"The Engine That Could" Award for Best Surprise Hit Game of 2010

[Muffin Top Merkley]

Nominees:

Heavy Rain
Bayonetta
Pac-Man Championship Edition DX
Toy Story 3
WWE: Smackdown Vs Raw 2011
Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light

In the year 2010 there have been alot of video games released that people knew were going to be a success. Games such as Halo: Reach, Call of Duty: Black Ops, Assassins Creed: Brotherhood. Due to the number of immediate successful games released this year, a number of games have either gone unnoticed or were quickly disregarded as nothing worth playing.

For those who ventured past the blockbuster releases, a number of games may have managed to become one of your most favorite gaming experiences of the year.

This award is dedicated to those games who were often ignored by many, and charished by everyone who has played them.

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*In the event of a tie, the winner will be decided by written votes.

 

[SuperSteve16]

My Vote goes to Toy Story 3.
This is the best kids game based one on a Movie I've ever played becuase it offered so much replayable value and freedom outside from the storlyine. There was a whole gaming world to explore, made up of mini guests and creations. The storyline was good to, with added splitscreen that provided competitive races and challenges. This was a game that adults and children alike could play and thats why it gets my vote for biggest surprise for 2010.
By the way, I didn't vote for Smackdown Vs Raw 2011 becuase Smackdown Vs Raw 2010 was a very good game, so 11 being good wasn't really a surprise

 

[J-Dogg]

Im going with WWE Smackdown vs RAW 2011, even though it has it's flaws its still a hell of a fun and creative game, and the DLC has been good, the improved but still kinda flawed Create a storyline mode is cool, new finishers, the game mechanics and physics have changed but are still fun. We on this forum have a thread for it and love it, the reviewers on some gaming sites gave it good to decent reviews. Its an overall enjoyable game with flaws that we haven't move on from.

 

[Cena's Little Helper]

I see someone got this thread created for the sake of heaping more praise on Heavy Rain suspic:). Anyway, I'm not sure where you guys keep on getting this idea that Heavy Rain wasn't going to be a hit. Despite what the game's creator said, his previous effort, Fahrenheit/Indigo Prophecy, sold 800K worldwide. Sure, it didn't hit the million mark, but that's still damn good.

Heavy Rain had hit written all over it. I will give the game its due props, though: if gaming geared towards adults becomes a more lucrative endeavor, then Heavy Rain will have played no small part in this.

 

[bigdogstalfos]

As I nominated Bayonetta for this award, I better stump for it.

Bayonetta, released way back on January 5, developed by Platinum Games and published by Sega, was hands-down the best straight action game of 2010. I say "straight action" to differentiate it from Mass Effect 2 and Red Dead Redemption. While God of War III went over the top with violent and bloody deaths, Bayonetta went another direction, and I'm not just talking about the walking piece of fetish fuel that is the title character. Bayonetta went for the ridiculously stylish route a la Devil May Cry and completely delivered. Combat is frenetic, smooth and, thanks to the incredible numbers of combo attacks you can deliver, almost never dull.

The graphics and especially the environments look great as well and really help set the mood. The sound is a mixed bag, however, as the voice acting isn't the best, though it fits the whole campy motif and as for the music, it's good, but I hope you like hearing "Fly Me to the Moon."

The only knock on the game I really have is its story doesn't make much sense, but if you're playing a game like this for the story, I'm very surprised. You'll also be having too much fun to really care too much about it.

Bayonetta got extremely good reviews, especially the 360 version, which didn't have the major load time issues its PS3 counterpart did. The game sold decently well, but is still comparatively obscure enough I'd call it a sleeper hit, much like Clover's (the predecessor company to Platinum) masterpiece Okami. I had a lot more fun with this than God of War III and I liked GoW III quite a bit. This game follows in the lineage of great forgotten action games like No More Heroes and God Hand, and is my choice for 2010 Little Engine That Could.

tl;dr version: Bayonetta has guns strapped to her stiletto heels. That's way too awesome to ignore.