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Black Ops, Call of Duty top Google gaming searches in 2011

Search engine giant lists Activision Blizzard shooter brands as most popular this year; Halo: Reach, Super Mario, Mortal Kombat round out top five.

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Given the game's record-setting opening sales and $1 billion lifetime total, it seems fairly clear that Activision Blizzard's Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 will be the best-selling game of 2011. However, Modern Warfare 3 has lost this year's popularity contest, as measured by Google searches. The good news for Activision is that Modern Warfare 3 lost out to its predecessor, Call of Duty: Black Ops.

This just in: Black Ops is popular.
This just in: Black Ops is popular.

Today, Google released its yearly analytics report for most searched-for terms of the year, revealing Black Ops as the leading term in the gaming spectrum. Perhaps not so surprisingly given the popularity of Activision's shooter, the phrase "Call of Duty" slotted in just behind Black Ops.

Microsoft's Halo: Reach was the third most searched-for gaming term of 2011, with Super Mario and Mortal Kombat rounding out the top five.

Google released a separate list for online gaming alone. Activision Blizzard topped this list as well, with "Wow" (or World of Warcraft) easily outpacing all other search terms. "Addicting Games" fell in at second, with "free online games" coming in closely behind.

A full list of Google's top gaming search terms can be found below.

Top 10 Google Game Searches:
1. Black Ops
2. Call of Duty
3. Halo Reach
4. Super Mario
5. Mortal Kombat
6. Skyrim
7. Battlefield 3
8. Dragon Age 2
9. Diablo 3
10. Mass Effect 3

Top 10 Google Online Game Searches:
1. Wow
2. Addicting games
3. Free online games
4. Miniclip
5. Webkinz
6. Tower defense
7. Kids games
8. Armor games
9. Tetris
10. Juegos

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Avatar image for scarlov87
scarlov87

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Well the best COD where the MWII and MW, and that world at war, but this game was disappointing, throwing axes at god knows where and bang you got a kill, specially when it touches just the cord of your shoe at the very edge, nah,there was less popular games that were vastly better, even the old battlefields were better on multiplayer, the story alwais is envolving but is not enough, a game that you play more than a half of decade and still give you a challenge on playing no cheating or glitching, it has a plus ahah that zombie mode :D

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Avatar image for botsio
botsio

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why do some people hate call of duty this much.its the best shooter game on the block period.we all witnessed history this year.so let it rest and lets enjoy the moment period!

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Avatar image for daub11
daub11

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c.o.d black ops is one of the best games ever played.

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s4dn3s5

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Pretty sure youporn is still more popular...

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toddx77

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I bet the most searched game on Google was Half Life 3 but Activision paid Google to take it off the list. lol

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DroidPhysX

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CoD has been meh.

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Avatar image for Robotman170
Robotman170

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@soothsayer42 EVEN BETTER. So whats in for 2012??. Modern black ops 4

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Avatar image for Oldboy08
Oldboy08

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I wonder how many times Porn gets searched on google a day....imagine the yearly numbers on that!

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ryzrocks

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The thing people type in the Google search bar is "Why CoD balck Ops is so crappy?" True story :P

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cycoknob

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If Activision had made Battlefield 3, "3" would have been the number 1 in this ridiculous article!

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Avatar image for rondog56
rondog56

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All I want for Christmas is a release date for Diablo 3. Is that to much to ask for?

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Avatar image for TryDaBeardON
TryDaBeardON

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Funny, just the other day I saw a similar article on PC Gamer's website, featuring also, interestingly enough, search numbers from Google, only that one said BF3 topped the gaming search list in 2011. Ads are awesome. And always true.

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Avatar image for Scorpion2929
Scorpion2929

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Somehow I get the feeling that Activision pays Gamespot to put stupid articles like this...

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kos_maverik

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Tetris :P

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Avatar image for Jawehawk-DK
Jawehawk-DK

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Wow. Gamespot must be running out of things to write about. I maybe they just really to write about CoD.

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Snaptrap

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If EA renamed Battlefield to Boobs, it would always be the #1 search.

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nyran125

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i bet porn's still #1

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aaron25m

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BIG DEAL!

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ZeroX91

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So the phrase black ops automatically equates to CoD now, cant help but recall a certain black op this year that took out a certain head of a terrorist organazation.

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nousername66

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So this proves that monkeys really can use computers!

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Rheinmetal

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I was searching all the time the web about Dark Souls related questions, straight for a month. Why Google didn't record that activity? :P

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pidow

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Is the listing done by dollar or what? Games like Max Payne. Crysis, F.E.A.R, Mass Effect, Doom(s) lots more.

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dxBIGBOSSxb

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@calebcop Even better: Call of Duty4: Modern Warfare "Amazing game" Call of Duty: World At War "Not quite as good, but still great! ZOMG!" Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 "More of the same, and in fact worse because of the day 1 hacks, OP as hell EVERYTHING, unbalancment issues, terrible community, and underwhelming Spec OPs" Black Ops: "OK this is getting old... fast" Call of Duty Modern Warfare 3 "I wonder if it's the same as everyone says? 'Boom Headshot'... yep."

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valensim

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And I thought I would see Grand Theft Auto or Max Payne in the Top 10 .... I'm sou upset :(

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Avatar image for calebcop
calebcop

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Call of Duty4: Modern Warfare "Great game" Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 "More of the same, but still a good game" Black Ops: "OK this is getting old." Call of Duty Modern Warfare 3 "Boom Headshot"

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CptRexKramer

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@wavelength121 HA! Your a funny guy.

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Link3301

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Is Infinity Ward took a dump into a box and labeled it Call of Duty: Crappy Warfare, people would still buy it.

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calebcop

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SO tired of CoD. All it is is the same game, put in a different box every freaking year. I am done. Soo freaking done. And I bet all those searches, are a bunch of 5 year olds, not knowing what their computer even freaking is "Can my computer run Black Ops?" God! I am just so tired of it. But I guess you get that with any high end game. Half the reviews on Amazon of BF3 are bad because "It runs slow on my computer" when they just have a crappy computer! If your PC can run it, there should be NO LAG!

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calebcop

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[This message was deleted at the request of the original poster]

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wavelength121

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@CptRexKramer I'm sure all those searches are just by "fanboys who will buy anything activision repackages with a few new skins", right? Keep on hatin' silly DICE troll

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wavelength121

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[This message was deleted at the request of the original poster]

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aamir69

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Next article on gamespot "UFO sighted playing MW3" Next year i am releasing tetris or pacman and i will pay GS a million to advertise for my game. I am sure then tetris will beat CoD series by a mile. :D

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ziproy

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Did they really have to count Black Ops and Call of Duty. What would they even search for, there are no cheats in the game

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hella_epic

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arrow to the knee joke anybody????

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Odins_Fury

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I think the searches were a little more like this: How do I own at Black Ops?

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CptRexKramer

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Why? What on earth do you think your going to learn? It's the same game over and over and over and over again. 'Nuff said.

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CUDGEdave

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I searched for "Black Ops" and all I got was some porn.

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TonnFool23

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how much did activision paid gamespot to keep writing horse crap articles that don't mean a thing? If you're searching for battlefield 3 in google it's a waste because you just need to run origin and run BF3 from there and battlelog pops up or just write battlelog.

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scarabD

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So, base a list by Google searching.. I remember a site called Tiobe, that indexes programing languages popularity by Google scores too. But the problem with this is Microsoft languages never do well in the list because they have everything under MSDN so none need to Google to find information.. they go to MSDN. In games, when you need info about BF3 for example you just need to enter Battlelog and have all there, so Googling is just losing time. The list is inaccurate in my opinion.

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Avatar image for GabrielOnuris
GabrielOnuris

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Am I the only person who sees some reason in this article?! This shows some info about game marketing in general. I know it is a little bland after all, without solid numbers and palpable results and profits of any form. You can even make this kind of research on Google Analytics itself, like compare searchs between "my little pony" and "porn" if you want, it's a good Google tool for school and work research, and I'm sure Tom Magrino knows that. But please gamers, grow up. If you wanna hear only about games and nothing else, stick to your couch/chair and only play the games, don't even try to search for some game marketing (albeit bland, as I said) news.

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parkurtommo

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This really pisses me off... that the majority of gamers on the internet are casual CoD kids

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xenochrophis

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what is the bloody point of this article?This is the exact reason why people have stopped believing in news channels 'cause all they show is pointless news like these.Grow up and write some real informative articles related to gaming.

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PlatinumPaladin

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All this shows is how many people who play games are too ignorant to go directly to dedicated gaming sites. How does Google know that all of the people searching for "Black Ops" were after the game? How are the conspiracy theorists going to react to the news that their Google searches are being recorded for ulterior purposes?

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Chubb001

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They didnt care to mention that Battlefield 3 is on the front page as #5 on the list of fastest rising worldwide searches? << LINK REMOVED >>

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Fastenprune

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Skyrim would of been most searched game, but took an arrow in the knee

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TheDarkSpot

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Problem?

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Rocker6

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And this is news worthy because...?

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Masoodahmedkk

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what about porn?

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Zephol

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This helps in sales or what!?

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Soothsayer42

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So whats in for 2012?? :D MW3??? :P

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