Genre: Flight Sim
Publisher: 505 Games
Developer: Gaijin Entertainment
Release: Q3 2009

When I arrived at 505 Games' meeting room today, they were ready with a couch, bottles of water in an ice bucket, and just one game: the Xbox 360 build of its upcoming flight combat simulation, IL-2 Sturmovik: Birds of Prey, coming to every major system except the Wii.

World War II is an exceptionally common ground for video games, and with so many fronts, there's bound to be one that hasn't been explored — like the one right above the heads of almost all of the

Genre: Action/Adventure
Publisher: EA
Developer: Double Fine
Release Date: "Rocktober" 13, 2009

Psychonauts is the very definition of a cult hit. It was released for the Xbox to solid reviews and poor sales, but word of mouth turned it into a real hit. All you have to do is mention it to people who've played it, and their faces will light up as they recall one of their favorite moments. The brilliant minds behind Psychonauts may not have released any new games since then, but they most certainly haven't been idle. Instead, they've been working on what

Genre: Action/RPG
Publisher: Electronic Arts
Developer: Bioware
Release Date: 2010

Mass Effect 2 opens up after the events of the first Mass Effect, with Commander Shepard in a pretty bad situation. A new enemy has appeared in the galaxy and is presenting a threat to humankind on par with the Reaper that Shepard defeated in the first game. Things have gotten so bad that Shepard was thought to have died in combat. Fortunately, he was rescued and recruited by a shadowy underground group who is looking for his help on a suicide mission. Shepard is the only human capable

Genre: Fighting
Publisher: SNK Playmore
Developer: SNK Playmore
Release: July 2009

The King of Fighters is a long, long running series. This fighting game series has been running at the speed of Madden for a major length of time, until it stopped annual releases in 2003 and went to subseries like Neowave and Maximum Impact. Now we're back to the original series, with the Roman numerals translating to 12, with a nice set of HD updates that bring the series into the current generation.

The standards of The King of Fighters are in effect: Take many SNK

Heavy Rain is a dark, immersive and emotionally-engaging experience; one that expands upon the innovative ideas of 2005’s acclaimed Fahrenheit to create a noir-thriller where decisions are charged with importance and actions can have drastic and unforseen consequences. Breaking with traditional game conventions where

You are a fugitive and you’re being ruthlessly hunted by the very government you once served. The key to your survival is to improvise, adapt and overcome.

Experience original game play based on improvisation where your environment becomes your weapon. You need to react to changing situations and use the environment and the crowds around you to create diversions and deter your enemies.

Genre: Rhythm
Publisher: Electronic Arts/MTV
Developer: Harmonix
Release Date: Holiday 2007

We've seen the future of awesome, and its name is Rock Band.

Harmonix had set up shop in a small room to the far left of the converted cafeteria at Electronic Arts' Los Angeles compound, isolated from the noise and spectacle of the dozens of other titles on display. How did we know where to find our first look at the multi-instrumental explosion of collaborative rhythm? There was a line outside the door — stretched 12 or more people deep at times.

It was like going to