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[mcc]

So if you saw the Game of the Year poll I was posting about last week, the results are in! Here are the winners, plus the winners if I run poll results for only those voters who came in through tigsource.com:

CLICK HERE FOR PRETTY COLOR-CODED FULL RESULTS-- FULL POLL (858 voters)

   1. Mass Effect 2 (8125)
   2. Red Dead Redemption (4887)
   3. Starcraft 2 (3930)
   4. Minecraft (3678)
   5. Fallout: New Vegas (3513)
   6. Super Meat Boy (3205)
   7. Super Mario Galaxy 2 (3006)
   8. Halo Reach (2713)
   9. Battlefield: Bad Company 2 (2505)
  10. Civilization V (2444)
  11. Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood (2378)
  12. Bayonetta (2257)
  13. Darksiders (1967)
  14. Just Cause 2 (1865)
  15. World of Warcraft: Cataclysm (1855)
  16. Angry Birds (1740)
  17. Alpha Protocol (1677)
  18. Call of Duty: Black Ops (1604)
  19. Heavy Rain (1573)
  20. VVVVVV (1523)

CLICK HERE FOR PRETTY COLOR-CODED FULL RESULTS-- TIGSOURCE.COM USERS ONLY (39 voters)

   1. Super Meat Boy
   2. VVVVVV
   3. Minecraft
   4. Mass Effect 2
   5. Super Crate Box
   6. Starcraft 2
   7. Super Mario Galaxy 2
   8. Hero Core
   9. Halo Reach
  10. Amnesia: The Dark Descent
  11. Fallout: New Vegas
  12. Red Dead Redemption
  13. Recettear: An Item Shop’s Tale
  14. Battlefield: Bad Company 2
  15. Alan Wake
  16. Donkey Kong Country Returns
  17. Limbo
  18. Dragon Quest IX: Sentinels of the Starry Skies
  19. Alien Swarm
  20. Hydorah

(The results for Tigsource are of course pretty similar to Paul Eres' official forum poll.)

The numbers in parentheses are the final scores each game got under the poll’s ranking system. Thanks if you voted, and some more elaborate analysis of the results and scores (maybe more elaborate than you really wanted) can be found below.

------
NOTEWORTHY WINNERS

GOTY 2010:

#1, Mass Effect 2

Top-ranked PC Exclusive:

#3, Starcraft 2

Top-ranked Wii Exclusive:

#7, Super Mario Galaxy 2

Top-ranked 360 Exclusive:

#8, Halo Reach

Top-ranked iPhone/Android Exclusive:

#16, Angry Birds

Top-ranked PS3 Exclusive:

#19, Heavy Rain

Top-ranked DS Exclusive:

#31, Dragon Quest IX: Sentinels of the Starry Skies

Top-ranked PSP Exclusive:

#64, Valkyria Chronicles 2

Best RPG:

#1, Mass Effect 2

Best FPS:

#4, Minecraft

Best Indie Game:

#4, Minecraft

Best Game for a Console Download Service:

#6, Super Meat Boy

Best Browser Game:

#48, Robot Unicorn Attack

"Cult" Award (see below):

#52, Deadly Premonition

Best Downloadable Game (XBLIG division):

#59, Breath of Death VII: The Beginning

NOTEWORTHY LOSERS

Best game of 2010 which somehow nobody considered to be their #1 pick: #35, Alien Swarm
Worst game of 2010 that at least one person considered their #1 pick: #200, 3D Infinity (For XBLIG; only one person voted for this at all)
Worst game of 2010: #237, Dead Nation (Only one person voted for this; it was their #20 pick)

There were 23 games on the nominations list no one voted for at all.

METHODOLOGY AND ALTERNATE SCORING METHODS

If you missed the other thread, here's how all this works. Most polls, you’re given a list of four or five options and you’re asked to pick the one you liked best. This poll, people are given a list of a couple of hundred options, consisting of every new game released in the previous year– and asked to rate their top ten or twenty.

This does a few interesting things. First off, we get to see all the information about what people’s second, third etc choices are. Second off, because the second, third etc choices count, people are more likely to vote for the game they want to win, rather than the game they think is likely to win– they’re less likely to engage in “strategic voting”. Finally, because we have all this information, we’re actually able to provide somewhat reasonable rankings for something like the top hundred or so games of last year.

The rankings themselves are based on a version of the Borda count voting method. Each vote cast for a game gives that game a certain number of points. If someone ranks a game #1, that game gets 20 points. If they rank it #2, the game gets 19 points. If they rank it #3 the game gets 18 points... and so on. I have a script that checks a couple of alternate ways of ranking the same data, though.

For example, if we rank games only by the number of first place votes they got, we get a wildly different list, with tons of games listing that otherwise weren't anywhere near the top 20:

First Past the Post

   1. Mass Effect 2 (231)
   2. Red Dead Redemption (69)
   3. Starcraft 2 (47)
   4. Super Mario Galaxy 2 (40)
   5. Minecraft (35)
   6. Fallout: New Vegas (29)
   7. Bayonetta (20)
   8. Super Meat Boy (19)
   9. Battlefield: Bad Company 2 (18)
  10. Alpha Protocol (15)
  11. World of Warcraft: Cataclysm (15)
  12. Dragon Quest IX: Sentinels of the Starry Skies (14)
  13. Deadly Premonition (12)
  14. Rock Band 3 (11)
  15. Civilization V (10)
  16. Alan Wake (10)
  17. Halo Reach (10)
  18. S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat (10)
  19. Super Street Fighter 4 (9)
  20. Call of Duty: Black Ops (9)

Most years when I look at the first-past-the-post list a “cult” game usually emerges that received very few overall votes, but where an overwhelming percentage of those votes were #1 votes; this year actually seemed to have more "cult" games than normal, but I think the cult award was pretty clearly earned here by Deadly Premonition, which went from a ridiculous #52 in the normal ranking to #13 in the first-place-votes ranking. Also noteworthy here though were Dragon Quest IX (jumps from #31 to #12) and S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Call of Pripyat (jumps from #37 to #15, tying with Halo).

I also did two more ways of sorting the rankings: an “approval” vote, where nothing is counted except the number of votes a game received (i.e. a first-place and a twentieth-place ranking count the same– all the matters is if the game was on someone’s list); and an instant runoff vote. These lists are probably starting to look sort of similar at this point, so I bolded the places where these two votes differ from the normal rankings:

Approval

   1. Mass Effect 2 (440)
   2. Red Dead Redemption (284)
   3. Starcraft 2 (241)
   4. Minecraft (235)
   5. Fallout: New Vegas (217)
   6. Super Meat Boy (210)
   7. Super Mario Galaxy 2 (182)
   8. Halo Reach (177)
   9. Battlefield: Bad Company 2 (165)
  10. Civilization V (163)
  11. Bayonetta (155)
  12. Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood (146)
  13. Darksiders (144)
  14. Angry Birds (137)
  15. Just Cause 2 (135)
  16. Scott Pilgrim vs The World (115)
  17. Alpha Protocol (115)
  18. Call of Duty: Black Ops (115)
  19. Heavy Rain (114)
  20. World of Warcraft: Cataclysm (114)

IRV

   1. Mass Effect 2
   2. Red Dead Redemption
   3. Starcraft 2
   4. Minecraft
   5. Fallout: New Vegas
   6. Super Meat Boy
   7. Super Mario Galaxy 2 [/b]
   8. Halo Reach
   9. Battlefield: Bad Company 2
  10. Civilization V
  11. Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood
  12. Bayonetta
  13. Darksiders
  14. Just Cause 2
  15. Angry Birds
  16. World of Warcraft: Cataclysm
  17. Alpha Protpcol
  18. Call of Duty: Black Ops
  19. Alan Wake
  20. Heavy Rain

That's it. Thanks again to all.

[s0]

Glad to see Deadly Premonition and DQIX get some well-deserved recognition.  

It's interesting that Catclysm is so ranked so low, I'd have expected it to be in the top 5.

[mcc]

It's interesting that Catclysm is so ranked so low, I'd have expected it to be in the top 5.

Everybody's either played WoW by now or is never going to play it. Also people usually don't seem to vote for "expansion" type stuff when it sneaks on the poll (SSF4 did awful despite SF4 being #11 last year). All things considered it's probably actually impressive the series has enough staying power that their like third or fourth update can get in the top 20, I think.

Limbo probably got robbed by the way. #21 on the general ranking!

[tesselode]

Indie games do a lot better on TIGSource than they do in general, apparently. I guess I shouldn't be surprised.

[mirosurabu]

Hmm, was God of War 3 part of this poll? I expected it to be in Top 20 at least.

Not that I'm fan of GOW games, just wondering! (:

Ah, position #28. It's strange it's ranked so low.

[s0]

Everybody's either played WoW by now or is never going to play it. Also people usually don't seem to vote for "expansion" type stuff when it sneaks on the poll (SSF4 did awful despite SF4 being #11 last year). All things considered it's probably actually impressive the series has enough staying power that their like third or fourth update can get in the top 20, I think.

Well I thought there was a lot of hype for Cataclysm, that's why. I guess I was just listening to a vocal minority of WoW players. I stopped playing WoW about a year before Burning Crusade came out so I don't really know what it's like these days.

[PGGB]

Well I thought there was a lot of hype for Cataclysm, that's why. I guess I was just listening to a vocal minority of WoW players. I stopped playing WoW about a year before Burning Crusade came out so I don't really know what it's like these days.

Cataclysm is great. From my experience many people who play WoW though don't play that many other games though, which makes it less likely for them to vote on a Game of the Year poll.

[mcc]

Everybody's either played WoW by now or is never going to play it. Also people usually don't seem to vote for "expansion" type stuff when it sneaks on the poll (SSF4 did awful despite SF4 being #11 last year). All things considered it's probably actually impressive the series has enough staying power that their like third or fourth update can get in the top 20, I think.

Well I thought there was a lot of hype for Cataclysm, that's why. I guess I was just listening to a vocal minority of WoW players. I stopped playing WoW about a year before Burning Crusade came out so I don't really know what it's like these days.

Right. Sorry, didn't mean to come across as dismissive or whatever-- remember if this seems obvious to me it's because I've been watching this poll (with more or less the same core set of voters) for years so I kind of have a sense of how they tend to vote.

Heh. Something I just noticed: None of people who I tagged as tigsource readers voted for Cataclysm at all.

[PGGB]

Everybody's either played WoW by now or is never going to play it. Also people usually don't seem to vote for "expansion" type stuff when it sneaks on the poll (SSF4 did awful despite SF4 being #11 last year). All things considered it's probably actually impressive the series has enough staying power that their like third or fourth update can get in the top 20, I think.

Well I thought there was a lot of hype for Cataclysm, that's why. I guess I was just listening to a vocal minority of WoW players. I stopped playing WoW about a year before Burning Crusade came out so I don't really know what it's like these days.

Right. Sorry, didn't mean to come across as dismissive or whatever-- remember if this seems obvious to me it's because I've been watching this poll (with more or less the same core set of voters) for years so I kind of have a sense of how they tend to vote.

Heh. Something I just noticed: None of people who I tagged as tigsource readers voted for Cataclysm at all.

Yeah I think you forgot to tag me. I know because I'm quite sure that I voted Space Funeral for my #1 also (the only one to do that and it doesn't show up on the TIGS list either).

[ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)]

i think it's just sample size: if you choose people evenly you may get more WoW players, but your voters may come from other backgrounds/areas. besides, all the people who like cataclysm are likely busy playing it 14 hours a day and don't vote in internet polls.

[mcc]

Everybody's either played WoW by now or is never going to play it. Also people usually don't seem to vote for "expansion" type stuff when it sneaks on the poll (SSF4 did awful despite SF4 being #11 last year). All things considered it's probably actually impressive the series has enough staying power that their like third or fourth update can get in the top 20, I think.

Well I thought there was a lot of hype for Cataclysm, that's why. I guess I was just listening to a vocal minority of WoW players. I stopped playing WoW about a year before Burning Crusade came out so I don't really know what it's like these days.

Right. Sorry, didn't mean to come across as dismissive or whatever-- remember if this seems obvious to me it's because I've been watching this poll (with more or less the same core set of voters) for years so I kind of have a sense of how they tend to vote.

Heh. Something I just noticed: None of people who I tagged as tigsource readers voted for Cataclysm at all.

Yeah I think you forgot to tag me. I know because I'm quite sure that I voted Space Funeral for my #1 also (the only one to do that and it doesn't show up on the TIGS list either).

Well the "tagging", such as it is, is done just with referrer headers. In other words I ONLY count you as a tig reader if you followed a link from tigsource to the vote script, then proceeded to vote. If you hit "reload" or something it loses track of you and counts you as just having come in the front door. So all the per-forum counts undercount people. I think next year I'm going to try a less brittle method of tracking forums.

[moi]

Off that list I've only played vvvvv (the demo only)