Wings Over Scotland

It’s been a pretty big year for WoSland, with average traffic more than doubling in the year, all previous individual records smashed, a new name, a spinoff site and a fancy redesign bringing your favourite modern culture chronicle visually into something approaching the 21st century. We’ve slacked off a bit in December on account of some exciting videogame-development commitments and the holidays and stuff, but rest assured we’ll be back in full effect in the New Year. Meanwhile, here are the old year’s top 20 features (ranked in order of most views) in case you missed any of them.

David Cameron’s new best friend
The astonishing adventures of a witless Prime Minister-endorsed racist and his desperate attempts to hide from the all-seeing eyes of the internet. The story trended on Twitter and was so popular WoSland’s web hosts killed the site for over 24 hours at its peak lest the volume of traffic cripple their entire operation.

NGP: the 10 questions nobody’s asking
A fanboy-enraging but in hindsight mostly-correct dissection of the games-journalism industry’s failure to cut through the Playstation Vita hype.

Guess who’s back?
Tim Langdell pulls the move nobody expected – releasing a videogame. WoSland pretty much scooped the world on this one, only to be rewarded with a somewhat out-of-context quote on the game in question’s App Store entry.

Anyone STILL not convinced?
Our various analyses of game pricing issues and how they affect profits, mostly related to iOS stats, tend to get linked pretty widely and keep steadily racking up hits.

Just shut up, idiots
As does this handy one-stop reference for the sort of clots who still think smartphone gaming is about five-minute Flash apps.

Point-counterpoint
A very old rant on the awful Tomb Raider Legend, given new life by being featured on the monstrous PC gaming behemoth of doom that is Rock, Paper, Shotgun.

How 9/11 killed videogames journalism
One of the signature WoSland pieces of the year, examining how gamers get the media they deserve, so I was pleased to see it getting a pretty wide circulation.

This is why you’re probably an idiot
The new-look site launched with a ridiculously epic 25,000-word feature listing the 100 best iOS games of all time, with a twist – every game in the chart had been at some point available completely free. It’s easy to forget just how astonishing this aspect of iOS gaming is – it’s a format on which it’s perfectly feasible to legally enjoy new triple-A games every day of the year without ever spending a single penny.

This is Free-App Hero
Sadly our first iPhone app didn’t make it big, but the lessons learned from it will hopefully prove valuable in 2012.

The worst videogame ever made
Being 30 years old is no defence for crap games. WoSland has no statute of limitations, and no mercy.

Where is Jesus?
An embarrassing clanger, which may be why it was so otherwise-inexplicably popular.

On dicks and cunts
WoSland’s take on the Penny Arcade “Dickwolves” controversy. Gender politics have been a hot issue online in the last 12 months (WoSland has never been called a “rape apologist” so many times in quick succession, oddly despite consistently calling for more prosecution and stiffer sentences for this most heinous of crimes), and we’ve got some fun stuff lined up for early 2012 that should generate a death threat or two.

Who are the Tartan Tories?
Our best-rated and most-linked Scottish politics story before the genesis of Wings Over Scotland, based on quite a clever idea. Frankly we think it was pretty much single-handedly responsibly for the SNP’s unprecedented majority.

To proponents of premium prices
More game-pricing stuff. This is the central article around which the others revolve.

We aren’t the 99%
The piece I’m proudest of from 2011. I’d been meaning to write about The Great Division for months, even years, and finally got round to it. The subject was enormous and intimidating and when I started writing I had no idea where I was going, but in the end I think I said what I set out to say.

National Twat Day
Gratuitously provocative polemic aimed at early adopters, the dim-witted bottom-feeding scum of the games world.

Why I’m not excited about the PSP2
Speaks for itself. With £45 games, £45 memory cards and £45 chargers, I’m still not.

The alternative to the alternative
A late and futile attempt to persuade people to take the only approach to the AV referendum that made any sense.

Oh, poor DS, what did they do to you?
A valedictory salute to perhaps Nintendo’s greatest console.

When there’s no future, how can there be sin?
Reflections on the English riots of Summer 2011. Will there be more next year, or have the viciously draconian sentences handed down for the most trivial offences scared people out of protesting as their dreams, and the dreams of their children, are taken from them by the rich? We’ll find out together. See you in 2012, viewers!

SUBSCRIBER BONUS! The 21st most-popular story was this one on ShmupMAME, the excellent emulator that handles shooters too cool for normal MAME, including all the big Cave titles.