PLAY – Gears of War (XBox 360)

Gears of War (XBox 360) [Microsoft – $59.99]

To endorse one of the next-gen systems this holiday season would be damn near pointless — so much has been written about the Wii, Playstation 3, and even the XBox 360 that it’s nigh impossible at this point to write anything that hasn’t yet been said. Tech-junkies want the PS3, casual and family gamers want a Wii, and then, there’s a quiet faction of gamers sitting back and smiling while people fight over the two flavors of the month, content in their belief that the XBox 360 will outshine the other two in good time. The first sign of such dominance? None other than Gears of War, the end result of what can happen when a system is given a year-long head start over its primary competitors. Gears of War simply feels like everything a next-generation title should, from the intricacy of the graphics to the brilliantly-designed cooperative play mode to the elements of horror that permeate every single byte, it feels like more than just a game. Quite simply, it’s exactly what “next-gen” should be. [Amazon]