Sony Teases The Strongest Exclusive Game Line-Up We've Ever Seen

It's a long-running meme that's attributed to the fact that the PlayStation 3's never quite lived up to the success of its predecessors. The oft-touted "year of the PlayStation 3" has never quite come to fruition; Sony certainly had a strong 2009, but that was largely supported by a new marketing direction and a hardware revision.

But twenty-eleven. 2011. The year we're in now. This year really is the year of the PlayStation 3. In a bragging post on the US PlayStation Blog, Sony's detailed the twenty exclusive titles set to launch on the PS3 this year. Twenty. Sit and mull on that for a moment. Twenty. We've been following games for a long time, but honestly, we can't think of a single first-party line-up like this one. Even assuming five of those games slip into 2012, it'll still end up being the strongest first-party line-up in the history of gaming. That really is a triumph. Whoever's behind the line-up — we're guessing Shuhei Yoshida takes the most credit — deserves a jumbo bonus. It really is incredibly exciting.

We've listed all 20 titles below. We've attached a little hype meter next to the title to demonstrate where we think your interests should be focused. (5 represents "Uber-hype", 1 represents "No hype").

• Ar tonelico Qoga: Knell of Ar Ciel (March, 2011) - 2
• Hyperdimension Neptunia (February, 2011) - 2
• The Ico and Shadow of the Colossus Collection (Spring, 2011) - 5
• inFAMOUS 2 (2011) - 5
• Journey (2011) - 5
• Killzone 3 (February 22, 2011) - 5
• The Last Guardian (Holiday, 2011) - 5
• LittleBigPlanet 2 (January 18, 2011) - 5
• MLB 11 The Show (March 8, 2011) - 3
• MotorStorm Apocalypse (spring, 2011) - 4
• No More Heroes: Heroes’ Paradise (fall, 2011) - 2
• PixelJunk Shooter 2 (2011) - 3
• PlayStation Move Heroes (spring, 2011) - 3
• Ratchet & Clank: All 4 One (Fall, 2011) - 4
• Resistance 3 (September 6, 2011) - 4
• SOCOM 4 (2011) - 4
• Sorcery (2011) - 4
• Twisted Metal (2011) - 3
• UNCHARTED 3: Drake’s Deception (November 1, 2011) - 5
• Yakuza 4 (March 15, 2011) - 4

What's astounding about this list is that 80% of it is destined to be amazing. It would be all fine and dandy if Sony were touting 20 average exclusives, but at least 12 of these are destined to be amazing games, with the rest likely to be decent. It really is the most astounding line-up we've ever seen, and we're saying that with our fan-boy hat firmly off. Just incredible.

Sony touts that “nearly every major PlayStation series is making an appearance in 2011,” with Kratos just about getting the nod thanks to his cameo in Mortal Kombat. That's insane. Twenty. Did we mention the number twenty?

Twenty.