Byte vs Brick: Week Ending Nov 4

Every single damn week, I can't remember if it's called 'Byte vs Brick' or 'Brick vs Byte.' My failing memory terrifies me. Though my girlfriend is vaguely appreciative of it, as it allows her to tell me the same anecdotes repeatedly with me having no clue I've heard them before. At least, she claims she's my girlfriend; I can't rightly recall if that's the case or not. There's just this person in my house who tells me to do the washing up and feed the cat, and it seems to prudent to play along and hope my memory kicks in at some point. And why are all these words tattooed on my torso?

Anyway: Brick vs Byte, our weekly, unscientific look at how the top 10 best-selling games on Steam compare to the top 10 at UK retail. What mysteries will be revealed? Will Battlefield 3 still be king of the hill? And who the hell are you people? What's going on? Where are my trousers?

Week ending November 4, 2011

STEAM (including pre-orders):

1. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
2. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3
3. Football Manager 2012
4. Bastion
5. Dungeon Defenders
6. Left 4 Dead 2
7. The Lord of the Rings: War in the North
8. Dead Island
9. Batman: Arkham City
10. Payday: The Heist

Go go Bastion! That's a chart clearly defined by pre-orders and discount though, which increasingly seems to the Steam story these days.

UK retail/etail (not including pre-orders):

1. Football Manager 2012
2. Battlefield 3
3. The Sims 3: Pets
4. The Sims 3
5. The Sims 3: Generations
6. World of Warcraft: Cataclysm
7. The Sims 3: Late Night
8. The Sims: Medieval
9. Deus Ex: Human Revolution
10. Rage

Let the records show it to be true: success is not about fancy graphics. The visually low-tech Manager of Feet 2012 has knocked BF3 off its one-week perch, but EA nonetheless retains its Sims-based stranglehold on most of the rest of the chart. Nice to see DXHR still hanging around there, and the unfairly maligned Rage too.