Now 2011 is done and dusted, and my Film of the Year and Game of the Year awards have been announced, I figured it was time to look at some of the other areas of product releases in the last year, and to do this I've concocted a two-part feature recognising some of the unsung heroes of the twelve months gone by...BEST FPS GAME/MOST REALISTIC GAME GRAPHICS:
WINNER: CRYSIS 2
A much-deserved double win for CryTek's fantastic future first-person shooter Crysis 2. Not only did it trump both Call of Duty and Battlefield with its sublime single-player campaign- which for me seals the deal, not the identikit online multiplayer modes in every shooter nowadays- but the sequel to the PC's most infamous shooter also boasted graphics which were as close to life as this generation of consoles is ever going to come. Given that we saw Uncharted 3, Arkham City and Skyrim in the same year, that's no small landmark for this fantastic FPS, which comes highly recommended now things are about to get a little quiet in the world of video gaming!
BEST 'ANIMATED' GAME GRAPHICS:WINNER: RAYMAN ORIGINS
I'll admit that I did basically invent this category for the beautifully hand-drawn Rayman: Origins visuals, but once you've seen them in action, you'll completely understand why! Seriously, no side-scrolling platformer has ever looked as pretty as Origins does; it sets a benchmark for any successors in the now inevitable resurrection of this genre. If Ubisoft can ensure that next time around the game's latter half isn't so reliant on you becoming an avid collector of hard-to-reach items to progress the main storyline, they will have a near perfect formula with the rebooted Rayman franchise.
BEST REFERENCE BOOKWINNER: HARRY POTTER: PAGE TO SCREEN
I'll be bringing you a full review of the fantastic Harry Potter: Page To Screen very soon. Sufficed to say, though, that is one of the best reference books I have ever had the pleasure of reading, showing a usually unheard-of dedication to its source material in its vivid description of the process of turning seven extroadinary children's novels into perhaps the most iconic British film franchise of all time. Congratulations to everyone involved in the making of this perfect product, as Page To Screen provides such a heartwarming conclusion to both the books and their various adaptations that it makes saying goodbye to the Boy Who Lived even more difficult than I had thought possible!
BEST TV EPISODEWINNER: DOCTOR WHO: DAY OF THE MOON
There were many great TV episodes from Smallville, Glee, Torchwood and Doctor Who itself in 2011, and believe me when I say that choosing the best of them for this award was by no means easy. However, in the end it came down to which instalment told the most engaging, compelling and surprising story it could in its running time, and in this respect there could be no other winner than Day of the Moon, the second episode of Who's brilliant sixth season. Here, we opened with a visual spectacle as we saw Amy and Rory gunned down, River committing suicide off the edge of a skyscraper and the Doctor trapped in the 'perfect prison', only to discover that all of these grisly fates were lies, and the TARDIS gang to reunite as the Time Lord revealed that to stop the Silence, he would be using nothing but "Neil Armstrong's foot"- and all before the opening credits rolled! What a rollercoaster ride Steven Moffat gave us in the fifty minutes he had, not feeling too strained by the arc yet placing a host of delicate hints throughout, and the outright jaw-dropper of a cliffhanger where the mysterious young girl regenerated before our very eyes. By far the best scene was when the Doctor finally came face to face with the Silence and managed to supposedly defeat them, turning their mind-control against them as Apollo 11 landed on the moon, and backed by perhaps Murray Gold's finest tune yet, The Majestic Tale (Of A Madman In A Box). This was so perfectly crafted at the hands of director Toby Haynes, and wonderfully performed by Matt, Karen, Arthur and Alex that it was impossible not to be taken in by it all, ultimately to be dazzled at Steven Moffat's incredible writing talents (once again shown off last night with the equally brilliant A Scandal In Belgravia). For me, there's no other piece of telly aired in 2011 that I can watch over and over again and still find something new to love about it every single time. Bravo, Moffat and co., and may the good times continue this Autumn!
BEST DVD/BLU-RAY RELEASEWINNER: STAR WARS: THE COMPLETE SAGA (BLU-RAY)
There were a thousand ways in which George Lucas could have flopped the release of his treasured Star Wars movies onto the Blu-Ray disc format, but in the end, we needn't have doubted LucasFilm's dedication to bringing us the most visually splendid and feature-packed box set we could ever want to adorn our shelves. These six excellent films never looked better, with the original trilogy's dust and grime giving it a distinctly retro vibe in HD, and the prequel trilogy's stunning CGI vistas rendered perfectly, and John Williams' iconic soundtrack blares out at you in full force too this time around. Yes, Lucas himself has tampered with the source content again, adding in a dumb scream of "Noooooooo!" from Vader as he hurls the Emperor down the main reactor of the Death Star, and placing some CGI creatures in A New Hope-Return of the Jedi that really would have been better left out, although such additions are hardly derogatory to the sublime narratives (well, mostly sublime, let's try not to take Episode I's turgid melodrama into account as we're going to see whether it works on the big screen again next month!), and it's those characters, locales and setpieces that we're really here to see with our high-def tech. Better yet, we get a huge number of supplemtary works too, full of documentaries, trailers and archived deleted scenes to keep even the most dedicated Jedi Masters busy for weeks, if not months, on end! All this adds up to make a killer package worth every penny of its £60 RRP, and one that you should be proud to get for your shiny new Blu-Ray player if you're planning on upgrading this year.
BEST TRAILER FOR A 2011 FILMWINNER: HARRY POTTER AND THE DEATHLY HALLOWS: PART 2
The 'Every Moment He's Lived Has Led To This' trail for the very last Harry Potter film was an amazingly emotional rendition of what was to come for the Boy Wizard, benefitting from a little less focus on the final battle than past previews and a little more tear-jerking looks at the sadder moments of the concluding part of Deathly Hallows. If there was ever a video that made me want to see Part 2 and still showcases why it was one of the best films of the year, this was it!
BEST TRAILER FOR A 2011 GAMEWINNER: ASSASSIN'S CREED: REVELATIONS
Seen the wonderful CGI trailer which was released at E3 and segues into Revelations' excellent opening sequence? Then you'll know just why this came top.
BEST TRAILER FOR A 2011 TV SERIES/2011 TV EPISODEWINNER: DOCTOR WHO: SERIES 6 PART 1/SMALLVILLE: FINALE
The first award goes to the BBC for giving us a great look at the seven opening episode of Doctor Who's 2011 run in mid-April, and the second to Warner Brothers' wonderful homage to the Superman film franchise with their use of the John Williams soundtrack The Planet Krypton in their awesome ensemble preview of Smallville: Finale!
CATCH THE WINNING TRAILERS BELOW...
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