PSN's best-selling indies of 2011 revealed

By Fred Dutton Published 13 December, 2011

Limbo, PixelJunk, Hoard top US list.

Sony US has revealed PlayStation Network's best-selling independent games of 2011.

The platform holder broke the category down into three separate charts: self-published, SCEA-published and games that came out of its Pub Fund initiative.

Playdead's stylish platformer Limbo took the self-published crown, Q-Games' PixelJunk Shooter 2 dominated the SCEA chart and Big Sandwich Games' strategy effort Hoard came out on top in the Pub Fund rundown.

Here's how each list looked, as published on the PlayStation Blog:

Top 10 Best-Selling Indie PSN Games of 2011 - Third-Party Self-Published

  1. Limbo (Playdead)
  2. Castle Crashers (The Behemoth)
  3. TestYourself Psychology (Creat Studios)
  4. Marvel Pinball (Zen Studios)
  5. Worms 2 Armageddon (Team 17)
  6. Dungeon Defenders (Trendy Entertainment)
  7. Armageddon Riders (Targem Games)
  8. Braid (Number None Inc.)
  9. UnderSiege (Seed Studios)
  10. Hamsterball (TikGames)

Top 10 Best-Selling PSN Games of 2011- SCEA-Published Indies

  1. PixelJunk Shooter 2 (Q-Games)
  2. Fat Princess (Titan Studios)
  3. Flower (thatgamecompany)
  4. Aquatopia (Playlogic Entertainment)
  5. Hustle Kings (VooFoo Sudios)
  6. Eat Them! (FluffyLogic)
  7. Top Darts (Devil's Details)
  8. Super Stardust HD (Housemarque)
  9. Linger in Shadows (Plastic)
  10. Rag Doll Kung Fu (Qi Studios)

Top 5 Best-Selling Pub Fund Titles of 2011

  1. Hoard (Big Sandwich Games)
  2. Tales From Space: About a Blob (DrinkBox)
  3. Joe Danger (Hello Games)
  4. Eufloria (Omni Systems Limited)
  5. Explodemon! (Curve Studios)

"PSN has been the only platform to fully embrace indie developers, and in 2012, more indie-developed PSN exclusives are on the way, including Papo & Yo, Retrograde, Closure, Dyad, and many more," commented PSN director Susan Panico.

Picture of Fred.

About Fred Dutton

Fred Dutton is Eurogamer's US news editor, based in Washington DC.

Read more articles from Fred by visiting the Fred Dutton archive page.

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Comments (25) Latest comment 5 months ago

Comments for this article are now closed, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • Daeltaja #1 5 months ago

    Sales figures would be nice.

  • captain_Carl #2 5 months ago

    <3 Tales from Space.

    Well done Indies! Good to see so many great indie games on PSN :) Keep them coming

  • Stompy #3 5 months ago

    Post deleted at 23:13:35 17-04-2012

  • Ferral #4 5 months ago

    Outland has been my favourite Indie this year. Was gutted I couldnt get it when released due to PSN being down due to the hack. Was well worth the wait though.

    Just remembered bought Explodemon at the same time as Outland, another solid platformer, excellent game and really enjoyable to play.

    Its good that Indies are now getting a lot more recognision, in turn we are seeing better production values and altogether better games.
    Edited by Ferral at 13/12/11 @ 22:13

  • HeNiCiDe1988 #5 5 months ago

    limbo nice, and all that moneys gone to the developers :D

  • taurus82 #6 5 months ago

    Amazed to see a tech demo (Linger In Shadows) still in a top ten.

  • Lunastra78 #7 5 months ago

    @taurus82

    Easy trophies, that's why it sells.

  • RandomTerrain #8 5 months ago

    Lots of fantastic games there, well deserved sales, I look forward to seeing more!

  • Stompy #9 5 months ago

    Post deleted at 23:13:35 17-04-2012

  • f01re #10 5 months ago

    Nice to see Flower still selling well

  • Triggerhappytel #11 5 months ago

    Some good games there. I didn't know Tales From Space: About a Blob was a Pub Fund game; playing it at the moment and it's a really solid, fun platformer. Also, a shout out for Eufloria, which is very good, but utterly bastard hard.

    I would also recommend the excellent Hustle Kings to everyone with an interest in pool/billiards, and everyone with Move should get the massively underrated Top Darts.

    Tons of great games on PSN. My backlog of downloadable games is probably bigger than my physical retail games.

  • Triggerhappytel #12 5 months ago

    Also: surprised not to see Payday: The Heist in there, considering it was the centerpiece of their PSN Play promotion. I just got it cheap in the 12 days of Christmas sale, and am finding it really excellent - much better than I'd expected.

  • wizlon #13 5 months ago

    As an Indie dev myself it's great to see Sony embracing the small guy.

  • Alex_V #14 5 months ago

    As a distinctive service with a great track record, I think PSN has had a truly awful year. Not just because of the outage either. A lot of those titles either came out last year, or came out first on other services/systems.

  • captain_Carl #15 5 months ago

    @Alex_V Why does being multiplatform or being out more than a year make it bad? I'd say the fact that titles can sell well for more than a few months is a GOOD thing, not a bad thing.

  • DrStrangelove #16 5 months ago

    I'm surprised Eufloria made it into the charts. Don't get me wrong, I love that game (on PC), but I didn't find the PS3 demo particularly convincing.

    But that may be because I hoped after all that time they had addressed the most obvious shortcomings and maybe added something new, but all they did is joypad controls and a few random collectibles that have no impact on gameplay.

    The GUI even obscured the lower edge of the screen in a way you can't see a part of your empire's borders, which is quite a fatal flaw.

  • WeakOrbit #17 5 months ago

    Wow Castle Crashers and Limbo at number 2 and 1. Maybe we'll see the Behemoth's next game coming on the PS3 a little sooner.

  • Alex_V #18 5 months ago

    @captain_Carl Nothing wrong with that I agree, I should have been more specific. It's been an incredibly poor year for original new titles of note made specifically for PSN.

  • captain_Carl #19 5 months ago

    @Alex_V Ah i see, i thought you meant terrible in general for PSN. I agree there haven't been as many great little indie PSN games this year, which is a shame.

    Next year looks promising though with "Journey" and "Papo and Yo"
    Edited by captain_Carl at 14/12/11 @ 01:37

  • Obli #20 5 months ago

    What about Dead Nation? Is that excluded because it was a welcome back freebie?

  • uncharted86 #21 5 months ago

    @Obli

    Just because a game is only on PSN doesn't make it an indie title.

  • Triggerhappytel #22 5 months ago

    Yeah; Dead Nation is not indie as it belongs to Sony. I love it though - brilliant game which is very well balanced and the DLC is good stuff too. I hope Sony and Housemarque will make a sequel at one point.

  • TheEarlOfZinger #23 5 months ago

    I'd argue that Aquatopia is not a game.

  • 3william56 #24 5 months ago

    America in taste shocker!! Who knew?

  • Architect_z #25 5 months ago

    Pixeljunk Shooter 2 ftw! I don't understand why people thought this game wasnt that good? PJ Shooter 1 was very relaxing by comparisson, but PJ shooter 2 had such a good balance of intense shootouts and fast paced flying sections.

    It might just be because i'm a Pixeljunk whore.

    Currently trying to defeat the last boss on PJ Sidescroller on Brutal mode.