A list of the most pirated games of 2011 has now been compiled and published and we can tell you that the top game that PC and Xbox 360 users couldn’t wait to get their hands on legally, was not some of the most obvious choices in Modern Warfare 3, Skyrim or Battlefield 3.

Instead, it was none other than Crysis 2 as EA will be concerned to hear that the shooter takes home the title of most pirated game of 2011. A full list of games have been published courtesy of TorrentFreaks and it reveals that the PC version of Crysis 2 was most pirated with 3.92 million downloads. The Xbox 360 version in comparison was nowhere near as popular, as it didn’t even make it in to the top 5 games that were pirated on Microsoft’s console in 2011. That honor went to Gears of War 3 with an estimated 890,000 downloads.

If you are interested in hearing how Modern Warfare 3 faired, figures released by TorrentFreaks claims that MW3 was the second most pirated game of 2011, with 3.65 million downloads on PC, and around 830,000 downloads on the Xbox 360. Battlefield 3 was in third place on the 2011 PC piracy chart with 3.5 million downloads, but you may be surprised to hear that Skyrim was nowhere to be found in the top five on either PC or Xbox 360. Does that suggest that many fans opted to purchase a copy of Bethesda’s latest RPG epic out of respect for the company – perhaps.

Crysis 2 shouldn’t really be a surprise either. The game was leaked one month before release which probably explains why it came out top of the list ahead of Modern Warfare 3. When you put the PC and Xbox 360 Crysis piracy figures into perspective, that is a huge amount of money that EA has lost on the game and you can bet that they are pretty livid about it as well.

What are your thoughts on the piracy figures? Piracy will always remain on PC of course, but let’s hope that the next generation consoles in the PS4, Wii U and Xbox ’720′ remain piracy free.

More About: Battlefield 3, Modern Warfare 3, Skyrim

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During the time in which the Skyrim map was revealed on the internet, we suggested that it could be due to the game being leaked weeks before Bethesda’s intended release date of 11.11.11. We have since learned that the limited edition map was actually handed out to gamers during a Skyrim event in Russia, but we are now scratching our heads on finding out an explanation on how someone has managed to get their hands on the manual for the game.

Obviously we won’t post the images here since Bethesda are not going to be too happy about this, but you can view to your hearts content over at GameInformer here if you’re interested. As you expect, the manual gives you a general introduction to the game beforehand, involving tips on magicka use, cooking, horse controls, using stamina effectively and so on.

If you delve deeper into the manual, you’ll also see a complete button layout as well for the Xbox 360 version of the game, which will come in handy if you want to know what the basic controls will be prior to release.

We’re not going to jump the gun and say the game has been leaked exactly one month before release, but we doubt that attendees at the Russian event were handed official Skyrim manuals along with their maps. Someone seemingly has a copy of the game and it may not be long until he or she decides to upload some footage. If you have already had a cheeky peek at the manual, let us know what you think of it and your opinions on the game being possibly leaked.

[Who dares leak the manual?]

More About: Bethesda, Skyrim

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In a recent interview with PC Gamer, Bethesda’s Todd Howard has revealed a few details about Skyrim’s Radiant Story technology, a new addition to the Elder Scrolls series which will make side-quests more realistic by altering certain gameplay elements at different points in the game depending on your career path.

However, it was this Radiant Story feature that was behind a problem that Betheda discovered, and believe it or not it was all due to a chicken which apparently was ‘reporting crimes‘. We would have loved to have seen this in action, but since it is technically a bug or glitch whatever you want to call it – we won’t be seeing it in the final build of the game unfortunately.

All is not lost though, as there is the little subject of modding, and there’s probably a slim chance that these chicken files may still exist somewhere deep in the realms of the PC code. If they don’t, then some clever individual may even just re-create this chicken fantasy and send it off to Bethesda for pure amusement.

It does make you think what other bugs were discovered in Skyrim during testing, and there’s bound to be a few of them considering some are still present in Oblivion. Read more from the interview with Howard over at PC Gamer above. In the meantime, don’t forget to check out the full list of unlockable achievements if you haven’t seen them already and don’t mind a few spoilers – it’s certainly worth a read.

Crime reporting chickens in Skyrim, what do you make of that?

More About: Bethesda, Skyrim

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You may wonder why we would mention multiplayer, when Skyrim does not even have that feature, and there lies the problem, which to us could be its Achilles heel. IGN does find this a little strange, as fans of the franchise have been asking for said feature for some time now – now that’s one way to upset those who will make your game successful or not.

Bethesda has not let all fans requests go unnoticed though, as they have now given us dragons, which we did mention above – not sure if that is enough to keep the wolf from the door. Both games do have their strengths, and Multiplayer is Dark Souls. Fans hope that Skyrim will be able to redeem itself when it comes to downloadable content; we suggest that you do not hold your breath.

The reason why is due to the fact that Skyrim fans will have to wait a few months for the final parts of the game, in way of DLC. However, Dark Souls will already have the completion of the game on release, which means that you will not have to part with any more money in order to reach the games conclusion.

Do not think that the dragons will help redeem Skyrim, as Dark Souls has them as well. We do not want to appear one-sided, but it seems that Namco Bandai Games has Bethesda covered in almost every aspect of the RPG shootout.

More About: Bethesda, Dark Souls, Namco Bandai Games, Skyrim

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