Top 10 rated games of 2011

It feels like just the other day that I was writing up the top ten rated games of 2010. A year has passed since then, and with it, dozens of amazing games have come and gone.

These lists are always contentious, mostly because people take them too seriously and can’t handle the idea that their favourite games are not the immutable, absolute best games ever.

Having said that, there has to be some value in the broader consensus which professional game reviewers reach, right? And there is no better way to quantify just that than by looking at the likes of Metacritic and Gamerankings. So that’s what I’m going to do right now, just for fun.

Nathan, if you crack that "arrow in the knee" joke one more time...

Below are the ten games which critics at large chose as their favourites of 2011. PS3, Xbox 360, PC, Wii, PSP, DS and 3DS games were eligible for placement.

In the interest of fairness, we averaged the Metacritic score and the Gamerankings score to get consensus between the two aggregating sites.

The list only includes AAA published games. We left off indie games because the standards by which they are rated are usually not comparable to those which AAA games are rated. As such, we will be compiling a separate list of the top ten indie games of 2011.

Game	Overall rating (%)	Platforms
Batman: Arkham City	96.06	PC, PS3, Xbox 360
The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim	95.55	PC, PS3, Xbox 360
Portal 2	95.15	PC, PS3, Xbox 360
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D	94.00	3DS
The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword	93.21	Wii
Xenoblade Chronicles	92.91	Wii
Little Big Planet 2	92.17	PS3
Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception	92.04	PS3
Gears of War 3	91.44	Xbox 360
Forza Motorsport 4	91.22	Xbox 360

A lot of the obvious candidates are present, but at the same time a lot of 2011’s big hitters are missing, such as Battlefield 3, Deus Ex: Human Revolution, Killzone 3, Modern Warfare 3 and Assassin’s Creed Revelations.

Here is a list of more games which could have, but didn’t make the list of 2011’s top rated games: Crysis 2, Bulletstorm, Rift, Dead Space 2, Total War: Shogun 2, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, Dark Souls, LA Noire, Dirt 3, Killzone 3, Mortal Kombat, Saints Row: The Third, Marvel vs. Capcom 3: Fate of Two Worlds, Assassin’s Creed: Revelations, Rage, Dragon Age 2, inFamous 2, Dead Island, Dungeon Siege 2, Homefront.

Wondering what MyGaming thought of the 2011 year in gaming? Check out our own list of the top ten games of 2011.