January 6th 2012 2:30 pm PT

Top Games of 2011

Last year was a fantastic year to be an Xbox 360 gamer as is evident by the quality of titles that Xbox LIVE members were playing.

After a few days of number crunching, here are the top games for 2011 based on Unique Users connect to Xbox LIVE or full versions purchased between January 1, 2011 and December 31, 2011.

Xbox 360 Top LIVE Titles (based on UU’s)

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20		 Call of Duty: Black Ops
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3
Modern Warfare 2
Halo: Reach
Battlefield 3
Skyrim
Gears of War 3
FIFA 12
FIFA Soccer 11
Madden NFL 12
GTA IV
NBA 2K11
Battlefield: Bad Co. 2 
Call of Duty 4
Battlefield 3 Beta 
Halo 3
Gears of War 2
Forza Motorsport 4
Red Dead Redemption
Call of Duty: WaW

Top Arcade Titles (Full Versions purchased)

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20		 Pinball FX2
Full House Poker
Castle Crashers
Fruit Ninja Kinect
From Dust
Trials HD
Magic: The Gathering — Duels of the Planeswalkers 2012
DEAD RISING 2: CASE WEST
Torchlight
Toy Soldiers: Cold War
Plants vs. Zombies
Portal: Still Alive
Bastion
LIMBO
Game Room
DEAD RISING 2: CASE ZERO
Peggle
Dungeons & Dragons Daggerdale
Battlefield 1943
Beyond Good & Evil HD
  The above list is based on full versions purchased.

Top Indie Games (Full Versions purchased)

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20		 FortressCraft Chapter 1
Total Miner: Forge
The Impossible Game
Avatar Paintball
Toy Stunt Bike
CastleMiner Z
I MAED A GAM3 W1TH Z0MB1ES!!!1
Avatar Legends
CastleMiner
Miner Dig Deep
Avatar Laser Wars 
Bird Assassin
Voice Changer 360
Nuclear Wasteland
Avatar Karting
Zombie Estate
Avatar Drop
Baby Maker Extreme 2
College Lacrosse 2011
The $1 Zombie Game
  The above list is based on full versions purchased.

Games for Windows LIVE Top LIVE Titles (based on UU’s)

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20		 Age of Empires Online
GTA IV
Batman Arkham City 
Super Street Fighter IV Arcade Edition
F1 2011
DiRT 3
F1 2010
Fable III
Street Fighter IV 
Resident Evil 5 
AoE Online – Beta
Fallout 3
Colin McRae : Dirt 2
Batman: Arkham Asylum
Bioshock 2
Bulletstorm
Section 8: Prejudice
Red Faction Guerrilla
Dead Rising 2
Operation Flashpoint Red River

Windows Phone Games (based on UU’s)

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20		 Angry Birds
Fruit Ninja
PvZ
Need for Speed Undercover
Full House Poker
MONOPOLY
Doodle Jump
Bejeweled LIVE
Rise Of Glory
geoDefense
ilomilo
Assassin’s Creed – Altaïr’s Chronicles HD
Sonic 4 Episode I
Tetris
Fable: Coin Golf
Hydro Thunder GO
The Harvest
Uno
Tentacles
The Sims 3

These lists are based on global unique users connected to Xbox Live or in the case of Arcade and Indie Games, full versions purchased during 2011.

Some content (and therefore the links) may not be available in all Xbox LIVE regions.

Top LIVE By Larry Hryb, Xbox LIVE's Major Nelson

permalink: http://majornelson.com/2012/01/06/top-games-of-2011/

  • http://twitter.com/brillman Keith Miller

    Call of Duty, wow.

  • Killing Machine

    Pretty sad that there’s so little variety in the LIVE titles. The Arcade list looks more like the standout to me.

    • Anonymous

      It’s pretty sad eh?

      • http://www.facebook.com/people/Bc-Wendel/100001405486130 B.c. Wendel

        Why can’t people just play what they like without you judging them?

        • Anonymous

          Impossible, BC. It’s the internet.

  • http://twitter.com/hottlikeurmom Tim Sierzega

    lmao how are there still people playing the BF3 Beta o.0

    • Anonymous

      They are not…..you should should read a little bit.

  • http://www.facebook.com/bennybenbenj Ben Foden

    Isn’t Dead Rising’s Case West DLC for the game and not a stand-alone game? Case Zero was arcade.

    • Anonymous

      Case West was a separate Arcade game. It was officially an Arcade release.

    • Anonymous

      Case West was a separate Arcade game. It was officially an Arcade release.

    • http://twitter.com/ColbyPot Cole Potter

      Case West was the 2nd XBLA DR2 game. No mistake.

    • http://twitter.com/ColbyPot Cole Potter

      Case West was the 2nd XBLA DR2 game. No mistake.

  • Anonymous

    Further evidence not too many people cared about Gears or Forza. Taking note, MS?

    • http://twitter.com/SamLeDoux Samuel LeDoux

      are you retarded? those are huge numbers and considering both games outsold many of the other consoles exclusives i think you should take note. 

      • Anonymous

        OP obviously has no idea what he/she is saying. Forza did extremely well considering its target audience.

        • http://twitter.com/karlcramer Karl Cramer

          He’s one of the regular trolls on this site. Ignore him.

    • aStrangeDisease

      Take note Honky, Gears and Forza were in the top 20 games of the year. That means a lot of people cared.

  • Anonymous

    Further evidence not too many people cared about Gears or Forza. Taking note, MS?

  • Anonymous

    I can’t believe Game Room was in the top 20 arcade titles. And yet Microsoft won’t fix it from constantly freezing on people.

  • Anonymous

    I can’t believe Game Room was in the top 20 arcade titles. And yet Microsoft won’t fix it from constantly freezing on people.

    • http://thetjhzone.blogspot.com Tylerh1701

      Game Room is free.  I know I downloaded it because you can get like 100 free gamerscore from it.  I’m sure there are lots like me just downloading it for free, either for the Gamerscore or just to see what it is.  But they don’t actually spend any money on it.

      I think Pinball FX2 also receives a similar bump like this.  If you want to demo any table in Pinball FX2, you basically have to “buy” the game.

      • Trip The Light

        If it’s anything like Family Game Night, that game was at the top of the XBLA lists for a long time and it was always calculated based on combined sales of the ‘add-on games’.

        Unless I’m terribly mistaken, I’m pretty sure Pinball FX 2 and Gameroom sales are calculated from total premium tables purchased and total Game Room games purchased.

        • http://thetjhzone.blogspot.com Tylerh1701

          That seems very possible.  Would be cool if major could clarify.

        • http://thetjhzone.blogspot.com Tylerh1701

          That seems very possible.  Would be cool if major could clarify.

          • Anonymous

            The “free” app and game trials don’t count, but whether it counts “plays” (which you pay for) or just the individual game purchases would be where clarification is needed. Hasbro FGM (the free hub) didn’t count as a game, but each and every one of the games purchased counted individually.

    • Anonymous

      If you download the free Game Room, that’s a full version “purchased”.  Each of the 13 free-to-download game packs also counts as a full version purchased, even if you don’t buy any of the games in them.  It’s on the Top 20 by smoke and mirrors, not by purchases.

      Much like how Pinball FX2 is number 1 because it has over two dozen different “Full Versions” to purchase (each individual table or Marvel pack counts as a purchase for this list) – but at least it DESERVES to be there.

      • Anonymous

        I’m pretty sure your Game Room scenarios are a little off. Anything that is free doesn’t count towards the XBLA list. So for game room, it would be individual games purchased, not downloads of the free app or the free trial game packs.

        • Anonymous

          I know back last year, at least for RBN songs, the Trial/Full songs were the exact same files and the record books treated every Trial download as a “full purchase.”  They finally fixed that mess, so maybe they’ve fixed the similar clerical errors on XBLA.Even in that case, if someone buys a 40 point Game Room mascot, they’re doing a “full purchase.”  And when you pay for a 40 point single-play session (if anyone ever even DID that), it’s also a “full purchase” for the numbers.  Both count as much as buying one copy of Bastion for 600 (or 1,200) points.

          • Anonymous

            I don’t think there ever were similar errors on XBLA because even free games (like the Doritos promotional games) didn’t show up in the top 20 when they were released if I remember correctly, even though you were technically “purchasing” the full version of the game when you downloaded it.

            That said even if you take out the DLC and the one time play stuff, it’s still not a fair comparison considering how many times a person can add a ‘purchase’ to Game Room’s (or Pinball FX 2′s or Family Game Night’s) count compared to a game like Bastion.

  • http://www.facebook.com/echeverriamario Mario Echeverria

    Call of Duty domination. It’s not just on Xbox Live, its also on PSN. Why is arcade twitch shooting so popular right now? Oh well I guess we’ll never know. *goes back to playing MW3*

    • http://www.facebook.com/fguhein Frank Guheinowitz

      Hehe. Blame Halo.

  • http://thetjhzone.blogspot.com Tylerh1701

    I really don’t see the appeal in Castle Crashers, don’t understand why it’s still so popular after years on the marketplace.

    Also, can’t believe From Dust was the highest selling SoA game.  

    However, I love that you included the WP7 list, Major.

    • macjr82

      Actually, Fruit Ninja Kinect was the highest selling SoA game.

      • http://thetjhzone.blogspot.com Tylerh1701

        You’re right.  Not sure how I missed that, but I did.  Thanks.

  • Brian Lawhorn

    Kinda sad that 3 of the top 6 indie games are Minecraft clones. No creativity there… 

    • aStrangeDisease

      Kind of sad that five of the top twenty Xbox 360 games are Call of Duty. No creativity there.

      • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_D2BKNKEAI56XXMJESGNLNY2P5A David

        Haters gonna hate.

        • http://twitter.com/IINaSII Nas

          It’s not about hate, but milking.

          • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_D2BKNKEAI56XXMJESGNLNY2P5A David

            It’s a financially and critically successful franchise, you’re hating.

        • buried_horizon

          And lovers gonna love…

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Alice-Lockhart/100000438939703 Alice Lockhart

    At least that Black Ops it’s above of Modern Warfare 3 =/.

    • Anonymous

      Considering it was out the entire year so more people likely own it (MW3 had a bigger opening week but I’m pretty sure that has of now, more copies of Black Ops have been sold total), it doesn’t surprise me that it’s highter.

      • http://www.facebook.com/people/Alice-Lockhart/100000438939703 Alice Lockhart

        Well, I think that Black Ops it’s better than Modern Warfare 3. That’s why I said that =/.

      • http://www.facebook.com/people/Alice-Lockhart/100000438939703 Alice Lockhart

        Well, I think that Black Ops it’s better than Modern Warfare 3. That’s why I said that =/.

  • http://twitter.com/KiloOscarZulu KM

    Good to see that the BF3 was the most played game without split screen to artificially boost UUs.

    • http://www.facebook.com/people/Joe-Excell/1616875539 Joe Excell

      split screen does not boost UUs.

      • http://www.facebook.com/people/Alice-Lockhart/100000438939703 Alice Lockhart

        Well, the Split-Screen boost sales =/.

    • Anonymous

      They are all generic military pop shooters up there, don’t act like your favorite game is different.

    • http://twitter.com/TheJayDiz Jeremy Peacock

      you know whats funny? Modern Warfare 2 is a 2 year old game, doesn’t have splitscreen, and it STILL beat BF3. So shush.

  • threeguys onemovie

    Seriously whats up with that game room?  How about Major getting us some facts from msft.  Game room was all hyped up and now nothing forever.  It was stupid not to let peoples avatars interact in the arcades imo. 

    • Anonymous

      Game Room is dead. Company closed shop.

  • Anonymous

    Major, when is MS going to change up the Dashboard making it easier to find Indie games… and Arcade games… and anything, really?

    Try the Indie Game “Game Type”, really funny.

  • fsdfg dsfds

    Yeah the music game bs needs to piss off, they need to bring back the friends leaderboards on the dash also

  • http://twitter.com/Navarin Bennijin Turbo

    Could have just titled this “Everything Wrong with Gaming”.

  • Anonymous

     Get all the tips related to stock market covering NSE, BSE and MCX. High accuracy assured in all segments of stock market

  • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100000063268616 Luis Arturo Noria Trejo

    BF3 was released before MW3 and still MW3 was more played. 

  • http://twitter.com/swearingatgames swearingatgames

    How is Game Room on there and yet is completely been ignored? Obviously people are playing it and MS TOTALLY dropped the ball. Absurd.

  • Anonymous

    Oh man!  I really wanted to pick some of these games up when they were discounted, but I’m stuck waiting to get my stolen Xbox Live account and points back from the Microsoft investigation team. :(

    • Anonymous

      Wow, that was fast. I was just notified that my account and points were available again. Fast work Microsoft!

search
Latest Podcast
Show 476

see more

Twitter Feed

see more
Blog Archive
RSS Feeds
Helpful Links
Ads