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Best of 2012 Statistics: Breaking down Joystiq's awards
To decide its top ten games of the year, Joystiq goes through a fairly strict voting procedure, which is much more civil than the battle royale you might imagine our process to be. And now, you can get a better idea of how all that procedure works – while you're looking at some cool infographics.Here's how it works: each editorial staff member picks his or her top five games of the year, with no stipulation other than: the games listed must be 2012 releases in North America and not include any re-releases or upgraded versions of previously released software (sorry, Persona 4 Golden!).But the staff doesn't only select five favorites; they can list as many games as they want for the awards, with the caveat that anything listed after number five is considered their "Best of the Rest" selection.Each of the top five votes carries a weight. Number 1 is worth five points, number 5 is worth one – this is the game's base score. Listing a game as a "Best of the Rest" also carries some weight: .5 points toward the final tally per appearance on the "BotR" list. Ties are broken by the number of times a game appears on the base list – represented here as "Top Five Voted" – and, if further tie-breaking is required, by how many times it appears on the "BotR" list.Super Hexagon is a good example of how this system works as intended. The game made multiple appearances within the staff's top five lists, and appeared on the "BotR" list many times. Eventually, the game's score carried it into the fifth spot. Surprising, yes, but we collectively loved it enough to put it there.In the case of something like FTL: Faster Than Light and Borderlands 2, those games most frequently appeared in "Best of the Rest" sections of staff lists. Despite only cracking the top five of a few lists, both games were just shy of enough points to make the list due to these numerous Best of the Rests; if it was the top twelve of 2012, FTL and Borderlands 2 would be in there. It was that close.For the top spot, Journey edged out XCOM: Enemy Unknown by a mere three points. Three!
