As we throw away our Christmas trees and make our New Year’s resolutions, looking back, Xbox 360 really came into its own, Playstation 3 and Wii started to get their motors running, Playstation 2 finally started to fade away, and DS and PSP continued to be good reasons to stop playing your Gameboy Advance. So here we have it, Saving Progress’ cross-platform, cross-genre list of the best video games released in 2007. We’ve chosen to forgo the overall list that most publications offer in favor of our staff’s individual picks, as it would be impossible for everyone to have played everything and we’re small enough that a vote wouldn’t be fair. More casual, personal impressions than our reviews, each list is the games we consider to be the exceptional ones we played from the year. Order is not defined, just the very best and the rest.

Crackdown - For the Rocker Launcher toting Mario in all of us.

Catan - Longest Road even if those dice rolls were fuckin’ rigged.

Halo 3 - It had the most pressure, and delivered. Single player was surprisingly solid this time around.

BioShock - “A man chooses, a slave obeys” (would you kindly play this game).

God of War II - Without a doubt, the game with the most “Holy shit, that was badass” moments I’ve ever played.

Rock Band - I’m the one who likes its pretty songs and likes to sing along.

Portal - No jokes, probably the best puzzle game of all time.

Okay, so it may not do anything new. And perhaps it is a little too derivative of Knights of the Old Republic. Oh, and the frame rate is pretty much consistently bad. But goddamn is it satisfying. Combine Gears of War and Oblivion, take out all of their shitty parts, and add even more depth, and you’ll have Mass Effect. Not to mention that it’s the first RPG where I’ve actually felt strongly connected to my character; where I had to think strongly before I wanted to select that bottom dialog option. It might be KotOR without lightsabers, but fuck that sentiment. Fuck the inventory system, fuck the frame rate, fuck innovation, and fuck alien hermaphrodites. This is the best game I’ve played this year, and the best single player-only game I’ve played since Super Mario 64.

Warhawk - Like the Pizza Hut 300 meters from my house, always there in emergencies!

Portal - Huge success.

skate. - The only game where falling 50 feet off of a parking garage onto a car going 45 can be considered ‘Clip worthy.’

BioShock - Wait… was that mannequin there before? Oh my… ARGHGHGHG!

Picture the scene: It’s 4:30am on a Monday morning. I have work in less than 4 hours. Any sane person would be fast asleep. But I’m there, sitting on my couch with 3 empty mugs of Nescafe Gold Blend, a half eaten Toblerone, and a case of sherbet dib-dabs watching the end credits to Mass Effect minutes after finishing the game. I’m sitting there, utterly stunned. Like watching a fantastic movie, or wrapping up a thrilling book, there is a period of time where you just keep running through events at light speed in your brain. Mass Effect had this effect. Did it all just happen? A roller coaster of an ending to an extremely well-polished and constructed game that is an evolution of the design BioWare started with KOTOR, it was thrilling. Stunning. Perfection.

Mass Effect is my game of the year, because no other game has caused me to miss work in that way - not for years. For the next few days, I was a zombie; disheveled, unshaven and ragged, darkened eyelids and a gaunt expression. Looking at me, any normal person would have assumed family tragedy or terminal illness. Any gamer would know instantly my face was that of someone playing their game of the year.

God of War II - Bigger setpieces, more intense violence, full frontal nudity: sweet, sweet catharsis.

Rock Band - A natural extension of their Guitar Hero games, Harmonix (and EA) have crafted the finest party game of all time with more than enough content to keep both the lonely and the popular busy.

Mass Effect - More Star Trek than Star Wars, here is proof that BioWare doesn’t need years of pre-written back story to make an excellent RPG. They just write their own.

S.T.A.L.K.E.R. - Easily the most immersive game of the year, only performance issues keep S.T.A.L.K.E.R. from being the best shooter I have ever played. Instead, it is just the best shooter I played this year.

It pains me deeply to not give S.T.A.L.K.E.R. the top spot, and maybe I would have if my computer had been up to the task (I think it may have actually killed my machine). In the end, BioShock was better than both S.T.A.L.K.E.R. and everything else this year. It was polished and consistent looking from beginning to end. The role-playing elements and varied environments reward creativity in combat. Each encounter is different, every time, and there is always a different way to have done it.

Much has been said about the game’s difficulty and lack of death penalty. I myself got lazy on occasion, getting killed just to catch my breath and rethink things, but it was never a negative, and I understand why. If I had created a story about a world as tragic and beautiful as BioShock I would want everyone to see every bit of it, regardless of their eye-hand coordination. Every moment is worth experiencing, which is more than I can say about any other game this year.

Hotel Dusk: Room 215 - For being the only game with better writing than Mass Effect.

BioShock - Because the plot twist is the moment of the year.

Rock Band - One of the best ways to piss a night away with friends, period.

Pac-Man Championship Edition - Utterly entrancing if you have the right tunes pumping.

Halo 3 - Went all Pat Metheny on my heartstrings.

Portal - For “Still Alive” …and everything before it.

I’ve always been playing video games, from my feeble attempts at playing NES and SNES games as a small child, to making not-so-informed decisions about which N64 and Xbox games to buy as a pre-teen and young teenager, to being the more aware, serious gamer I am now. One feeling I hadn’t felt since I was about 10 though, when I first played through The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, was losing myself in a video game’s world. I hadn’t even thought about it since I’ve gotten older, but Super Mario Galaxy did it for me. Based on the early press about the game, I did go in with high expectations, but once I actually played it, all of them were exceeded. I got caught up in a whirlwind of awe, exploring all that the game had to offer, that I couldn’t escape from, even as I played Assassin’s Creed, Rock Band and Mass Effect in the following weeks.

It’s astonishing how much love and genius went into making Super Mario Galaxy. The ideas-to-levels ratio here is far beyond what any other developers tried to do this year, or any other year in recent memory. Simple gameplay mechanics that would be the gimmicks for entirely other games come and go as if they’re what developer Nintendo EAD Tokyo throw away after lunch. It’s an instant classic, and the first game to be released in years I feel comfortable saying is one of my all-time favorites.

Hotel Dusk: Room 215 - Next to no gameplay, but the story follows like a fantastically written book.

Rock Band - Such refulgent multiplayer that you’ll swear this nectareous game is dripping from your tongue.

Metroid Prime 3: Corruption - Controls that actually live up to the Wii’s potential and fill me with joy for what’s to come in the future. However, the game didn’t seem to have very much soul.

Call of Duty 4: Modern Combat - The ‘challenges’ within CoD4 are so numerous that there is no way you wouldn’t have mastered the FPS genre after completing them all, and the multiplayer is so enslaving that completing all of the challenges will be a mere byproduct.

It’s a magical adventure that will impregnate you with a bucket-full of joy. The controls are quick, simple, and a fantastic marvel of coding goodness. I’m not sure what goes on behind the sensational art design and I don’t think I want to, but it seems that every single person working on this game knew what they were doing. Not only this, but it all fits together like a puzzle of Mona Lisa or some equally revered work of art. It ensnares so much of the past, and yet, feels so foreign and unfamiliar. I almost feel as if I’m Jodi Foster in Contact–I know how beautiful this game is, but I’m left speechless, only to suggest that a poet should be the one describing it instead. Really, though, just go buy it.

Mass Effect - BioWare makes a sci-fi action RPG set in a galaxy not very far away, not too long from now, and leaves everyone else’s writing in the dust. Star Wars be damned.

Rock Band - As a matter of fact, no, I’m never getting tired of it. Now get on drums or get out of my room; it’s time to rock.

BioShock - Despite being a pretty Xbox 360 version of System Shock 2, this game deserves kudos for simultaneously making me want to hug little girls and shoot crazy people in the face with a crossbow. Immersion up the ass, and Sander fucking Cohen.

Halo 3 - Suddenly, everything peaked. I’ve got bad news for Bungie, but good news for anyone who buys this game: it’s all downhill from here, baby.

Call of Duty 4: Modern Combat - Call of Duty 2 set in present day, with every mission’s goal being some variant of “be the biggest hardass in the history of mankind.”

I don’t understand a damn thing about this game. You tap away at the touch screen as the quirky pop music comes out of your DS( Lite)’s tiny little speakers (or, preferably, headphones). It’s all in Japanese (which I do not understand in the slightest), and your tapping in the beat controls a squad of male cheerleaders who, when doing well, are surrounded by walls of fire. These guys cheer on the most random citizens in a bizarre assortment of tasks: help a toy monkey return home from the garbage truck, help a little boy keep from wetting the bed, help a werewolf get through a date without revealing his monstrous form, etc. It’s weird, it’s foreign, and it’s so fun, it hasn’t left my DS in a long, long time. When I don’t feel like playing anything else, I play Ouendan.

Crackdown - An incredible visual style, coupled with an extremely open-ended game mechanic in a huge city makes this a game for everyone’s collection.

Call of Duty 4: Modern Combat - The only game to ever make me want to play online, thanks to the RPG-style unlockables. Story is more than kickass, too.

Mass Effect - BioWare back doing what they do best; making incredible virtual worlds for you to enjoy. Wait, what’s that? It’s an entire Universe!?

BioShock - “Welcome to Rapture,” the greeting you receive upon entering the underwater city, couldn’t be closer to the truth.

Halo 3 - A great game; it looks good, sounds good, and plays fantastic. But it got a spot for having my most memorable line of any video game ever: “You are, all of you, vermin.” *shudder*

You think BioShock had atmosphere? You thought Condemned was scary? You figured the Call of Duty 4 campaign was intense? You’ve experienced nothing till you’ve tried this free-roaming shooter. Created by GSC Game World, this FPS draws you in so much you’ll spend hours wandering the desolate wastelands of Chernobyl. It might not look the best, and it might not have the best sound effects ever, but this game has provided the best gaming moments for me this year. Now if only my computer would play nice and run it properly.