Skyrim (2011)
Skyrim’s jaw-droppingly beautiful, detailed world straight out of Norse mythology and its open-world structure meant that you could go anywhere and do almost anything. It’s “plot,” while engaging and exciting, could be totally ignored. You could claim your place as “The Dragonborn” and save Skyrim from the dragon invasion … or, if you’d rather, you could spend all of your time mining silver and making pretty rings to sell at the market. Sure PS3 users hit their share of tech glitches, but it was easy to forgive in exchange for an exhilarating and immersive gaming experience the likes of which players had never seen before.
