Why?

Becuase Skyrim's lighting and shaders are a joke. They look like their from a 2007 game or something. Very outdated.
Because there's extremely outdated texture depth methods, making all textures look flat and ugly.
Because the textures are extremely bad in general and a lot of the textures look like they could be from a 2002 game.
Because the game has poor view distance. Seeing grass and objects pop-up 50 meter in front of you is very bad for a 2011 game (sure you can increase the view distance of it, but it lags your computer more than it should).
Because shadows are probably the worst ones ever made for PC in a modern game?
Because a lot of the models are very low-poly.
Because some models are weirdly designed (mountains are not mountains, but rather lots of big rocks piled up)?

Skyrim can looks good in general, sometimes even really good, but because of what I said above, it can also look really bad in a lot of instances.

Technology-wise and graphics-wise, Skyrim is not impressive at all compared to what other games have nowadays. Since Oblivion, Bethesda's games have just looked worse and worse in standard to other games. This trend seems to continue.

I resent this statement. Crysis was released in 2007 and their lighting and shaders are immeasurably better.. see my earlier screenshots.

Why isn`t The Witcher 2 on the list? In my opinion it`s one of the best graphics this year, provided you have the hardware to run it.

Skyrim doesn't have, per these crap site's definitions, an "original score". Simply because it has 1 track which featured in Morrowind and 1 track that featured in Oblivion, somehow that makes the other 25 tracks irrelevant to these [censored] "gaming" websites.

Also, Skyrim has fantastic art direction, but is technically very unimpressive (shadows are a joke, for example)

Well, Skyrim only got like 3 good tracks that aren't direct imports from previous games anyway. That is, title theme, final main quest zone music theme and one of the ambient music tracks.

3 good original tracks out of 25 isn't a great score.

BF3 isn't on that list. It is invalid.

I doesn't not matter if this game is not nominated for a VGA, those awards are about as relevant as an MTV award.

That is your opinion, and a totally bat[censored] bonkers one at that.

weapon enchants are 2d textures slapped on top to increase performance instead of particle effects which would look much better but affect console gamers.

Skyrim shouldn't be on the list. It has good graphics, but not great.

Uncharted 3 obviously wins.

Lolno.

Arkham Asylum wins hands down - it has a PC version.

Skyrim is beautiful but nothing can touch Uncharted 3 in the graphics department imho.

As far as I can see the section we're directed to has no specific platform connotation; therefore logically no console-only game could possibly win, as even sloppy console ports look better on PC.

..of course, this doesn't take into account that all the voters may well be console players, which would make the PC version irrelevant.

It's precious when gamers discuss which game looks the best on a console version.

I have Rage and BF3. Skyrim graphics are phenomenal on a large and small scale. I don't know if some of you are still using non hd tvs but I agree it should have nominated for its graphics and its musical score.

Skyrim has amazing artistic design and direction but as far as resolution, poly-count, shadows it's a bit behind the front-runners in the grapchics department. It's enough for me that the game looks beautiful, though, I'm not the type to get as close as possible to a leaf and anolyze the textures for hours.

I dont know what the [censored] kind of hardware everyone is running, but with some tweaking and a few 580 GTX's Skyrim looks better then anything ive seen to date.. and its open world.. and WAY more fun... who the [censored] needs another boxed in FPS?

Skyrim

-Open world
-Fun Factor
-Great lore and story
-Not on rails... you can do WHATEVER you want.
-Dragons with random AI (anything can happen!)
-Mods to improve it for the future in EVERY way

I could go on and on... Ive played them all, Rage is a [censored] joke... Crysis is good, but SOO limited.. takes you though the game on rails.

I cant believe some of you [censored]s even mention Batman... yea go play Batman [deleted] comparing [censored] ES to Batman, thats awesome!! Who gives a [censored] about graphics, when the game is a bore anyway? Xbox/PS3 users dont even count because they are limited to HDTV's ... running programs at 2560X1600 changes everything.

Batman is one of the best games out this year and one of the coolest superheros... If you don't like him you're clearly homosixual.

hahahahah ok sparky! I bet you have his poster on your wall... I find it ironic when you call me a homo and you're all wet for a super hero.. awesome.

I REALLY want to know where Killzone 3 was in this list.

Killzone is the best looking shooter this year. By far. LA Noire shouldn't be one of them.


But Uncharted 3 obviously wins.

So? Uncharted 3 still wins hands down.
And people still use PC's these days? I thought they were extinct?

I mean for example, MW3 sold 13.5 million on console and under 500k on PC!! LOL

Honestly, I don't understand how LA Noire would compete against graphics from The Witcher 2.
This award is completely invalid, I wonder who the judges are on this crap.

The thing about Skyrim's graphics is not so much their technical horsepower, but their great design style. This is the kind of game that will last a very, very long time because the graphic style will always be pleasant to go back to. While games like Uncharted 3 and COD's graphical "horsepower" will be outmatched within a year or two, Skyrim will outlast them simply because it was designed so well.

The style of Skyrim's art, the way the landscape was laid out, is simply a work of art. Skyrim's graphical art is more akin to a water-painting sketch done at the hands of a Vincent Van Gogh, whereas Uncharted 3's art is like the art done by a Computer Graphics grad using the latest technologies. The latter garners more immediate "pizazz", while the former lasts the test of time.

because for most people graphics just means the amount of polygons, texture resolution, tri-linear filters and whatnot
skyrim could never compete with most games due it's scale

I do agree the game looks beautiful though

Uncharted and CoD aren't on the same level graphics wise.

COD looks meh, Uncharted looks insane.

And I don't see what you mean by it will "outlast" it.
Games like Uncharted and Killzone simply have better graphics.