A note about the cloud:

Cloud synchronization is a key theme for many great mobile apps, because, with a persistent internet connection, the iPhone is a revolutionary tool to connect your life when you’re out and about with your life on your computer. This is vitally important to mobile computing because no one wants to enter much information on a little device, but we want that information quickly accessible when we’re out and about. Synching with the could is already working magic for the first 3 apps above (they wouldn’t be on any top list without this feature), and you’ll be seeing it all over the place over the next year (for example, iWork.com).

• Braid and Mirror’s Edge share an award for reinventing platforming, a genre I normally dislike, in new and supremely creative ways. Braid is probably the most creative video game I’ve ever played while Mirror’s Edge has some of the slickest design aesthetics.
• Far Cry 2 and Burnout Paradise share another award for bringing great open-world gameplay to their respective genres (shooter and driving respectively). Both succeed because they make learning the environment (be it shortcuts through city streets or sniper hills over mercenary camps) just as important as raw driving or shooting ability.
• Left 4 Dead, Resistance 2, and PixelJunk Monsters all get awards for perfecting co-op gameplay. The best parts of these games are impossible to win without good team-work, but that requirement feels more like an opportunity than a burden.
• The Witcher Enhanced Edition and Mass Effect for PC prove that even great games can be better with some polish. Both games suffered from dramatically long load times in their original forms but that is no longer much of an issue in the improved versions. The Witcher also received the kind of polish that it always deserved in its Enhanced Edition which smoothed out the uneven dialog and cumbersome inventory management. Mass Effect also got some inventory improvements in the PC version along with better squad control. There are two take-away lessons here: it’s hard to do an RPG right but extra work can make a big difference. I hope that publishers looking to rush RPGs out the door in the future take note of this; some great RPG games have died unnecessary deaths because of hurried ship dates (See Vampire: Bloodlines or Knights of the Old Republic II).
• Sins of a Solar Empire get big kudos for transplanting the one-more-turn ad-infinitum addictiveness of games like Civilization into a RTS game that’s nearly impossible to stop playing. It’s so good, in fact, that after two marathon games when it first came out I’ve been loathe to pick it up again because I worry it will consume me.

1. Feist – The Reminder: Overplayed and too popular now (so I might have to hate it henceforth), but this doesn’t change the fact that it’s an amazing album of indie rock at the core. Not having any track less than good on the album helps too.
2. LCD Soundsystem – Sound of Silver: Electronic music taken to whole new places with touching and insightful lyrics.
3. Earlimart – Mentor Tormentor: A masterpiece of the introspective with layers of strings upon haunting vocals upon wonderfully tuned distortion.
4. Ra Ra Riot – EP: A band that you’ve never heard of (unless I’ve already shilled them to you) perfected the art of rocking out to the cello & violin.
5. Cinematic Orchestra – Ma Fleur: Listening to this album is like watching your favorite a bittersweet film; if you close your eyes you can see it play out right in front of you.

1. ‘Shadow’ – Beady Belle
2. ‘Fast Car’ – Tracy Chapman
3. ‘A Dream for Us’ – The Appleseed Cast
4. ‘To Build a Home’ – The Cinematic Orchestra
5. ‘Together We Will Live Forever’ – Clint Mansell, Kronos Quartet, & Mogwai

Extra Special Sixth Bonus Track: Overplaying has desensitized me to it, but ‘Freshman’ by The Verve Pipe deserves to be on this list too.

1. Ambulance LTD – Yoga Means Union
2. Spoon – The Beast & Dragon, Adored
3. Creper Lagoon – So Little to Give
4. The Decemberists – Sons & Daughters
5. Philip Glass – Metamorphosis 1

1. The Crane Wife by The Decemberists (?iTunes)
2. Broken Boy Soldiers by The Raconteurs (?iTunes)
3. The Fountain Soundtrack composed by Clint Mansell and performed by Kronos Quartet & Mogwai (?iTunes)
4. The Eraser by Thom Yorke (?iTunes)
5. Without Feathers by The Stills (?iTunes)

Honorable Mentions (in alphabetical order by artist):

• This Binary Universe by BT (?iTunes)
• Supernature by Goldfrapp (?iTunes) [Kept out of the top 5 only because of label BS since the UK version was released in 2005.]
• Mind How You Go by Skye (?iTunes)
• The Last Resort by Trentemøller (?iTunes)
• The Garden by Zero 7 (?iTunes)