» Mon Dec 12, 2011 11:53 am
No way. It's just an enhanced Oblivion, and as awesome as that alone might be, it could have been so much more and does nothing to deserve game of the year. Making a huge open-world is nothing. The challenge is in making it consistent and making it change in line with the player's choices. Did they accomplish that? Not really. You have to just pretend that you aren't hearing the NPCs say utterly illogical things constantly to maintain suspension of disbelief. That's not to mention the inexcusable technical issues plaguing the game's release on all platforms.
But will it get game of the year? Almost certainly. Can't argue with relentless hype from a pathetic mainstream gaming press after all.
The Witcher 2 deserves the game of the year, because once again, not only did the developers make sure the game was polished not only in terms of performance, but also in terms of inner-logic, an effort Bethesda will never make with Skyrim. They'll leave that to the modders. The Witcher 2 also received God knows how many new features, including entirely new game modes, for free. CD Projekt are a developer who genuinely cares, and they deserve their game to win Game of the Year. It won't though.