@anders.jiang: I'm using that word to describe film, and its connotation that film is the highest medium- as in, people like James Cameron spend insane amounts of money on something and a bazillion people see it. That puts the medium in a special place in our culture and society.

@Krackato-ATOMIC COLLIDER!: You know, it is curious that they use Radiant to name their tools. idTech's level editor is named radiant- a veritable juggernaut of a program when it comes to game development. It's a little like calling it the Photoshop Sky System. Makes me wonder if there's idStudio tech afoot here.

@cptincognito: tl;dr version: Video games as Gesamtkunstwerk.

Mocap and photo-based textures are distracting if not done well. The facial mocap is awesome, but it reminds me a little bit of quake textures that are unprocessed photos- just jarring. Eventually they'll integrate this stuff into the pipeline in a more artistically done way and it'll be awesome. The bleeding edge is…

@Manly McBeeferton: Yeah, it's a little too bad that you couldn't really control Marston's basic character in any meaningful way. That said, you could do some truly heinous things to NPCs when no one was looking.

@The Cap'n: I could level the same criticism against the other primary contender, ME2. In fact, ME2 sacrificed a lot of open-worldiness and RPG/emergent gameplay in order to convey a polished, mainstream, epic game presentation.

@Shinta: I disagree about the controls- they had a learning curve, but once you get good at them, you have a near-telepathic link to the world. Fact is: riding horses is hard, shooting a flock of birds out the sky takes a real badass, and the controls make these things a challenge, though possible.

To address some of the points made in debate:

@rpglover101: Nuketown and to a lesser degree firing range are popular because the matches reach score limit faster, and so you get more games and more points given the time spent with minimal effort.

@Howunfortunate: Played all the loyalty missions, made the rounds between missions. The loyalty missions are exactly what I'm talking about though- I didn't say same story, I said same story arc. The way the companions were all like, hey, I have a favor, perhaps I will like you more if you do said favor, rinse,…

@Bob_Malooga: Hacker Pro is a great answer to campers, as are dogs, NOVA gas, and RC cars. I wish they would have lowered the killstreak requirement for dogs- they weren't terribly hard to kill, but did a great job of smoking out campers in W@W.

@Killer Toilet: Don't encourage them! It'd be interesting to play W@W maps with the semi-modern guns though.

@spiderweb1986: well, maybe not niche... regional, perhaps? I kid, I love the game, but it might as well be a sports game with the learning curve and culture.

@Howunfortunate: Nope. Nosiree. I loved ME1, got ME2 at midnight, proceeded to play it from the moment I got home until it was beaten, and then immediately started a new game. I didn't even finish RDR, and I'd give it the top spot over ME2.

@coolguyface: Remember, New Vegas was released this year. I punched someone in the face, it exploded, and their eyeballs were suspended midair in a shower of blood FOR THE REST OF THE GAME. They just stayed there like a monument to my Norris-like left hook.

@Antiterra: I'm glad to see Jordan/2K11 on there, an excellently crafted game should get props even if it isn't a Gamer's Game. Though, if you're going to bring in niche games, Starcraft 2 was extremely polished, insanely well supported, and a ton of fun.

BLOPS is the first COD I've done on PC... it's awesome, so much fun, and I hate this console exclusive bullshit soooooooo much.

@Rachel Fogg: I'm with you on that- it's heads and shoulders above the other games listed (and I'm a huge ME/COD/MJ fan).

@zenpoet: Better yet, I'd like to see a thread for worst DS game of the year- complete with in-depth analysis... make those writers work for their money.

@VincentGrey: A lot of people enjoy the COD formula. Many, innumerable, whole lotta... It's almost a genre to itself, market-wise. And BOPS is a good COD MP experience- you don't get that many happy fingers on the controllers without garnering some recognition.