I can't play FFXII because my sister is playing DDR (hate!). So here's my opinionated take on the best 10 games of 2006!

Number 10
Super Swing Golf (and wii sports)

...shut up...it's good. I put them together because super swing is basically wii golf with more courses and chibi characters.

Number 9
Metal Slug Anthology

This is here because Bart brought it over and it kicked ass. (not due to Jay''s whining.) I don't think I need to explain why this rocks so hard, it's basically Metal Slug without the spending 80 bucks to beat one mission.

Number 8
Tales of the Abyss

Another title that probably should have been higher on the list, Tales of the Abyss offers players a return to the Tales of Symphonia's battle system, now featuring nonlateral movement! Tales of the Abyss offers incredible character design along with great story and fantastic music. The voicework and anime cutscenes do alot for this amazing piece of work. Tales falls behind in a couple of cattegories, the big one being that the story moves sluggishly at times and almost too fast at others. The only other thing I have to complain about is FOF (fields of fonons) mostly because nobody knows how they work and also because they were a waste of time.

Number 7
Hitman: Blood Money

This gruesome work was really "up-and-down" so to speak. All in all Blood Money is a real winner, from the excellent level design customizable weapons and gadgets and a holding system make this third person stealth game a near masterpiece. However it's not all good. Some of the new additions to the game made it far to easy. AP mines made brilliant hits into one-pice-puzzles and hand to hand eliminated the true purpose of both anesthetic and disguise. Even on Expert and Proffessional mode hits can be easily made using a pair of full auto ballers and your bare hands, undetectible high yield bombs are the cherry on top of the easiness pie. With the odds stacked so high in your favour something is missing, this game ends up feeling highly incomplete.

Number 6
Guitar Hero II

This is closer to where it belongs. Guitar Hero II is really like DDR only for your hands. The jams are sickeningly good and the there are enough excellent bonus features that this game is thuoughly satisfying even long after you've conquered the one player game on Very Hard. So where does Guitar Hero fall through? Nowhere really, other then the fact that it'll kill your hands.

Number 5
Godhand

There's only really one word to describe Godhand: Unique. There aren't alot of games that offer such a wide variety of customization and really interesting gameplay. This one's brought to you by all the gamemasters behind RE4 and Killer7, with Shinji Mikami heading the assault on your soul and senses. "What's godhand play like?" you may ask. Well imagine RE4, only replace Los Ganados with Punkass Demons and swap guns with a wide array of martial arts moves and you've got Godhand. You don't even need to swap out Leon because Devilhand is him with sunglaces. This game offers satisfaction supreme with special movie that will literally kick you in the nards and uppercut you into the stratosphere. You can mannage to milk about 50 hours out of this one with all the bonuses included. It's in five simply because parts of this one are either too hard or two wierd. But if your out for some laughs and asswhoopins spare no substitute.

Number 3 (tie)
Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess

Let me say this before continuing. Zelda fanboys and fangirls stop put down your torches and hear me out. I loved twilight princess, it wouldn't be here if I didn't but I must draw the line somewhere and twilight princess had one foot over it. Basically we all know what's good about this game it can be summed up in 5 letters. Z-E-L-D-A. But what's bad can be summerized into three points. 1. Warping, this basically made epona obsolete and really took away from the whole epic quest factor, in the end it made thew world seem a hell of a lot smaller then Ocarina or even the mansion in RE. 2. The human segments of this game feel recycled, like someone put some makeup on Ocarina of Time, made you wait eight years then gave it back to you. 3. The wolf parts of the game suck. Like ALOT. Esspecially when there are games like Okami which offer you the same thing only more interesting, and a hell of a lot more fun. All things said and done it's better then Majora's Mask but worse then Windwaker.

Number 3 (tie)
Metal Gear Solid Portable Ops

There's something to be said about a portable game of this quality. No strings attached, no catch, no problems. This game dominates. It's MGS gold, with uncanny visuals awsome cutscenes and a just a pinch of madness. A story so good it'll break your mind, gameplay that go hand in hand with amazing voicework and uncanny sound. Never in my life have I played such an outsanding portable game. If you have a PSP then stop wasting your time and buy this game. Problems...ummm...well I guess you could say that unlocking soldiers takes a lot of time...but is that even really a minus?

Number 2
Okami

Like calligraphy, japanese art of any style, mythos, amazing music and an endlessly epic quest? Okami is your game. If you're looking for Grand Theft Halo look somewhere else. If you're looking for gaming gold. Look no further. Okami really goes above and beyond the standards set by most games and offers Zelda-like gameplay then definately check this title. Cons? None, not that I can think of at any rate, other then the fact that the calligraphy for "wind" and lillypad can be confused for frustrating results.

Number 1
Final Fantasy XII

Hey Jay, it's your turn to put down the flaming torch. When FFXII came out I had one concern, I couldn't tell if the main character was a man or not. Later, down the road to FFXII I noticed that your team is the master race embodied. But when everything was said and done, this game rocked my world. To describe it as the Magnum Opus of 2006 would not be a pretentious call to make. It's that good! Really it's hard to explain why though, you just have to play it to understand. Downsides: 1, you have to play as Vaan in cities and villiages. if you've got a PS2 and a longing for something to fill your free time with. Here's your answer. Did I mention that the sound, music and voicework were outstanding?

And that's my look at it. again.

HONORABLE MENTIONS
these are games I never played but everybody loved:

-Rayman: Ravin' Rabbids
-Gears of War
-Disgae 2
-Xenosaga 3
-Tekken 5: Dark Ressurection