@marcopolo426 I agree that The Last of Us had a perfect story. I'd give that game a 10 as well. Where he touches his watch in the last scene -- the brilliant subtlety in the story is remarkable. Perfectly balanced.

Between The Last of Us, and Beyond: Two Souls I could easily understand a disagreement on which is best. The comical irony of it is that either way, Ellen Page takes the cake --both stories have primary characters designed in her likeness. She definitely wins big this year!

This game is a 10. One of the most poignant, moving games in memory -- likely since Shadow of the Colossus, yet you also get intense action, and very satisfying feeling of participation in the story. Many games I play, I end up focusing on trophies, or just finishing it and moving on. Many games have filler elements that either are not inspiring, or just feel like grind work. You get zero of this with Quantic Dream's approach. This is the first game in a while that I actually soaked in every minute. I wonder if Ellen Page could be nominated for acting awards for her performance here. Her acting in this game is among her best, and more interesting than many movies in recent memory. The story is remarkable as well. The climaxes are more memorable in this story and Heavy Rain than were for me in M. Night Shyamalan and Alfred Hitchcock's films. I wish more games could be like QuanticDream's games. This formula works.

I'm excited to imagine where QuanticDream could go in the future -- and I believe they are closer to the way future games will be than most design houses. Could you imagine what a stealth/espionage game like in the spirit of the Metal Gear Solid series could be done by this team? Or a truly dark story? In any case, I will be following this design team closely from now on.

@frostbite2user Agreed. I enjoyed "being" Faith as much as I did Ellie. I think both were notable female protagonists. Ellie was less sexualized than Faith, but I think Mirror's Edge did make a contribution in a similar way to the Last of Us. Both are great games. I think Naughty Dog succeeded in a sense with their goal.

At the current $20 price point, this game is a screaming deal, being worthy of twice that figure. No More Heroes 1 and 2 were my favorite games on the Wii and Lollipop Chainsaw is the closest I've come to finding that excitement again since. Unexpectedly, I've come to like Juliet Starling even more than Travis from NMH. Travis was a kind of an "anyman" where Juliet has her own unique story and personality. Many elements of the game shine, from the various minigames to racking up the star popping multi kills. Most of the stages are great to play through multiple times -- which is the intent. This game is underrated -- it should rate right up there with Shadows of the Damned.

Suda has contributed heavily to the canon of genuine pop culture in his career. While some criticize the polish of his games, he certainly nails it on creativity. Killer 7 is up there with Shadow of the Colossus for one of most artistic games in recent memory and his recent games have developed a world of diverse characters (Travis in No More Heroes, Juliet in Lollipop Chainsaw, Garcia in Shadows of the Damned, and Mondo in Killer is Dead) and new original mythos for Gen Xers and Millenials. He is in my mind a true artist.

This makes sense. I'm glad Bethesda makes effort to explain stuff like this. I can speak from experience that end of design to production can be weeks or months. Bethesda has managed to become one of the better developers in recent years. I hope they continue to innovate. If only they could reduce those horrible load times on some of their otherwise wonderful games.

@EsteemSVX @camichan @Johnny-n-Roger Agree that emulation can save us from losing great titles down the memory hole forever. I'd encourage more emulation (and it's not a matter of legal or illegal here. I'll pay for happily value like this) as a means of preservation. I saw an article on this recently about the risk of losing lots of (digital cultural) information in the future because it cannot be properly archived without violating copyright law. Lots of wrinkles that need to be worked out. It'd be a shame if in 30 years there is no way to play a game like Killer 7.

@Draxin the ps3 is the best system for expats who can't easily buy discs from "back home". The Wii and Xbox region locked discs make the systems fairly worthless for expats. PS3 at least makes it possible for me to play the games I can easily purchase in my expat country. I play asian, european discs no problem. It's an overlooked benefit of the PS3, though only expats likely notice it..

@Johnny-n-Roger Many gamers may not care, but one concern I have is the long term. In 15-20 years when I dust off a system to replay an old fave that I have in my collection and I'm dead in the water because the server that supports the game (or DRM) is no longer active isn't going to be a problem I want to worry about. Nothing guarantees the server will be around in the longer term. Eventually these companies shut down the servers to move them to titles that are new and profitable. Essentially, there is potentially a risk of your entire portfolio of games evaporating along with a company, or a server. It all depends on how they implement it, but I want to have confidence that I can enjoy these memorable titles years down the road with something stable. There may be some merits for gaming in being always on, but I imagine its likely ultimately about eliminating resale (first sale doctrine, etc).

The idea of "always on" turns me off, but I might be willing to reserve judgment on whether it offers some merits for gaming until I experience it first hand -- it's not easy to innovate and the public is generally antagonistic to new tech (Isaac Asimov spoke about this) until its value becomes clear. Unfortunate comments like Orth's however just piss me off to the point where I wouldn't even give MS a fair shake at showing me something new. But, I'll forgive MS now that he's gone (a retraction/apology would have sufficed). Caring about your customers and fans is the way to go.