Aaron Sampson, Video Producer Follow

I'm not going to lie: as a producer here at GameSpot, I see tons of games every year, but rarely have a chance to play them to completion. With that in mind, here are my top five picks of 2012.

5. Dance Central 3

Dance Central still has the smoothest Kinect integration of any game I've seen and has made that piece of hardware more than just a TV ornament in my household. Dance Central 3 is a game that gets gamers and non-gamers alike up and moving, and moving, and moving. Really, you can't cheat this game and you're better for it. My greatest criticism of Dance Central 2 was that it didn't bring enough unlockables to the table, but DC3 remedies that and at the same time introduces some lighthearted party-friendly modes.

This game also has some very interesting difficulty level differences. On the harder modes, not only are the routines harder, but the dancers' attitudes get ratcheted up several notches, making you feel more accomplished once you've sweated your way through a routine many times in order to get those coveted five stars. DC3 is a winner with my family this year.

4. Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon Online

No, seriously: the online combat in this free-to-play game was superior to Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon: Future Soldier. It also has one of my favorite movement and cover systems of the year. You can chain both a slide and a dive to get into cover. While in cover you can be prone, crouched, or standing, which means you can take effective refuge behind just about any object, from curbs to pillars. This cover mechanic also gives chest-high walls new depth, as you never know quite where to aim when clearing them. Ghost Recon Online also doesn't go for the regular old class abilities, and the abilities it offers do everything to encourage players away from a simple run-and-gun style, without actually forcing them away from it.

The powers selected for classes in this game encourage some insanely fun team play. For example, a specialist can charge over a capture point after turning on a bullet intercepting system, while an assaulter shield-charges anyone in front of him, while a sniper reveals all enemy positions, and voila, a zone capture succeeds. Speaking of maps, GR Online has one of my favorite takes on conquest mode this year, involving two teams fighting for a center point and then taking the battle past the opposing force two more zones. The unique part of this mode is that the maps can go in two completely opposite directions, giving the levels tons of replayability.

3. Halo 4

343 Industries took Master Chief from a man with no emotion to a man who couldn't express his emotions, and it made all the difference. Throw in Cortana grappling with her own mortality, a doctor devastated by the loss of her life's work, and superb camerawork and animation, and you've got a game that delivered deep emotion in very small spans of time. The type of writing in Halo 4 is the hardest type of writing, the less-is-more variety. Throw in some of the smoothest gamepad controls in the industry, the classic arena style combat, the need for ammo management, and a ton of enemy variety, and you've got a near-perfect package. I'm not afraid to admit that I was not a true Halo fan before. Halo 4 changed that.

2. Mass Effect 3

Mass Effect 3 is a game about many individual endings, and it saw the passing of characters whose deaths made me feel actual grief. The really fantastic thing about this game, however, is that when I would talk to my coworkers about it, many of them would look back with a blank stare and reply, "That guy didn't die, what are you talking about?" Like Star Wars with its special effects and The Matrix with bullet time, Mass Effect 3 did what few things do: it gave me an experience I had never had before.

That experience was crafted in the old choose-your-own-adventure style. It's not that it hasn't been done before; it's just never been done this well. In the end, the game even gave me what I would consider a perfect ending when I went the control route. Mass Effect 3 also made me think about film differently--I now feel that film is obsolete for telling certain stories, because they can't give you the personal experience this game did. I am looking forward to many more years with this franchise and can't wait to see what Bioware comes up with.

1. Borderlands 2

This game is unabashed gun porn and it works perfectly. I swore off MMOs years ago but this game managed to sneak in all the old staples of that genre (including the dreaded fetch quest) and made me love them. At the heart of Borderlands 2 is a Diablo-style random loot system involving guns, shields, and special mods. 99% of loot dropped is normal, but the idea that a powerful enemy could drop a rare or legendary gun really drives players to explore this gorgeous cel-shaded world. The funny thing is that you are aware of the gimmick, but it gets you anyway.

The weapon systems of Borderlands 2 are unique and rooted in the concept of several different gun manufacturers, all of whom offer up firearms that vary in more ways than just fire rate and accuracy. The world of Pandora has also undergone a major upgrade since the previous game; it now has a much higher density and variety of enemies and NPCs, resulting in a landscape that's chock full of tactical decision-making and incredible personality. Having completed my first playthrough with Maya, Borderlands 2 has me feeling like I've only seen a small percentage of what it has to offer.