Metal Gear Solid 4 should get game of the year hands down. It also provides an out for reviewers who gave GTA 4 a 10 (since most of them gave MGS4 a 10 too and even said things like "can I give it an 11?" like on IGN).

I'll admit GTA4 was flawed to an extent. Really if they had just toned down the friend thing (where they call you ALL the time so you can't get a damn thing done) it would have been 5x better. I will also admit I was enthralled by MGS4 while I still haven't quite finished GTA4.

The only other game that deserves a title shot is Fallout 3, but that is a bit idiosyncratic for GOTY. Maybe Little Big Planet for GOTY but that is even more of a darkhorse then Fallout 3.

If I had to bet my money would be on MGS4. It was just an amazing finish to my favorite video game series of all time.

      That's the kind of thinking that leads uneducated people to think that because something is popular that means it is great which is very seldom the case in any artistic medium.  Music -- you might think New Kids on the Block was some great band because their albums sold so well, but no Tom Waits was the best musician on earth back then, before then, and pretty much still to this day.  You might think Twilight is a great vampire movie because it was so popular and was the number one movie in America a few week ago, and it might have been alright; but the best vampire movie released in 2008 is a little Swedish film called Let Light In which will probably never be as popular as Twilight.

     When judging artistic works only in very rare occassions can the case be made that the most popular works (The Lord of the Rings and The Dark Knight in most recent memory where movies are concerned all of the games that score 9+ in reviews on the PS2 in gaming; GTA and MGS IV) are also the best works.

It got it's highscores for it's story and technological impressive ness.

IMO:

Pros- Most realistic Open world ever created.
Great Physics
Very Good Story

Cons- Gameplay seems lacking
Lack of offline Multiplayer.....
Still feels like a game filled with bugs and glitches [better than the past games though]
Not much customizable options....

Does it deserve game of the year??? No.
Did it deserve it's review scores??? Depends on how you look at it.

Yeah i think it was given a little bit to high of a score. I feel it deserves a 9.25!!! It was really good graphics and really detailed and the voice acting was top notch!! But the story was really cliched though still brought you into the action. All in all i thought it was a very good game. The best GTA since Vice City

Ok, b4 we start this, my fav. film is 2001 and kubrick, hitckcock and scorcese were robbed (the latter coz it took so long 2 get an oscar)

But what your saying is that 1 game that has generated so much interest and popularity and is certainly the most unique experience, doesn't deserve to be called the best of the year. Why not?

If you look at my other comments what i have suddenly come to terms with is that in reality Miyamoto has embarressed us all with his diverse and unique variation in videogames yet again this year. He started this with Wii Sports and, unlike hollywood and that predictable analogy of bad movies sell thing they always say, to me it seems Wii Fit is anything but.

Yes its different, yes its labelled as something that isn't a game. As i write this im smirking due to that classic misunderstood artistic genious label, not that he isn't appreciated, but that he isn't acknowledged the way he probably should be for going against the grain.

That is a true artist, that should be the game of the year. Irrelevent how much money it makes.

Youre absolutly right  people still think popular games equals best games

Mostly because nintendo is making these games that are imensile popular with the casual crowd some fanboys want nintendo to have game of the year because its games sell great

If anithing nintendo should grab publisher of the year because with few games they have outsold every other publisher by a very wide margin and for that they deserve such a award but not a game of the year they have no game this year that deserves it

Really, so lets just imagine there was no Wii sports, ok.

Now i come to you with a set of bathroom scales and tell you it will sell millions of copies, get lots of people interested in video games and (this is key) completely change the way people interact with a video game system. Whats your response when it does all this for real? Ahhh GTA4 is better

Now that i think about it i was wrong to ever consider other traditional games worthy to compete with the unique approach that Miyamoto has gone for time and time again.

Wii Music, i just didnt get it but that's really what makes it and all the others so significant and important.

edit > im no fanboy, try not to be. But in reflection i see the value of gaming as something much broader than others right now. Don't you think thats a valid lesson to learn? You can really make an interactive experience about anything you want to.

There are no rules and we don't have to obey them. thats kind of the point of artistic freedom

Whose GOTY are we talking about?

"But what your saying is that 1 game that has generated so much interest and popularity and is certainly the most unique experience, doesn't deserve to be called the best of the year. Why not?"

Because it is not a game. It is not even a game in the sense that Wii Sports is a game. It might be an acceptable exercise device for the people that need it, if so that's good, but it doesn't make it a game. And, if has produced some nice Youtube videos with attractive young women using it that I consider it a guilty pleasure to watch. Still doesn't make it a game though. When game review sites have reviewed it something they probably shouldn't have done since it is not a game, they have all seemed to agree that it was in the low to mid eights not nearly as high as GTA IV.

"Now i come to you with a set of bathroom scales and tell you it will sell millions of copies, get lots of people interested in video games"

Yeah? How many people that bought Wii Fit as a result of CBS News saying it was good for seniors to exercise with immediately went out and bought a copy of Mario Galaxy, Super Smash Brothers, or Metroid Prime 3: Corruption the next time they went near a Game Stop?  And, it doesn't count if they got the Wii, Wii Fit, and then went out and bought the grandkids those games, because Wii Fit totally failed to get the purchasers in this case  interested in the other games.