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5 Awesome Gaming Videos of 2011

Examining a handful of poignant gaming industry videos this year.

 

One year after its inception, I'm happy to declare that the weekly Numb Thumbs column is still trucking along here at Patch.com! What started with a modest review of an addictive puzzle game (which still deserves to be played if you missed it) expanded to a weekly catalog of musings and examinations on various games and industry events.

Now, at year's end, it's time to reflect on some particularly noteworthy moments that occurred in the game industry over the year of 2011. But you don't need another article of obvious news bites like the launch of the Nintendo 3DS or the announcement of the PlayStation Vita. Instead, we present you with five must-see videos from this past year that help us to remember just why we love gaming as much as we do:

Since its October release, Battlefield 3 has swallowed many gaming hours of FPS fans worldwide. But you gotta wonder about just how many people put in as much time and effort as PC player Stun_Gravy. As evidenced by this video, he apparently doesn't spend all that time trying to improve his K/D ratio, but rather to accomplish ridiculous feats.

RendeZook is indeed a ridiculous feat. After deftly flying a jet in a multiplayer match and racking up tons of points, he notices someone on his tail in a dogfight. What does he do to get rid of them? He flies straight up in the air, jumps out of his plane, and fires an RPG at the opposing fighter. Just the thought of this is crazy, but the fact that he actually hits and destroys the jet with the RPG and safely falls back into his own plane where he resumes flying... I can't find the words to do that justice. Just watch the video. This one's for the history books.

If you've been abreast of news in the gaming industry over the past week, you've undoubtedly caught wind of the Ocean Marketing debacle chronicling a cringe-inducing exchange of emails between an unhappy customer and a marketing representative deficient in the field of public relations. Penny Arcade spearheaded the Internet-wide release of the jaw-dropping email thread which proceeded to go viral. It's certainly worth a read.

The very same day that the Penny Arcade post went up, video team New Challenger delivered on the entertaining video poking fun at the ridiculousness of Ocean Marketing's response to the screwed-over customer. Well-done and timely, this one will continue racking up the views for some time. Just make sure to read the Penny Arcade article first or you won't understand the many references to the emails.

And one other thing: Due to generous use of profanity, you can consider this video NSFW.

This is a video of some guy you don't know lip syncing 50 different moments of horrible voice acting in video games you've probably never played. It sounds as un-funny as it gets, but seriously, this is worth watching.

Voice acting in video games, especially in its infancy, has hosted many famously horrendous moments. But sometimes you don't notice just how bad they are while caught up in a puzzle or plot twist. Or maybe you've just been desensitized to them after having come across them so many times. So here we have Dean Lauderdale - who had been using his YouTube channel primarily for a musical outlet - deciding to pick 50 of these so-bad-they're-good moments and do a little face acting to them.

The result is a legitimately funny and clever video even if you don't know anything about the games that are referenced. Give it a look! "Now, bear my arctic blast!"

If you haven't played Portal 2, you've missed out on not only one of the best games of the year, but probably the best puzzle game ever. You've also missed out on some of the best gaming dialog and one of the funniest games in history. Fantastic voice acting and hilarious scripting allowed for one of the most entertaining games you'll ever play.

But the little gem of a character showcased in this video doesn't appear until the very end of the game and makes you just want to sit and listen to him talk. This video is of the ending of the game and host to just a snippet of a fantastic performance by Stephen Merchant, so if you plan on playing it (as well you should), it's a heck of a spoiler. But if not, just watch it. It's awesome.

The de facto game of the year, Skyrim has spawned hundreds of YouTube videos as gamers everywhere want to show off their feats. But few are as impressive as this video of a carefully placed arrow that had to be the result of an insane amount of trial and error.

At first, you don't know what the player is doing. You're not even sure what he is aiming at. He lets the arrow fly, calmly walks over, and takes a seat. No... he didn't... he can't have...

Yep. He did.

2011 was a heck of a year for gaming. Not only did many great games hit all platforms, but tons of players contributed to the community in the form of entertaining videos like these. And with the industry continuing to grow as well as video creation becoming more accessible, we can expect even more of these in 2012.

Check out these retailers for your video game needs:

Related Topics: 2011, Gaming, Video Games, Videos, and Year

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