Techno Freak: Have you played the top 10 games of 2008?

With the next generation of gaming hardware hitting its stride, the hits came fast and furious: Nintendo shipped its long-awaited Super Smash Bros. Brawl for Wii, Rockstar Games finally gave us Grand Theft Auto IV and Sony got its make-your-own platform game LittleBigPlanet out the door. Perhaps just as important, independent games shifted from quirky distraction to viable business model. With digital distribution taking off on all three consoles, small teams crafting small, innovative games captured more and more of our gaming dollars.

10. No More Heroes
This Wii game squeaks into 10th place largely on the strength of its well-directed and very funny story about an otaku doofus pro wrestler who gets duped into being a lightsaber assassin.

Swinging the Wiimote to chop off dudes' heads is exhilarating. Doing odd jobs to earn money in between assassination attempts is significantly less so. But it's such a hilarious and occasionally brilliant experience that No More Heroes' flaws prove forgivable.

9. Left 4 Dead
It might not have been the homage to George Romero's zombie flicks that some gamers were looking for, but Left 4 Dead's cooperative multiplayer action made for a concerted adrenaline rush.

This Xbox 360 and PC game features an AI Director that adjusts the pacing of the zombie-filled action sequences depending on how your team of four desperate survivors is faring, so as to keep the tension at perfect pitch — and make sure that no two gameplay sessions are the same.

8. Super Smash Bros. Brawl
As a game, Super Smash Bros. Brawl is a divisive experience — players either love its four-player, pummel-your-friends-to-oblivion gameplay, or they can't stand the random chaos that every match quickly devolves into.

But as a tribute to a quarter-century of Nintendo culture, this Wii game is an unqualified masterpiece. Its developer filled the disc with characters, fighting arenas, music and bonus content pulled from practically every game the company has ever produced. One example: Brawl contains a whopping 314 music tracks to smash by.

7. Persona 4
We had a lot of great times together, PlayStation 2, but you're not as much fun to be around as you used to be. You've still got one or two hits in you, though, as evidenced by Persona 4.

Japanese towns possessed by demons were never so much fun: This mammoth RPG successfully blends going to school and making friends with taming grotesque creatures to fight other grotesque creatures for you. Here's hoping the sequel lands on PS3, though.

6. Boom Blox
Legendary filmmaker Steven Spielberg teams up with Electronic Arts, and his first game is a multiplayer Wii game where you throw baseballs at towers of blocks? Amazingly, this unlikely project turned out to be a polished, addictive critical success and a big hit at parties.

Meanwhile, Spielberg's more traditional project — the cinematic, serious adventure — is now rumored to be in jeopardy after EA layoffs. Whodathunkit?

5. Grand Theft Auto IV
The first high-definition entry into the world's best-known series of violent crime games was going to sell millions of copies no matter what. But Rockstar didn't just slap a new coat of paint on Grand Theft Auto: It overhauled almost every aspect of the gameplay, making it much more palatable.

Finally, the gameplay missions were as polished as the story line — which itself was even better this time around. Most gamers still probably just ignored the story and went on hours-long killing sprees, but there's no accounting for taste.

4. Fallout 3
Think of Fallout 3 as a dry run. The bombs are going to drop eventually, and when they do, as you emerge from your shelter into a radioactive nightmare world populated by wild packs of giant, roving cockroaches, you'll be thankful that you spent 40 hours practicing.

Will you keep your moral compass and be humanity's savior, or will you just start taking everything that isn't nailed down? This Xbox, PS3 and PC game lets you rehearse for your post-apocalyptic life.

3. Professor Layton and the Curious Village
When you solve one of Professor Layton's many logic puzzles, you're sometimes rewarded with a congratulatory line from the top-hatted teacher in his smooth English-gentleman lilt. And sometimes, feral child Luke shrieks at you.

The uneven voice work is the only sore spot in this collection of lateral-thinking puzzles organized around a charming, animated story line. Don't let the cartoony look fool you: Layton's brain teasers will have you stumped for hours. This is the Nintendo DS game that should be in everyone's library.

2. Braid
We've had a lot of fun this year with inexpensive downloadable games like Audiosurf and World of Goo. But this Xbox 360 title is the best example of why the independent games movement is important. Braid isn't just a quirky puzzle game: It's a subtle, emotional story that hits with real impact.

This is only possible because its creator, Jonathan Blow, was able to control every aspect of the game's production. Had Braid been cooked up at a big publisher, it surely would not have possessed such a strong authorial voice — something that videogames need much more of.

1. LittleBigPlanet
User-generated content — levels, characters and the like produced by gamers — were perhaps 2008's biggest buzzword, but no game pulled it off as well as LittleBigPlanet. Thanks to the title's charming design and intuitive interface, PlayStation 3 owners are bending over backward to produce new action-game levels to be enjoyed by the rest of the world.