RPGWatch - Game of the Year 2012 Awards

Boy 2012 really was a bad year for RPGs that didn't have an A in front of it, wasn't it? Here is hoping for 2013.

Originally Posted by crpgnut
I voted on Amalur as best game, though that was mostly from a lack of choice. There just wasn't any AAA games that stood out last year.

Huh? There were several AAA games that definitely stood out last year. I'm guessing you just didn't play them. i.e. XCOM, Dishonored.

I voted Game of Thrones as top RPG of the year. I thought it was highly underrated; it is an excellent story driven RPG with good customization, well developed characters and decent dialogue, generally good mechanics, some challenge and difficulty. Probably the most RPG of many of the RPG lite/ARPG games on that list.

*edit*
It also captures the atmosphere of the Game of Thrones setting extremely well I thought if you are interested in that kind of thing.

I had to go with Risen 2. I put more time in that than any other AAA RPG this year and enjoyed every minute. I really like Kingdoms of Amalur and Borderlands 2, but I just got both of those recently and haven't spent enough time to give them my vote. Kings Bounty LOTN was good too, but I liked Armored Princess better. My son got Dishonored for Christmas on the console, but I haven't got to give it a go yet.

I had no doubt on the Indie game that I liked the most this year - Legend of Grimrock.

Weak year. I don't particularly want to pick anything in the A category. I liked Dishonored and even Xcom a bit, though it was dumbed down quite a lot from he original. Neither of those are RPGs. Can't wait until my Kickstarters start coming to fruition next year.

EDIT: I picked Game of Thrones and Risen 2, as they are the only two on the list I've played that I consider to be RPGs, and the poll question asked for best RPGs. There aren't many RPGs on that list at all.

Doesn't look like I'm entitled to vote. I've only played GoT from that list (and that due to it being short) but it certainly looks like a "weak" year as far as mainstream AAA/AA RPGs are concerned. I'm certainly not complaining since my backlog is now somewhere between 500 and 1k hours of gametime.

Due to the fact that I'm only going through a few action/RPG games per year plus any sequels of games that don't require much dedication (the new Hitman and the latest Assassins Creed), my list with the serious stuff is not getting shorter but at least it's not going to get bigger either.

It really was a year of replays or promises from Kickstarters.

Yeah, pretty dry year, and I don't just mean the weather. We'll see what shows up with the new console generation.

By the way, in the last question of the survey the "Other" doesn't have a text box for your write in.

I had to vote 'Inquisitor', as it was the only game on the list I played. And it was a good rpg, though I'm still playing it and have not finished it yet. Well, I did briefly play Diablo 3, but it was not something I thought was anything noteworthy.

The rpgs I'm looking forward to, in rough order of anticipation, top to bottom:

Chaos Chronicles
Divinity: Original Sin
Legends of Dawn
Eschalon: Book III
Nuclear Union
Grim Dawn
Wasteland 2

I think there are several promising and exciting rpgs on the horizon, after a long dry spell.

Heh, I should occasionally buy recent releases and play them so I can vote on these awards. Damn you steam sales and giant backlog…

I voted for Frayed Knights II, Rampant Coyote - now go hurry up with that

Heh - Working on it right now! Ran into some hurdles with being a part-timer in 2012, hoping 2013 won't be quite so bad.

The vote page has the instructions from last years vote.

I couldn't sincerely vote forr AAA's because my machine is not powerful enough to run them.

Neither of these were RPGs, but I'd say I enjoyed Dishonored and Far Cry 3 the most.

ME3 was pretty good as well, an improvement from ME2 in some ways. Overall I enjoyed Game of Thrones as I'm a fan of the books and the writing was a good fit with the ASOIAF universe (I believe GRRM consulted on this project in some capacity), but it was not a very good game. Certainly would not recommend GOT to anyone who was not already into the series.

And I'm still waiting for Risen 2 and Amalur to drop below $10 on Steam

Originally Posted by CountChocula
And I'm still waiting for Risen 2 and Amalur to drop below $10 on Steam

You should have purchased Amular during the holiday sales. GamersGate was offering the original game plus both DLCs bundled for $15 for nearly 3 weeks.

You'll have a tougher time finding Risen 2 that cheap, but it's well worth the current price anyways imo.

Voted XCOM as my overall best game even though I don't really classify it as a true RPG, it made #1 on my Game of the Year lists at other forums so what the heck.
Amalur getting second place.

I only started Inquisitor a couple of days ago but having lots of "old school" fun with it and it looks great in a non-3D environment, but isn't this an indie game? Anyway that's where I voted for it.

A lot of nice 2012 gaming experiences here, but surprisingly few which I would consider to be RPGs (and I try to keep my genre definitions pretty loose). Somewhat ironically, Mass Effect 3 wins by virtue of being a game I liked which was more RPG-ish than most other games I liked on the list (including my GOTY Dishonored).

I played maybe 20 games in '12, only 3 would I consider rpg's…..LoG, Avernum, and maybe Xcom by a hair. Real rpgs seem to be quite rare these days.


-Carn

Originally Posted by JDR13
You should have purchased Amular during the holiday sales. GamersGate was offering the original game plus both DLCs bundled for $15 for nearly 3 weeks.

Yeah, also the Amalur collection was $12 on Amazon during the cyber monday sale in November - which I snagged. I still haven't got around to playing though.

I voted Torchlight 2, Dark Souls (despite the bad port, it's an incredible game) and Grimrock. Looking forward to Chaos Chronicles and Wasteland 2 the most in the new year.

Is there a reason Skyrim isn't listed on the poll? Was it disqualified or something? Does it not count as a 2012 game? (My memory is hazy.)

11/11/11

I realized I haven't played a single one of those games…. that's a first for me. Not a good sign….