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[Protome]

Coming soon...Maybe xD I wouldn't bet on it.
Mass Effect review [PC]
Crysis Warhead review [PC]
Super Mario Galaxy review [Wii]
Metroid Prime 3 review [Wii]
Updates
3 topics w00t!

This topic is for my game reviews, top 10 lists and various other tidbits. Which are my new hobbies...Starting now...

Note: My review scores will sometimes be split into 5 sections. Gameplay, Story, Graphics, Replay Value, and Overall. I'm trying to stop doing that to make my reviews seem...more professional xD
Sonic & The Secret Rings Review
After the bad reception of Sonic 360/PS3 Sega's mascot is back once more, this time on the Wii. Sonic is also treading lightly on the line that seperates 3D and 2D with his on rails...platformer? Action game? I'm not entirely sure what catagory it falls under...But it's a good game. Almost definately the best 3D Sonic game, pushing aside the mediocre PS3,360,GC,Dreamcast,Master System and Sega Saturn iterations.

Gameplay: First lets talk about the controls. I, personally have had very few problems with the controls. The motion sensing for homing attacks and moving around are all extremely responsive. I have however had a few odd glitches where my homing attack hasn't been picked up but these times were few and far apart. Unfortunately for most people the controls in this game have an extremely long learning curve and most people will give up with the game before they finish the second level.
However after the controls become familiar you will be flying through the 7 worlds of the Arabian Nights, collecting World Rings and defeating enemies. Figuratively speaking of course, the game starts off slower than Link wearing Iron Boots. This is a problem solved as you progress through levels and are rewarded skills to upgrade Sonic with, speed upgrades, attack upgrades and various other little things that you'll probably use for the related tutorial and nothing else.
I know this all sounds extremely negative at the moment but trust me, the game gets better as it gets faster and your reflexes are pushed to the limit as you dodge oncoming obstacles while everything is just a blur, of course if you miss an item or something earlier in the level you can always go back but unfortunately with Sonic's newfound camera angle (which for the most part is directly behind Sonic as he runs) going backwards is reduced to nothing but hopping. It seems that those magicians over at Sonic Team managed to magic up another broken camera. How can you break an on-rails camera? Easy, allow the player to go backwards but don't allow the camera to ever turn round! Thus the player cannot see behind him and voila, broken camera. Luckily you wont need to go backwards often.
Gameplay: 6/10

Next up, Story. Now this is where Secret Rings really gets strange. The basic plotline is this, after sitting down with his trusty smoking pipe (not really) Sonic decides to read the Arabian Nights. However he is sucked into the book by a the Genie of the Ring "Shahra" who explains that the evil Erazor Djinn is erasing the stories in Arabian Nights one by one! You go to face Erazor and teach him what's what and he shoots Sonic with an arrow! Ohnoes. And that's not all, the arrow is cursed! And so it'll continue to burn away until it either kills Sonic or is removed. Of course Erazor isn't going to just pull it is he? So he offers Sonic a deal, bring him the 7 world rings in return for his life. Then he disappears and Sonic runs off to find him. Also, Tails, Eggman, Knuckles and others make cameos as various characters from the book.
And that's the plot. No joke, that's all. There are no plot twists or anything apart from Shahra appearing to have some kind of emotional connection to Erazor...
Story: 5/10

Graphics-wise Secret Rings is one of the most beautiful games on the Wii. It's 7 enviroments are unique and brilliantly detailed, from the whisping sands of the desert to the large marble interior (and exterior) of Erazor's fortress/mansion/temple thing. Everything is brilliantly animated, with Sonic's spines moving as he jumps and the giant golem enemy lurching around brilliantly.
The only problem I have with Secret Ring's graphics is a minor one, during the intro to every level a countdown from 3 shows up and as each number ticks down the game zooms in on Sonic slightly more. The first and second level of zoom show off the beautiful graphics but dear god, the third level of zoom makes me want to gouge my eyes out. With a spork. And this is at the beginning of EVERY LEVEL.
Graphics: 8.5/10

What's that? A whole positive section? I can't have that. Time for Replay value then. Sonic and The Secret Ring's Replay value is pretty sparce. You'll complete the game (if you do that, the last few levels are bloody hard) and then what? There's the multiplayer mode, which is Mario Party-ish and has sometimes wonky controls. While it boasts 40 mini-games i've yet to see them all this is because I've not played multiplayer in the mode that lets you select your own minigames yet and the computer tends to only pick between same 4 games over and over. Occasionaly throwing in one of the better games.
So is that it? Just multiplayer for replay value? No, there are also unlockables. You can unlock characters and minigames...for multiplayer...And you can unlock the final-final boss to fight...
6/10

Gameplay: 6/10, Buggy controls and another broken camera stops this Sonic game being as good as it could be.

Story: 5/10, Linear, and horrible. It has the most dramatic pinky promise ever commited to game, not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing though...

Graphics: 8.5/10, beautiful. I'm sure the Wii could do better though.

Replay-Value: 6/10, you can unlock multiplayer stuff and the final boss fight...You could go back and get a Gold medal in every mission but trust me, you wont want to.

Overall Sonic and The Secret Rings is the best 3D Sonic game so far but truth be told that isn't saying much. It has many control problems to begin with and at times is extremely difficult. Overall though, it's fun.
6.5/10

[OnewingedDragon]

Well, color me impressed. Even though I know you liked the game, you provided an accurate review. Devoid of any real bias.

Bravo.

[Chevalier-Ange]

Hahaha...agreed.  Very nicely done Ninja.   

[Ares]

As much as I love this game, I still think Sonic Adventure 2 was the best 3D Sonic game. It had true replay (Chao), more variety, and an amazing soundtrack. All of which this game lacks.

[Protome]

Sorry, had a busy weekend. So the Wii Sports review in the list on the first post is delayed O.O
Everything else is correct.
The Sonic Top 5
I'll admit it, I'm a Sonic fanboy. If Sonic is confirmed to be in Brawl I WILL break into Nintendo HQ and steal a copy of the unfinished game, however just because I <3 Sonic doesn't mean that all his games are brilliant...just the 2D ones. So here's my top 5 Sonic games, I'll do a Bottom 5 at some point too.
There shall be some rules of course, since there are so many Sonic games (And I haven't played them all, just most of them) and some of them don't deserve recognition in any way , form, shape or size.
So the rules are;
1. The Game must have Sonic as the main character (excluding Shadow The Hedgehog, and that terrible Tails Ring game that I can't remember the name of.)
2. It must be for a Console (That means no Portable games)
3. Uh...there isn't a 3. But all good things come in threes.

THE LIST
5. In fifth place comes Sonic's fourth attempt at 3D after the mediocre Sonic 3D, the fugly Sonic The Fighters and the forgotten Sonic Jam. It's a game that originated on the Sega Saturn but was ported the PC where it had a few extra features added (online play via a patch on Sega's website) but still retained all it's all bugs. What game is this?

Why it's Sonic R of course.
I know many of you are no doubt thinking, "Why is this shi*t in the list?" and I'll tell you why! It was the first time Sega did 3D right! It's one of the most addictive racing games on the earth, even if it's impossibley hard to win a race with any character other than Sonic or Super Sonic.
Sonic R is everything a Sonic Fanboy could want from a racing game, it's fast (ish), contains all your favourite characters (Plus the adorabley creepy Tails Doll, or Teddy Tails as I like to call him) and it also sported a brilliant soundtrack, some tracks that successfully create worlds that you could believe existed in the Sonic universe and of course it had something that wasn't expected from a cameo racing game at the time, Unlockable characters.

Coming Tomorrow: Numbah 4.

[OnewingedDragon]

Why is it that whenever anything goes Super, they become blond? Damn you Akira Toriyama!

Interesting, albeit brief, review. Accurate, basically how I feel about the game. one request though. Something other than Sonic games?

[Comic Kid]

I disagree on SatSR.

It... To put it likely, really, really, supremely sucks.

In my opinion.

Only Sonic Game I ever disliked.

[Mike Caron]

Protome, I am going to assume that Mobygames does not like their images being hotlinked. If this not the case, please add a tag like "posted with permission" or something to the image, or else remove it.

[Protome]

Whoops, I only intended that to be there for 10 minutes while I took a screenshot of Sonic R myself...Then the game refused to load and I forgot xD
Anyway, t'is gone now.

[Protome]

 I'll add to ze list later. Now it is time for...
TEH METROID PRIME REVIEW...OF DOOM!

Doomy doom doom...with some doom on it...
Okay, so it's quite an old game, that doesn't mean I can't review it! First a little history lesson. Metroid Prime is the first Metroid game to be made in 3D and when it was first announced to be an FPS (First Person Shooter) developed by a second party company everyone on the internet thought "Ohnoez itz ruined!" Of course, if you've played any of the Metroid Prime games you'll know it all ended up okay.

What's that? I called it an FPS? I'm sorry it was a typo. Metroid Prime is most definately NOT and FPS. It's a First Person Adventure game with shooting tacked on. As you progress in Prime this will become blatanly obvious, as you will go long periods of time without an enemy in sight and nothing to shoot but doors and various puzzle solving...things. That's not to say it doesn't have a lot of shooting, in fact Prime has a few sections where you are forced to stand your ground and fight, and Samus is prepared. Her arsenal of weaponry expands over 4 beam weapons, 2 types of missile, 2 types of bombs and 4 visors (they don't actually hurt enemies exactly, but they are necissary for certain battles). You can switch beams with the yellow C-stick and fire missiles with the X button while the D-pad serves the purpose of switching between visors. The shooting itself is probably the worst part of Metroid, at least for those of us used to the regular Dual Analog set up for FPS's, as Metroid has your gun constantly focused on the center of the screen and uses the Analog stick to move around, meaning that to aim at an enemy you need to either Free aim holding the R trigger or lock on to an enemy using the L trigger or, occasionally against flying enemies, both. And while for the most part this works fine it can hurt your hands but to be fair that's the Gamecube controller's fault not the game's. This camera choice works well when running and gunning, although things get a little hectic against multiple foes, doesn't work as well when exploring the enviroment of Tallon IV. You will be constantly holding down the R-trigger to look around for where you are meant to go and to find the solutions to puzzles, and then there's the jumping! DEAR GOD THE JUMPING! It's not too bad actually. But still it feels a little awkward jumping onto a platform and not being able to tell if you've landed on it especially later in the game when platforms get smaller.
9/10

So, Retro turned Metroid into an FPA but did they do anything else differently? Of course they did, Retro decided to take Metroid the whole way and give it an actual plot! No more of this Space Pirates have Metroids and you must kill them nonsense...well, there's less of it anyway. This time Samus picks up a distress call from a Space Pirate Frigate orbiting around the planet Tallon IV, despite hating and being hated by the Space Pirates, Samus decides to check it out, the ship crashes onto Tallon IV and Samus decides to explore and the planet and find out why the space pirates were there in the first place. And this is where it gets good, the plot isn't told through cutscenes, dialogue or even scrolling text. You need to piece the story together yourself! You come equipped with the Scan visor which allows your on board computer to translate Chozo and Space Pirate logs and also tell you some useful facts about enemies and various other things. For example if you see a computer screen you can scan it to read a log of whatever the Space Pirates are doing in that area, this can range from logs about metroid experimentation to information about the bounty placed on Samus's head by Space Pirate HQ. It's a truely unique way of telling the story and is nice change from the usual run of the mill cutscenes.
10/10

The Gamecube was the middle system last gen, with Xbox being the strongest and PS2 the weakest, but it still pulled off some graphically impressive games in its time. Prime is definately one of these games, the landscapes of Tallon IV are beautifully created from the ruins of a Chozo civilisation to the frozen plains of Phendrana Drifts. It doesn't use amazing lighting effects like the latest game but it still boasts crisp detailed enviroments and brilliant level design.
10/10

One of the only downsides of Prime is it's replay value. While you may want to play it again after your first run through to gain the 100% final ending or play through it in a harder difficulty mode there isn't much of an incentive to continue playing if you aren't interested in these things. Also, the sheer amount of backtracking in this game may put you playing it multiple times.
7/10

Overall Metroid Prime was, and still is, an important part of the Metroid series. I've yet to play Metroid Prime 2 or 3 but I they have one hell of an act to follow after this.

Gameplay: 9/10, Great adventuring gameplay, sometimes camera can get on your nerves.

Story: 10/10, Unique story telling method.

Graphics: 10/10, Beautiful for it's time, still holds up today.

Replay Value: 7/10, Hard difficulty and bonus ending give incentive, replay value removes it again.

Overall: 9.5/10, As close to perfect as a first person game can be.

[Mike Caron]

I agree with this review 99%. The only part I disagree with is the fact that I've played through the game dozens of times, and I still find it interesting. Easy, sure. But, interesting.

There's actually 3 distinct goals in Prime: Completing the story mode, getting 100% of items, and getting 100% of scans. The last goal is very difficult, as there are certain scans that are "limited". Eg, bosses don't come back. The reward for getting them all? Well, that's up to the player to find out...

Edit: Oh, and don't forget about Hard mode, which is good for veteran players. Unlock it by beating normal mode.

[Protome]

Just a little update, I've finished playing through Super Paper Mario for the Wii and I'll be writing a review of it some point soon. Probably not today because I'm going out after school but it should definately be up tomorrow.
Also I got bored of the Seperate Ways missions in RE4 so a review of it will be up some point this week.

Ciao!
Okay change of plan, I have been out every night this week. Expect a review tomorrow.   

[Protome]

It Be Reveoo Tiem!
Super Paper Mario (Wii)
Back when the Wii was released almost a year ago Nintendo canceled all of it's games in development for the Gamecube and ported them to the Wii instead, with mixed reactions from gamers. Zelda TP came out on both systems with both games being almost identical and it was met with generally favourable reviews, the other ports have yet to be released and include Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn, a new Kirby platformer running on the Melee engine (maybe switching to the Brawl engine?) and Donkey Kong: Barrel Blast (or something else, it looks terrible so I forgot it's name. How professional of me ^_^'). Also, Super Paper Mario which was recently released for the Wii (over here anyway >_>) started off as a Gamecube title. And it shows.

For those of you new to the Paper Mario series here is a short explanation of the games; You are Mario. You are made of Paper.
The end. Well, not really. The first two were a couple of the deepest RPGs ever to grace a Nintendo system and after the second it's hard to think how Nintendo could improve upon the series. I'm pretty sure Super Paper Mario proves that they couldn't as it's worse in almost every way.
Not to say it's a bad game, far from it, in fact it's one of the best games on the Wii as of typing this review however if you have played the original Paper Mario games and loved them you probably wont like this game as much as you could.

Well lets start actually reviewing shall we? The gameplay first. Super Paper Mario isn't a turn based RPG like the previous two games it's now a 2D/3D platformer but it still retains some of the elements that made the first two so great, such as the crazy items and timing a button push (or rather Wiimote Waggle) right after an attack to gain more points. In Paper Mario 2 - The Thousand Year Door - these button presses created either combos or stylish moves depending on when they were pressed, combos did what the name says allowing you to dish out another attack at times and stylish moves which boosted your star power which allowed you to use special moves, in this game it gives you combos and stylish moves at the same time. However now the points generated by stylish moves no longer fuel special moves but add onto your Experience Points which in turn levels you up. Leveling up is now almost entirely useless however, it may boost your attack power and your health but you'll never really be at a point where you think "Gosh, I need to make Mario stronger" although I'll admit there are times where you will attempt to level up just to gain the free full health boost that it comes packed with. Next up are the items, gawd the items. Almost every item has a gimmicky minigame which is used to determine how powerful it's effect is. This would have been a good addition if it werent for the fact that all the minigames are so goddamn easy. If you played TtYd you will know that some of the minigames required skill and split second timing to get the strongest possible use of your item/special attack in this you'll be launching devistating attacks from an item easier than actually attacking the enemy. One of the main draws of Super Paper Mario is its "unique" - The PSP game Crush did it first - ability to switch from 2D to 3D at the push of a button and it does indeed work well. When a bottomless pit which is too big to jump across blocks you path you simply need to switch to 3D and find out that you can walk across the scenery behind it or that there were some blocks that could only be seen from a 3D angle that allow you to cross over safely. It's a very nice addition to the game that adds a nice twist to what would have been just another run-of-the-mill 2D platformer.

As a Gamecube game turned Wii game SPM was never going to impress in the graphics department. It looks like TtYd only with smoother characters and areas but with the switch to full 2D that was expected. The varied enviroments are beautiful though, especially the intro to each one which shows you it being drawn in. From the colourful fields of the opening level to the artisticly beautiful but annoying castle of the new villain "Count Bleck" the game never fails to amaze, it even has a world made entirely of small squares as a throw back to the 8 bit platformers it owes it's roots to. And then you push the A button. And it all goes wrong....kinda. Pushing A activates the 3D mode and while some levels retain their beauty in 3D others just end up looking like barren wastelands. Also, the 3D camera has only one angle and so it's hard to tell what's coming up behind you when you run towards it, similar to SaTSR only less frustrating. All in all it's a very pretty game though.

As I referenced above the main villain of this game is the vile Count Bleck who has a dastardly plot to...force Peach and Bowser into marriage? That's not too bad right? I mean, Bowser clearly loves Peach and I'm sure Peach could get used to him. But no, Peach and Bowser's union into holy matremony is so terribley illogical and just plain wrong it creates the "Chaos Heart" an item so powerful that it opens a rift that threatens to destroy every world in existence. Mario sets off to destroy the Chaos Heart and stop Count Bleck with the aid of his new side-kick "Tippi" and some familiar faces. Then there's Dimentio who seems to work for Count Bleck although he(?) aids Mario and co. once or twice along their journey for his own reasons. There aren't many plot twists and overall the story is a lot simpler than the previous games but personally I think the characters are developed quite a bit better. Also, It has some of the funniest content of any game ever if you are willing to sit and read it all. There's no voice acting just lots and lots of text O.o
Oh, and where's Yoshi?

Next up is Replay Value, this game has quite a lot of it. There are many hidden items such as recipes and bonus cards that you will want to search for. Also, some of the levels are just fun to run around in.

Gameplay: 7/10   
    Pros: Great 3D puzzles, Solid 2D platforming
    Cons: Annoying Minigames for items, The game was better as an RPG, Space levels suck

Graphics: 8/10
     Pros: Unique Paper style, Varied enviroments
     Cons: 3D sometimes looks ugly.

Story: 8/10
      Pros: Great Character development, A few twists in the story, Highly Funny, Dimentio
      Cons: No Yoshi, The beginning makes little sense even if it is funny, Walls of text.

Replay value: 9/10
       Pros: Lots of collectable cards and recipes.
       Cons: No other sidequests? Where's the Job center thing from TtYd?

Overall: 8/10

It's a great game but not the best in the Paper Mario series, must have as a platformer not as a Paper Mario game.

[Protome]

Well, I'm a little late but here's my Game of The Year choices.
Protome's First Annual Game Of The Year Awards!
Okay, first a little explanation. I don't own a 360 or a PS3 therefore all of the games on those two systems have been excluded. So it's really just Wii and PC games of the year. The PC, 360 and PS3 line ups this year are so similar it doesn't really make much of a difference. Also games I haven't played obviously wont be in the list. So really it's just a list of games I like from this year >_>
I will be reviewing all these games at some point one by one, starting with Unreal Tournament 3. The review for which will be up some point next week hopefully.

Top 5
5. Crysis

Earlier this year from the creators of the cult classic Far Cry came Crysis. A first person shooter that exists mainly to show off their brand new Cry2 engine which, graphically at least, makes the Unreal Engine look like dog poop in comparison. It is THAT beautiful. If you have a rig good enough to run it. Which I don't. But the Low settings are pretty too, and the game itself is fun as well.

4. Metroid Prime 3: Corruption

Samus is an unlucky lass. She went to a chozo planet, uncovered an ancient phazon creature which she the proceeded to kill, it was then revived after she left. This "Metroid Prime" became Dark Samus, and chased Samus across the galaxy. Where Samus proceeded to kill it again. And it revived. And now Dark Samus has joined forces with the Space Pirates in order to corrupt the whole galaxy with phazon and essentially take over. The result of this plan is one of the best games to be released this year (4th best if you trust this list ^_^) and the first truely amazing first person effort on the Wii.

3. Unreal Tournament 3

Back in the olden days before multiplayer FPSs were dominated by Halo and Counter Strike they were controlled by Unreal Tournament and Quake. And so when Epic released their new Unreal Tournament game in an effort to retake the internet that is theirs by default everyone should take notice. The game itself is as fast paced and action packed as any of the older games and it also looks really pretty. Unfortunately for it the online community hasn't really kicked off yet (but it is gaining momentum) but despite that it still shows other FPSs how the genre is supposed to be handled.

2. The Orange Box

I wasn't sure whether I was going to put the Orange Box in this list, mainly because it isn't really a game. It's 3 games. However those 3 games are so amazing they would have each dominated the list and probably pushed Crysis and Metroid Prime 3 into the abyss. So here it is, the collection which includes the long-awaited Half Life 2: Episode 2, the ground-breaking Portal and the team based multiplayer game Team Fortress 2 is probably the best collection of games I've ever played. Portal is great, Episode 2 is great (although I'll admit I haven't played much of it) and Team Fortress 2 single handedly managed to 'borrow' a month of my life that I've yet to get back.

1. Super Mario Galaxy

Maybe you saw this coming, maybe you didn't? I don't blame you if you didn't since my top 5 has 4 first person shooters. That said Mario Galaxy is by far the greatest game to be released from Nintendo or indeed any publisher/developer this year. Personally I consider it the greatest game ever. But that's just me. It expands over 121 stars which can be collected twice (once with Mario and secondly with another character) so technically that adds up to 242 stars. Graphically Mario Galaxy is better than any Wii game to date and the gameplay is refined from Sunshine's clunkiness and the broken camera repaired. If you buy only one game from last year BUY MARIO GALAXY.

Reviews will be up some point soon, feel free to post your top 5 Games of the year aswell.

[Mike Caron]

Well, I'm a little late but here's my Game of The Year choices.
Protome's First Annual Game Of The Year Awards!
Okay, first a little explanation. I don't own a 360 or a PS3 therefore all of the games on those two systems have been excluded. So it's really just Wii and PC games of the year. The PC, 360 and PS3 line ups this year are so similar it doesn't really make much of a difference. Also games I haven't played obviously wont be in the list. So really it's just a list of games I like from this year >_>
I will be reviewing all these games at some point one by one, starting with Unreal Tournament 3. The review for which will be up some point next week hopefully.

Top 5
5. Crysis

Earlier this year from the creators of the cult classic Far Cry came Crysis. A first person shooter that exists mainly to show off their brand new Cry2 engine which, graphically at least, makes the Unreal Engine look like dog poop in comparison. It is THAT beautiful. If you have a rig good enough to run it. Which I don't. But the Low settings are pretty too, and the game itself is fun as well.

Don't forget the prequels, Crysanthinum and Jesus Cryst, Super Star

4. Metroid Prime 3: Corruption

Samus is an unlucky lass. She went to a chozo planet, uncovered an ancient phazon creature which she the proceeded to kill, it was then revived after she left. This "Metroid Prime" became Dark Samus, and chased Samus across the galaxy. Where Samus proceeded to kill it again. And it revived. And now Dark Samus has joined forces with the Space Pirates in order to corrupt the whole galaxy with phazon and essentially take over. The result of this plan is one of the best games to be released this year (4th best if you trust this list ^_^) and the first truely amazing first person effort on the Wii.

That's interesting, how The Metriod' revives itself each time. I mean, the first time, it sucks up all the Phazon on Tallon IV. Sure. But, WTF is with Metroid Prime 2? It explodes and is trapped in a collapsing dimension. Ah well, still a very fun game.

3. Unreal Tournament 3

Back in the olden days before multiplayer FPSs were dominated by Halo and Counter Strike they were controlled by Unreal Tournament and Quake. And so when Epic released their new Unreal Tournament game in an effort to retake the internet that is theirs by default everyone should take notice. The game itself is as fast paced and action packed as any of the older games and it also looks really pretty. Unfortunately for it the online community hasn't really kicked off yet (but it is gaining momentum) but despite that it still shows other FPSs how the genre is supposed to be handled.

Alas, I haven't played any UT games... MP series notwithstanding, I'm not much of an FPS guy.

2. The Orange Box

I wasn't sure whether I was going to put the Orange Box in this list, mainly because it isn't really a game. It's 3 games. However those 3 games are so amazing they would have each dominated the list and probably pushed Crysis and Metroid Prime 3 into the abyss. So here it is, the collection which includes the long-awaited Half Life 2: Episode 2, the ground-breaking Portal and the team based multiplayer game Team Fortress 2 is probably the best collection of games I've ever played. Portal is great, Episode 2 is great (although I'll admit I haven't played much of it) and Team Fortress 2 single handedly managed to 'borrow' a month of my life that I've yet to get back.

The cake is a lie.

1. Super Mario Galaxy

Maybe you saw this coming, maybe you didn't? I don't blame you if you didn't since my top 5 has 4 first person shooters. That said Mario Galaxy is by far the greatest game to be released from Nintendo or indeed any publisher/developer this year. Personally I consider it the greatest game ever. But that's just me. It expands over 121 stars which can be collected twice (once with Mario and secondly with another character) so technically that adds up to 242 stars. Graphically Mario Galaxy is better than any Wii game to date and the gameplay is refined from Sunshine's clunkiness and the broken camera repaired. If you buy only one game from last year BUY MARIO GALAXY.

By "broken camera repaired", you mean "broken camera repaired and explicitly designed to present Mario upside down as much a possible", right?

All in all, good choices. I couldn't come up with a better list... Actually, I don't think I've played 5 games released in 2007...