#5: Splinter Cell: Conviction

I've admittedly played very little Splinter Cell prior to Conviction, but it was still easy to see how much of a departure this game was from the rest of the series. Instead of the calm government operative he was in the earlier games, Conviction’s Sam Fisher is a free agent calling his own shots, and it has a huge impact on the gameplay. Everything feels very organic and on-the-fly, and without your support team chattering in your ear all the time, there’s a great sense that you’re really on your own. The main storyline is short, but it moves along so briskly that I had a hard time putting the controller down, expecting another shocking twist to be around the next corner. Also noteworthy is the multiplayer co-op campaign, which serves as a prequel to the main story and has one of the most memorable finales ever.

#4: Picross 3D

Despite loads of skepticism this was the right direction for my beloved Picross series, Picross 3D ended up delivering the feel of classic, 2D Picross while putting a new spin giving a fresh angle adding an extra dimension (SORRY) to the gameplay so it doesn’t just feel like a Picross expansion pack. (Although I honestly wouldn’t have minded.) Also, now I’m really looking forward to the inevitable Picross 4D.

#3: Mass Effect 2

I like to give Mass Effect 2 a hard time for not quite living up to the original (probably my favorite game this generation), but Bioware’s sequel managed to cut out a ton of what everyone most disliked while improving the parts they loved, and that sounds like a success to me. There’s a little less awe and wonder this time around because you’ve already been introduced to the Mass Effect universe in part one, but Bioware nearly makes up for it with a huge cast of some truly original characters, including a singing alien and—finally—a killer, renegade robot.

#2: Just Cause 2

As much as I loved Grand Theft Auto IV, I’m part of the large group that feels the sandbox genre has definitely stagnated since the glory days of the PlayStation 2 GTA games. It was a huge surprise, then, when I was unable to tear myself away from Just Cause 2, a game that’s constantly lambasted for being shallow and repetetive. But the sort of stuff you do in Just Cause absolutely bears repetition, whether it’s jumping out of airplanes, tying speeding vehicles together with a grappling hook, or detonating progressively larger fuel depots. There’s a central plot and overacted characters and all that—everything you need to fit the bill of a contemporary sandbox game—but Just Cause 2 once again gives you a reason to ignore all that and just blow up everything in sight.

#1: Dragon Quest IX: Sentinels of the Starry Skies

I was not a fan of Dragon Quest VIII. I picked up my copy of DQ9 mostly out of obligation and approached it with a sense of dread. To say that I was pleasantly surprised is a gross understatement; I ended up playing this obsessively for the latter half of 2010. It’s got that classic Dragon Quest feel, an almost endless amount of content, and an unprecedented level of fan service in the form of costumes, allies and villains that reappear from past games. It feels almost like a tribute to the series up to this point, to the degree that, if they never made another Dragon Quest game after this, I’d probably be fine with that. After all, it’s not entirely unlikely that I’ll still be plugging away at this by the time Dragon Quest X comes around.

Honorable Mentions

...And some games from my backlog that I didn't get around to until this year.

Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood - The campaign in this was mostly just Assassin's Creed II: Part 2, but it was still a lot of fun and offered a satisfying conclusion (I think) to Ezio's chapter of the overarching AC storyline. More notable about this game is the online multiplayer, which is basically a lethal version of hide-and-seek. It's a little rough around the edges, but it's unlike anything else out there and I can't wait to see how they'll develop it for the sequel.

Enslaved: Odyssey to the West - The gameplay is largely forgettable, but it's still worth checking out Enslaved for the mysterious story and the interaction between the two main characters.

Limbo - Minimal, moody, and just challenging enough--Limbo is like Super Mario Bros. meets Braid, as dreamt by Edward Gorey.

Lost Planet 2 - Just barely edged out of my top 5 by Splinter Cell. Monster Hunter Lost Planet 2 takes the serviceable shooting of the original and makes it incredible by allowing four players to team up through the whole game. It’s also got the best set pieces in any game last year.

Star Trek Online - Although it got off to a rocky start and power gamers may be able to blow through much of the game’s content in weeks, in the year since launch, developer Cryptic has rolled out tons of compelling new features, like custom mission creation and weekly featured episodes, that promise to keep the game fresh for years to come.

VVVVVV - Simple platforming gameplay with a thousand rows of menacing teeth. It’s also got a wonderful, retro aesthetic, a silly story, and a hyperactive chiptune soundtrack that I can’t get out of my head.

And finally, apologies to Alan Wake, Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker, and Red Dead Redemption. They were games I felt stood a good chance at making the list but I just didn't get around to playing them in 2010. There's always next year's list!

...and decided something was missing:

Much better.

Happy Halloween!

The answer is six hours. THANKS, JERKS.

p.s. best movie everrrrrrr

As a part-time music snob, I get some smug satisfaction when the Internet doesn't know about one of my CDs yet.

#5: ExciteBots: Trick Racing

Building on one of my Excite Truck, one of my favorite Wii games, Monster's ExciteBots is still a ton of tilt-controlled fun at high speeds, except this time it features a wide variety of robotic animals instead of those boring trucks. The rush of speed from Excite Truck isn't quite there and neither is the custom soundtrack option, but ExciteBots arguably makes up for it with a new online multiplayer race mode for up to six people.

#4: Uncharted 2: Among Thieves

Naughty Dog's Uncharted 2 is somewhere between being a game and a movie. On the game side, it's got lots of brilliant platforming sections where you climb all over spectacular environments, both modern and ancient, and the shooting segments are exciting and usually take place as part of some mind-blowing set piece. There's also a handful of stealth sections later in the game that took me by surprise, because while it's definitely to your advantage to sneak around and dispatch as many enemies as possible without being noticed, you can still shoot your way out even if you're discovered.

The reason Uncharted feels like a different experience than just a video game is not just the quality of the voice actors' performances, or even the script, which is humorous, full of surprises, and definitely better than that last Indiana Jones movie, but has more to do with the aforementioned set pieces. Often whenever a big, dramatic event takes place in a game, it's in the form of a noninteractive cutscene. But in Uncharted 2, you just keep on playing no matter what's going on, whether your character is sprinting through a narrow alley as a truck crashes through walls behind him, or is trapped inside a collapsing building, or as all sorts of violence takes place on a moving train over miles of track. And all of this is rendered with probably the most gorgeous, fluid visuals I've seen in a game. Sometimes it's frustrating you can't just yell "cut!" to take a look around.

#3: Modern Warfare 2

So here's the Biggest Game of All Time, and while I don't know if this is the end-all of first person shooters, it still manages to be a lot of fun. Many who spent days playing its predecessor, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, complain that this feels more like a point upgrade and not a full-fledged sequel, but I'd argue that the improved perks and weapon customization systems offer much more variety and nuance than CoD4 ever did.

What's particularly brilliant is you can set up your soldier to suit pretty much any play style. Those coming from faster shooters like Unreal Tournament can wield dual submachineguns with added ammo and perks to increase accuracy as they run around, guns blazing. Or for the tactician, you can play overwatch for your team with a motion tracker and a perk that lets you hear enemies' footsteps through walls. And of course there's a whole range of options in between.

The single player plot got a little silly this time around, but that's not much of a concern when the multiplayer is enough reason to keep coming back to this.

#2: Borderlands

Borderlands is sort of like an MMO, except that developer Gearbox took away the stale combat from games like World of Warcraft and Diablo and replaced it with some of the most viscerally exciting shooting in years. On top of first-person shooter gameplay just being more engaging than MMOs' traditionally menu-based gameplay, the guns in Borderlands are just a ton of fun to shoot: Assault rifles thunder as you pull the trigger and oversized revolvers let out a satisfying crack. And it never stops being hilarious watching an enemy explode in a ball of fire or melt down into a corrosive puddle. That sounds a little morbid at first, but Borderlands' dark sense of humor and inspired art direction make it feel more like you're in a more twisted version of a Wile E. Coyote cartoon. So it's all OK!

The plot quickly becomes paper-thin as it gets dragged out across 10-20 hours of gameplay, but it's forgiven as it's just an excuse to keep ushering your character into new areas with more bad guys to explode.

#1: Red Faction: Guerrilla

After a single player demo which made the game out to be little more than a mediocre Grand Theft Auto clone on Mars (albeit one that features fully destructable buildings and a vast arsenal of tools to accomplish said destruction), it turns out developer Volition designed one of the best multiplayer experiences in years. There's a whole host of game modes centering around destruction (and a few classics like Deathmatch and Capture the Flag), a giant arsenal of meticulously balanced weapons, and a unique backpack system that lets your character swap in a special ability including from X-ray vision, a concussive shockwave that sends other players flying, or a charging attack that lets you crash through a wall.

The real star of both the multi- and single-player modes, though, is the destruction. For years, destructible environments in games have amounted to little more than novelties like putting a hole in a wall when there's no convenient door. In Red Faction: Guerrilla, it can change the entire flow of a game. If there's an annoying sniper killing your team from up in some unreachable tower, just send someone with a sledgehammer to tear it down. You can destroy stairs and bridges to deny the enemy team easy access to your base, but be careful they don't knock over a smokestack (or half a building) to create a makeshift walkway. And of course there are several game modes that involve taking out a building's supports to make the whole thing come crashing down, often onto the heads of the other team. The wide variety of weapons and modes already makes Red Faction a top-tier multiplayer game, but the destruction aspect adds that extra element of surprise and chaos that makes this worth coming back to again and again.

Also you can beat people to death with an ostrich.

Honorable Mentions

...And some games from my backlog that I didn't get around to until this year.

Shadow Complex - Really fun Super Metroid clone, although I could have used tighter controls and more laser beams.

Monster Hunter Freedom Unite - Incredibly steep learning curve, but it's so satisfying to finally kill a giant monster that's been making your life miserable. Also, cats that cook for you.

The World Ends with You - The dual-screen gameplay is pretty disorienting at first, but fortunately there's an auto mode that will help ease you into it.

Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars - A GTA that doesn't take itself as seriously as its big brother, GTA4, but still manages to be a lot of fun. Also it's got Drug Wars.

Dead Rising - Just imagine how fun it would be to be allowed to pick up any object in a shopping mall and throw/ride/eat/kill a zombie with it.

Street Fighter IV - Hey it's Street Fighter.

Flower - A relaxing, super art-house game from the developer of the wonderful flOw. Also a nice reminder of what color looks like after playing Modern Warfare, Red Faction, etc.

DJMAX Fever - Sort of a "greatest hits" version of my favorite PSP games, DJMAX Portable 1 and 2.

I didn't get around to playing Batman: Arkham Asylum or Dragon Age: Origins, but that's what honorable mention 2010 is for!

Thanks, Wikipedia!

If you haven't seen, here's what the game's box art looks like in European territories:

North American players will be greeted with this absurdity:

Just because I'm completely baffled by the decisions behind this, here's what some other PS3 games might have looked like with a Heavy Rain makeover:

Inexplicable!

Update, 2.23.10: Someone pointed out that the image I grabbed for Heavenly Sword has her top Photoshopped out. I didn't even notice and now I think it's hilarious.

• Ain't No Rest for the Wicked - Cage the Elephant, Cage the Elephant
• 'Cross the Green Mountain - Bob Dylan, Tell Tale Signs
• Dancing the Manta Ray - Pixies, Doolittle Live
• La Femme Chinoise - Yellow Magic Orchestra, Yellow Magic Orchestra
• Heaven and Hell - The Who, Live at Leeds
• Heroin - The Velvet Underground, The Velvet Underground and Nico
• I Can't Explain - The Who, The Ultimate Collection
• I'm a Pilot - Fanfarlo, Reservoir
• My Patch - Jim Noir, Tower of Love
• Sea and Sand - The Who, Quadrophenia
• Sphinx - Tomoyasu Hotei, Guitarhythm II
• U・T - Yellow Magic Orchestra, BGM

I didn't listen to a whole lot of new music last year. I did pick up a lot of Who albums though, and the release of the Guitarhythm box set allowed me to round out my early Hotei library. Consequently, they both dominate my top albums list:

• 13 - Blur
• Chill'em All - Champion
• Guitarhythm II - Tomoyasu Hotei
• Guitarhythm III - Tomoyasu Hotei
• Guitarhythm IV - Tomoyasu Hotei
• Gunstar Heroes Sound Collection - Norio Hanzawa
• King & Queen - Tomoyasu Hotei
• Live at Leeds - The Who
• Oh Mercy - Bob Dylan
• Quadrophenia - The Who
• Reservoir - Fanfarlo
• Mirror's Edge - Solar Fields
• Tell Tale Signs: the Bootleg Series Vol. 8 - Bob Dylan
• The Ultimate Collection - The Who
• The Velvet Underground & Nico - The Velvet Underground
• Yellow Magic Orchestra - Yellow Magic Orchestra

Here's to more new music (and good, old music) in 2010!

Seats were ridiculously far but the concert more than made up for it. They opened with a few B-sides before playing through all of Doolittle.

Un chien andalou opening.

I bleed.

They showed this montage during "Here Comes Your Man."

Joey Santiago cracks me up.

Taking a bow.

"Where Is My Mind?" encore, at which point all the Fight Club fans figured out who the Pixies are.

And here's an excellent version of "Dancing the Manta Ray" that they opened with. GUITAR ASSAULT!! (For the optimal Pixies listening experience, turn your sound up until it's way too loud, and then it will be almost loud enough.)

Some of the articles on there today are just gut-wrenching.

1 The cruelest of all turned out to not be a hoax.

And now, a horrible cellphone photo gallery! Should've brought my real camera.

Outside the Festival Pavilion.

SF4 producer Yoshinori Ono gives a giddy speech, thanks Gamestop for choosing a venue that resembles Ken's stage from Street Fighter II, and tells everyone not to believe rumors on the Internet. (He was announcing the Champion Edition update that's out for free next week and I'm pretty sure I heard him say "Kotaku" when talking about how there had been some reports that it would cost $25. The translator changed this to "certain Websites" or something to that effect.)

Finals match between Mike Ross (no relation) and Justin Wong playing Honda and Rufus, respectively. Ross's Honda was fearsome in the lead-up rounds but was no match for Justin's unrelenting Rufus.

Seth Killian presents Justin Wong with his trophy and an oversized "admit one" ticket to EVO 2009.

Daigo stays classy.

Commemorative shirt, poster and my copy of SF4, now sporting Ono-san's signature.

And of course, someone (Youtube user Sakabot) already has some match videos up. Here's the final match between Mike Ross and Justin Wong:

Throughout the night, whenever Justin would unleash Rufus's ultra combo, the crowd would throw up their arms to mimic the final motion and it was pretty awesome. You can see it during this match against Korean champion Poongko at around 2:00 and 6:24.

And finally, the best match of the night: Japanese champion Iyo VS Daigo:

Pretty incredible evening.

In case you haven't heard, there is going to be a sequel to Excite Truck called Excitebots and it will feature SUPER SANDWICHES.

This comes hot on the heels of the SUPER RED BAR revelation.

GOTY 2009?