The most popular games on Xbox Live in 2012 were...
Ryan Gosling! No, hold on.
Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 were more popular on Xbox Live in 2012 than Halo 4.
That's according to average unique users per day connected to Xbox Live while playing the games - a handy metric if ever I saw one. Four of the top 10 games were Call of Duty titles, two were FIFA, two Halo and the others Minecraft XBLA (fourth) and Battlefield 3 (eighth). Borderlands 2 and Assassin's Creed 3 were 11th and 12th, respectively, and Far Cry 3 was 18th.
Xbox Live's Major "Larry Hryb" Nelson compiled the list. He also shared the 20 highest selling Xbox Live Arcade games of 2012; the 20 highest selling Xbox Live Indie games of 2012. The full lists are below.
Minecraft XBLA did phenomenally well. We already know it shifted an incredible 5,002,370 copies in 2012, making it the highest selling XBLA game ever, and so it was that Minecraft XBLA rightly sat the XBLA 2012 chart throne.
Below was other XBLA record breaker Trials Evolution. Below that, the acclaimed Walking Dead series by Telltale (the entire series has done some 8.5 million sales across all platforms).
Surprisingly, it was Pinball FX2 in fourth ahead of Counter-Strike: GO in fifth. Ubisoft's high profile I Am Alive managed eighth.
Eurogamer's Game of the Year 2012, Fez, was 13th.
Tony Hawk's Pro Skater HD was the only Summer of Arcade 2012 game to make the list in 10th. Alan Wake's American Nightmare finished 15th.
In Indie Games land it was mostly Minecraft clones doing the business. CastleMiner Z was top, CastleMiner second, Total Miner: Forge third, FortressCraft Chapter 1 fifth, Murder Miners sixth. Avatar Deathmatch managed to interfere in fourth.
Major Nelson also shared the most popular Games for Windows - Live snore no sorry can't be bothered.
Xbox 360 Top LIVE Titles (based on average UU's per day)
- Call of Duty: Black Ops II
- Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3
- Halo 4
- Minecraft: Xbox 360 Edition
- Call of Duty: Black Ops
- FIFA Soccer 13
- FIFA Soccer 12
- Battlefield 3
- Halo: Reach
- Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2
- Borderlands 2
- Assassin's Creed III
- Skyrim
- Madden NFL 13
- Gears of War 3
- NBA 2K13
- NBA 2K12
- Far Cry 3
- Grand Theft Auto IV
- Forza Motorsport 4
Top Arcade Titles (Full Versions purchased)
- Minecraft: Xbox 360 Edition
- Trials Evolution
- The Walking Dead
- Pinball FX2
- Counter-Strike: Global Offensive
- Castle Crashers
- Gotham City Impostors
- I Am Alive
- Fruit Ninja Kinect
- Tony Hawk's Pro Skater HD
- Trials HD
- Magic 2013
- Fez
- Dungeon Defenders
- Alan Wake's American Nightmare
- Peggle
- The Simpsons Arcade Game
- REAL STEEL
- Toy Soldiers: Cold War
- Full House Poker
Top Indie Games (Full Versions purchased)
- CastleMiner Z
- CastleMiner
- Total Miner: Forge
- Avatar Deathmatch
- FortressCraft Chapter 1
- Murder Miners
- The Impossible Game
- Avatar Laser Wars 2
- The $1 Zombie Game
- Avatar Paintball
- Avatar Legends
- Fortress Wars
- Miner Of Duty
- Miner4Ever
- Avatar Laser Wars
- End Of Days: Infected vs Mercs
- Toy Stunt Bike 2
- Flight Adventure 2
- Don't Die Dateless, Dummy!
- Block World