Best Games of the Half-Year

Rich Greenhill, Editor-in-Chief

They Keep on Rising!

2005 saw a very early contender for Game of the Year in the GameCube's Resident Evil 4, which arrived in the second week of January. Does 2006 have a similar story? Well, no, January was very quiet this time around. But it's been a solid start to the year nonetheless -- my esteemed colleagues list out a bunch of top games below, but I have two standouts. Both games received mixed reviews among professional critics, so make of that what you will; I consider them both stunners as multiplayer experiences (albeit less thrilling solo affairs), and that can be very hit or miss among reviewers.

THQ's The Outfit is a WWII action game unlike any other WWII action game; don't hold the mundane theme against it. If straightforward deathmatch bores you to tears, this is the Xbox 360 tactical shooter you need to check out. (There's a free demo on XB Live Marketplace.)

Meanwhile, eking out the spot for my best pick so far is the awkwardly named Rise of Nations: Rise of Legends -- it takes all the innovative mechanics of its predecessors, refines them, and then adds fascinating fantastical races and beautiful art design. This is the best RTS I've played for a long time and the first one that has thought of damn near everything when it comes to an interface that works for the player and not against them. A post-release patch has also solved the early matchmaking woes, so there's no better time to get online and see what a battlefield of clockwork spiders, sun idols, and glass dragons looks like. -RG

Read the Rise of Legends review See more screens from The Elder Scrolls: Oblivion

Mike Smith, Big Kahuna

Lost in Oblivion

Although 2006 has seen a fair to moderate number of decent games, I'm still trying to put Oblivion down, and failing. Badly. So far, this year has nothing that touches it -- while it's certainly not without its flaws, it's so monstrously huge, deep, and absorbing that it's capable of swallowing all the free time I can throw at it, and then some. The highlight for me has been the Dark Brotherhood guild, which displays some of the most imaginatively designed and best written quests I've ever seen.

Still, in between Oblivion sessions I've somehow managed to check out some of the year's biggest highlights. And while I couldn't say I put any great amount of time into it -- it's only four or five hours long -- Half-Life 2: Episode One deserves to make an appearance on any best-of-2006 lists, thanks to its awesome "single-player coop" approach that Valve implemented so beautifully.

Titan Quest deserves a mention too, although I wish it had a more robust online mode. Still, you can't have everything, and with great games like Prey and Battle for Middle Earth II 360 just around the corner, it's good to have an excuse to move on. -MS

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