14 DAY TRIAL // Besides movies and music, to a lesser degree, games make up the bulk of BitTorrent downloads, if only because of their size. While nowhere as popular as the year's top movies, several games proved very enticing to pirates out there.
TorrentFreak put together a top of the most downloaded games over BitTorrent in 2011, on three gaming platforms: the PC, Xbox 360 and the Wii.
Surprising or not, Crysis 2 was the most downloaded game of the year, both on the PC and overall. In fact, all of the top 5 PC games were downloaded more times than any of the games for other platforms.
Modern Warfare 3 and Battlefield 3 took the second and third spot, separated by only a few downloads. They took the same spots, in the same order, on the Xbox 360 as well, where Gears of War 3 ended up being the most downloaded game of 2011.
On the Wii, which had more downloads than the Xbox 360, at least when it comes to the top five titles, Mario games have been as popular as always.
What's interesting about the data is that the numbers are relatively low. While a few million people downloading a game can't be considered low and can't be brushed to the side entirely, the fact is, a lot more people bought their games rather than pirate them.
Overall, the number of downloads, again only for the top titles, is smaller than in the previous year, which could indicate either a smaller interest in these top titles or a broader decline.
Of course, the smaller number of game downloads, compared to movies, is also reflective of the larger landscape, movies are still far more popular, in terms of how many people enjoy the pastime, compared to games, even as the average gamer is well over 30 years old.