Still, BioShock 2 not only re-captures the dystopian aesthetic, gripping narrative, and deep gameplay of Irrational's original, but it actually greatly improves on the BioShock experience as a whole, fine-tuning what made Jack's voyage to Rapture such a memorable experience two years ago.

Despite being familiar with the game, Persona 3 Portable still managed to utterly consume me. When a game has such a profound effect on me, I believe it deserves nothing less than the highest praise I can lavish upon it.

Realistic scenarios in realistic environments add to Splinter Cell’s tantalizing world of covert operations. With a strong overall package of incredible features, the stealth/action genre has a new hero.

A masterpiece of superior game design, infinite gameplay variety, creativity, and life-and it's got a water cannon…and a damn brilliant one at that.

It's one of the best games to come out for the PlayStation in 2000.

Scribblenauts is the video game equivalent of your first kiss: it's awkward, it's sweet and it's utterly memorable.

While N+ is frequently challenging, it never devolves to the level of senseless head gripping difficulty that has been seen in similar games, as it strikes a nice balance in difficulty.

A breathtaking experience. From the inimitable graphics to the hypnotically addictive gameplay, it’s captivating on every level.

An intensely addictive combo of wild arcade racing and fun platform-style exploration … the joy of exploring all its cool tracks will make you feel like a kid in a candy store.

Overall, Super Circuit handles like a front-runner, but sometimes the windshield needs cleaning.

A truly dazzling, inspired game that mixes a riveting story with a stylish look and absorbing gameplay.

Heck, it might just be the best console RPG of all time. It's deep, complex and tremendously addictive. From the amazing character development system to the engaging and satisfying combat, Fallout 3 has everything you could want in an RPG experience.

A combat masterpiece.

From the fighting mechanics to roster of players Brawl is a well-rounded game that I just couldn't put down. The only downside to Brawl is that it doesn't do anything to reinvent the series. It takes elements of past SSB games and refines them, which is great, but players expecting an entirely new experience won't find it here.

In this captivating outing, 47 revisits the past while modernizing the nagging flaws of his previous games, making for his best trail of assassinations yet.

With amazing improvements and incredible gameplay, FFXII is without a doubt the best Final Fantasy game in over a decade. Put simply, this is what all RPGs, regardless of platform or subject matter, should aspire to be.

It isn't the best open-world game out there, but it does a sublime job of capturing what it feels like to be the head of a virtual crime family. [Apr 2009, p.81]

This is Zelda supreme. It's fun. One hitch, however, is that the skill level gets progressively harder - so hard that casual gamers might give up rather quickly.

Surprise, surprise —UT 2004 looks absolutely fantastic. From the sprawling battlefields to the tiny blades of alien grass, there’s not one visual detail that looks less than stunning.

Turns in a superstar performance with its addictive gameplay, authentic hockey feel, and exhaustive features.

The butter-smooth controls make the game a joy to play—between the big hits and the player-controlled dekes, you’ll alternate between brawling like Tie Domi and dangling like Pavel Bure.

Thankfully, Capcom included a near-perfect arcade port of "Street Fighter III", a fighting game as unsung as it is flawless. [Oct 2004, p.82]

Every minute that you play, you constantly feel as if you’re discovering something new and different, and the game’s puzzles feel very organic, intelligent, and open-ended, forcing you to think and rethink your strategy as you make new realizations about your place in the world.

At the end of the day, that's really what this Street Fighter is: it's a title that's built for newcomers, yet tweaked for old school vets from the arcade and console days. [Mar 2009, p.75]

Bastion isn't just one of the year's best title[s]. It's also one of the best stories you'll see in an indie game.

Offers a smooth ramp of power, fast-but-strategic combat, and a real variety of gameplay. Alone, it's cool. With friends, it's a blast.

Even beyond the football gameplay, you have to appreciate the wealth of extras and activities that make Madden NFL 2003 such an entertaining and complete package.

Unmatched in its field thanks to major improvements in every category combined with a deeply rewarding simulation experience.

All told, this is a great debut for the Prince of Persia series on the PS3 and Xbox 360. [Jan 2009, p.74]

It's the same brilliant game all over again with some new bits. Buy it and be happy.

Offers an addictively eclectic mix of item collecting, gambling, and relationship building; tantalizing eye candy; and one outstanding game of volleyball.

The fact that we get access to two classic games in one package is also a win for us, but again, the ability to take a long look back at Kratos' journey is the true reward of this amazing collection.

Compared to D2D, "Thunder's" cars don't handle as smoothly and its Career mode is heavy on complexity and short on fun. [Dec 2002, p.194]

BF IV's fantastic voyage and cool play techniques will keep fans of the series and newbies alike riveted for days.

So good that it will easily make diehard pocket fighters forget all about the great genre titles on the short-lived Neo Geo Pocket Color.

When playing in a loud stadium, visiting teams face a rowdily vibrating controller, shaking screen, and players whose lack of composure causes bad plays. If you think you can handle it, you're in for a surpise - the overall effect is huge, really adding to the challenge in key moments like kicking a field goal. [Aug 2004, p.90]

Don’t get rid of your N64 yet—Mario Party is one of the last and best games you can play on the system with up to three buddies.

The game looks incredible on a P4 2.7 GHz with a Radeon 9800 Pro, but still looks extremely impressive (and played wonderfully) on an Athlon 1.7GHz running a lowly GeForce 3.

When it comes to video game destruction for brains and brawn, Blast is definitely the master.

If you have something you need to get done right now, a paper, a report, just hold off on buying this game until you're finished because other tasks don't stand a chance when playing THPS2 is an option.

RoK has slightly more stringent hardware requirements than the original EverQuest, simply because the new continent is much more visually complex, with its more detailed textures and animated environment.

With a new budget price and gobs of bonus content, there's absolutely no excuse for missing what is arguably the best Metal Gear ever created. [Apr 2006, p.72]

The art is fantastic and the actual light mechanics of the torch are impressive, making for an all around high-quality feel.

An inexplicably rewarding, utterly bizarre, and impossible-to-put-down battery-sucking gem that feels like it was born to live on the Game Boy Advance.

An awesome new first-person shooter with the chops and options to tangle with the best.

It's easily the best survival horror game since the masterful "Resident Evil 4" and it sets the bar high for graphics, sound, and scares in its respective genre. Dead Space is an artistic nightmare clearly designed for survival horror fans by a passionate and dedicated team of like-minded gamers. Just be sure to play it with the lights on. [Dec 2008, p.90]

To say that this game is "fast" is an understatement - it absolutely blazes, so much so that blinking becomes a liability. [Nov 2004, p.96]

The good news is that the game is absolutely worth the investment, and even if you find yourself disagreeing with some of the changes Treyarch instituted or you run into a bunch of morons who are hell bent on ruining a particular mode for you, you have plenty of other options to keep you engaged for a good long time.

Enormously fun golfing with a variety of modes to satisfy everyone from the weekend golfer to the maniacal miniature-putthead. You couldn't ask for a better tee time than Mario Golf.

An intense action/adventure game where technique is king and the challenge level is high. Throw in fantastic graphics and intuitive controls, and you’ve got one of this year’s strongest PS2 titles.

It delivers all the clever, addictive gameplay that a THPS game should, and in higher resolution than ever before.

Furious battles between fifty ton robots never looked or played so good, and Mechwarrior fans will love this latest chapter.

Excellent A.I, sharp graphics, and addictive gameplay combine for an unabashed good time. Sim freaks need not apply—Rumble Racing is pure, unapologetic arcade goodness.

With a creepy, excellent story and perfectly paced, complex action, Undying oozes freaky atmosphere.

If you buy just one tower defense game this year, well, knock yourself out. But if you want a really good action game with some tower defense, some great scoring challenges, some wonderful multiplayer support, some great graphics, and a wonderful sense of humor, you can't go wrong with Toy Soldiers: Cold War.

This year, the design guys as Visual Concepts have turned ESPN NFL 2K5 into the most entertaining show in video-game football. [Sept 2004, p.98]

Any way you slice it, Niko Belic journey through Liberty City and his quest for answers to his shadowy past is an experience you just cannot afford to miss.

This isn't the sort of MMO that asks you to park for hours on end several nights in a row. It's more of a co-operative or competitive multiplayer action game, perfect for short intense visits. And because your character doesn't sport rows of tiny icons for a thousand different skills, DC Universe is also perfect for less frequent visits.

It's hard to put the sheer size and brilliance of Assassin's Creed into words. It is an epic game that you have to experience for yourself. I will caution that the game is not for the impatient or the faint of heart.

With cinematic camera angles, a grime-infested aesthetic, and gruesomely glistening monsters, Silent Hill 2 improves on the original in every way.

The gameplay is on-the-money with great baseball that ought to attract Xbox sports gamers and just plain baseball fans alike.

Gather your friends around and get over yourselves; you are about to have fun playing tennis.

It's now been four years of exceptional releases since the introduction of the skill-stick and every year has been made steadily better, adding more and more features and refining them to such a degree that it should come as no surprise that NHL 10 is by far the best hockey game put out, a clear cut game of the year contender, and possibly the best sports game ever released.

It speaks like no other game in the genre, loud and with feeling, and tells a story worth telling among all the explosions.

The superior force in online warfare and a real candidate for PC Game of the Year. If you’re fed up with Flak Cannons and Rail Guns, enlist with this platoon. Posthaste, soldier!

Enormously high production value adds to the pleasure of playing this game. It's no exaggeration to say that these graphics are the best you've ever seen in a console game...A masterpiece.

Why Sam has stepped out of the shadows and is on full out attack makes complete sense in context with the story, so if you can accept it for what it is and not dwell on the fact that it isn't what you've come to expect in a Splinter Cell title, you'll no doubt agree that Conviction rivals Chaos Theory as the best title in the franchise's history.

If there's one thing Guerrilla has plenty of, it's content.

Savage moves enable you to beat, stab, slice, and dice opponents with vicious violence that is sure to excite fight fans to unbelievable heights.

Set against a myriad of beautifully rendered 2D environments, the detailed visuals convey a feeling of dread.

UFC 2009 Undisputed does have a couple of issues that keep it from being a MMA-fan's dream come true but it is still a tremendous title that will make any fan of the sport proud.

It does create an eerie sense of tension and excitement. This is probably as close as you want to get to real battle.

If you’ve experienced Super Mario Kart on the SNES, this game will feel like a grand homecoming. New players of all skill levels will instantly pick up on the fun.

Monster Dash is easily one of the best iPhone games released this year, and if Halfbrick is as generous with updates to it as it has been with Fruit Ninja, this game can only keep getting better.

Everything that made EFMI so great on the PC arrives on the PS2 perfectly intact. The game’s many puzzles are perfectly balanced.

Call of Duty: United Offensive's white-knuckle WWII scenarios will blow away even jaded FPS veterans. And that's no small achievement, especially for a mere expansion pack. [Dec 2004, p.126]

Of the three console-exclusive characters, Link requires the most finesse to stay competitive but not so much that younger players will get frustrated.

The swelling chase music, idealized world, larger-than-life story, and easy-to-master controls combine to cut through the clutter of some more pretentious games and deliver a sense of majesty and bravery straight to your heart.

Still, Terraria is a great adventure, one of the best sandbox games around, and an absolute steal for ten bucks on Steam. It's well worth checking out for anyone, regardless of how they feel about Minecraft. Despite having one fewer dimension, Terraria hides greater depth than its 3D cousin.

The graphics are the main differentiator with the Xbox version looking sharpest, the PS2 version sprouting typical jaggies, and the GameCube version appearing slightly soft.

I can't recommend this innovative experience highly enough, and from first time visitors to the Velvet Room to jaded MegaTen fanatics, Persona 4 is an absolute must buy.

Beats its predecessor with souped-up visuals, new characters and moves, improved tutorials, hundreds of unlockable items, and the amazingly deep Quest mode. And this is a Greatest Hits title? Insane bargain alert!

You will play at every possible free moment, because Geometry Wars: Galaxies for DS is more awesome than you ever imagined it could be.

Absolutely tears up the modern-day war zone and even one-ups the "Battlefield" stranglehold in many areas.

The best RPG action the PC has to offer.

The ultimate automotive playground. A place where car buffs can come together and enjoy virtually every aspect of car culture you can think of – and engage in fierce, beautifully articulated competition.

Rarely does a game (much less a GBA one) keep the player so constantly surprised. [Mar 2004, p.75]

There are so many courses, cars and race types in DiRT 2 that it's almost overwhelming to look at your world map. At one point I had almost 30 unlocked, un-played events just waiting to be tackled. It's a dense game with a lot to do, and you'll want to do it all.

The gameplay in Vice City is more addictive than ever, except now there's twice as much of nearly everything that made the first game so great—more streets, more cars (and other vehicles), more cool missions, more awesome street life.

Whether you want to build a major league franchise or just play two with your favorite team, competing in a complete game of Xbox baseball couldn't be easier or more fun.

The writing is hilarious, the variety from level to level is impressive, and the game's chunky 3D art style looks great in action, especially when the game switches to slow motion to show off the destruction you've wrought with your meteors.

I think the real conversation is whether or not it's the best baseball game of all time. In my opinion, it is the greatest video game simulation of America's past time ever.

Considering the fact that it's been a target of political and media pundits who keep harping on the infamous "Hot Coffee" incident, it's understandable to think that Rockstar might tone down the adult themes in GTA IV. But thankfully, that didn't happen. This is a mature game, and a devilishly good one at that.

A mandatory addition to any Castlevania fan's game library.

Okami shames them simply by being the genuine article: A stunningly gorgeous and unique masterpiece that effortlessly blends art and storytelling with puzzles and amusement. Miss this landmark effort at your peril. [Oct. 2006, p.78]

Even the single-player mode is fun, but the Party really starts when the players interact with each other while competing in this hilarious game.

It's tough to sum up everything that makes Arkham City work as well as it does. If Arkham Asylum was a fun-house chock-full of Batman's most famous foes with a decent dose of fanservice for Dark Knight die-hards, this is a sprawling theme park that plumbs the depths of his case files.

The fact that Visceral boldly ignored the fan fervor and pulled the franchise forward in a logical and thrilling direction is commendable, and even though they'll get their fair share of close-minded bitching that the game fails to live up to the gory heights of the original, it's still a worthy follow-up to the tense opening chapter.