Handheld consoles have traditionally been dominated by Nintendo. In recent years the iPhone and lately Android devices have tried to stake a claim to this market but those are not quite up to the same level of depth or game design just yet.
So the big players in this field are the Nintendo DS (and DSi) with its accessible, smartly pitched games and the Sony PSP with its fuller experiences and wealth of download options via Minis and the PlayStation Store.
As we’ve already seen the download-only category, this award is only open to retail-available titles. This was an incredibly closely fought category at the top with the winner only two percent higher in the polls than second place. To be honest, any one of the top titles in this category would have been deserving of the award but on the whole we think the right game came away with the victory. Just about.
We present our Handheld Game of the Year 2010, God of War: Ghost of Sparta.
lewis815
Juuust out of interest, what put Soul Silver on the list ahead of Heart Gold?
Probably the best choice for handheld GOTY up there from everything I’ve seen ! :)
mynameisblair
Because that’s the version I had :p
dude90
Well nobody was expecting GoW on top, imagine this time next year with the new 3DS.
Peter Rushton
Actually quite a lot were.
Charmed_Fanatic
quite surprised to see this, although it does deserve it
DrNate86
Gosh I was expecting MGS to top this, though it was close! A deserving winner anyway.
Aquastyle
Got Professor Layton and the Unwound Future for christmas, it truly is a great game, just like it’s predecessors. Was expecting Peace Walker to win this though, not Ghost of Sparta, but haven’t really played any of them due to not having a PSP, I guess they’re both great games aswell…
hennerzcfc
not realy a suprise
tonycawley
I saw GOW: GOS for £10 the other day, pre-owned. I ummed and arred about whether to get it and dust off my PSP or not. This may have tempted me to do so.
Foxhound_Solid
Psp had a great year. Both peace walker and ghost of sparta would hold their own as fully fledged ps3 giants. Awesome games.
Armonster9000
Dragon Quest IX was my GOTY for handhelds. No doubt about it, I’ve loved DQ ever since #3 (which was called Dragon Warrior III.
Still need to try out the latest GOW though.
Vaile23
what about iOS games? don’t they count as handheld ;)
cc_star
Yes, except they’re all download only games so were in that category not this one, which is only for retail handheld games