than becoming skilled at a certain thing, or gaining any form of momentum. It’s more a part of letting the game take you as opposed to you taking it. Maybe that’s not everybody’s cup of tea, but for those who welcome such a thing and perhaps already have tried the game for themselves, it may just be a part of the future of not just adventure games, but many aspects of gaming as a whole.

Holding the characters’ fates in your own hands is a major part of the game and one of the major reasons it works so well. The decisions you make, puzzles you solve and clues you unearth will ultimately decide what the future holds and whether everyone makes it to the end of the journey, or if some check out early. As well as this and its engrossing plot, the graphical capabilities of the game are also something to behold. Forgiving a jagged edge or two, the visuals really help set the entire mood of the game, and the lighting effects in particular create a sense of urgency and suspense unlike no other.

The controls are perhaps the most controversial talking point of all, as completing the game, whilst not wholly easy, does only require a few quick button presses at certain critical points and a few tricky holds. However, many of them are set in a way that feels natural for the action you’re attempting to convey on screen. Drawing, for example, feels rather serene when conveyed through the game. The recently added Move compatibility simply expands on this; bringing the actions to life more vividly.

This is a title that has everything we feel a game of the year should: a great story, stunning visuals, originality, engaging characters and a wide accessibility. It may not have a multiplayer component, but that’s simply not what Heavy Rain is about. To end, New Line Cinema and Quantic Dream Pictures currently hold the movie rights if they ever wanted to take this to the big screen, but  there’s really no point, as here you not only get to watch the movie, but become part of it and that is priceless.

Read our full review here.

Finally, we would like to thank you all for being a part of our Game of the Year and hope you're with us sharing more great gaming memories throughout 2011.