Lost Planet: Extreme Condition

Think of Lost Planet as the ice planet Hoth section of The Empire Strikes Back stretched into an entire game. Oh, but instead of staying warm inside of a freshly slaughtered wampa beast, you'll climb into a mech VS (Virtual Suit). Don't worry, though, there'll be plenty of slaughtering as you blow away all the creepy, crawly bug-like aliens. Of course, that's precisely where this snow-swept third-person shooter gets a little ethically iffy. Having overly polluted their own planet, humans have set off into space to find a new one with fresh resources to exploit. Lo and behold, they come across EDN III, a frozen wasteland that happens to be already inhabited. Sure, the Akrid are just giant bugs but c'mon, they were there first. Making it even sketchier is the smallpox blanket-like plan to terraform the planet and kill them off, paired with discovery that their bodies contain valuable thermal energy. In essence, you're drilling for oil in the hearts of living creatures. But it is that very energy that makes the game so much fun. It's kill or be frozen as your ever-decreasing body temp can only be replenished by consuming the remains of the dead Akrids, an innovation that adds momentum to the single-player campaign and prevents hiding out too long in multiplayer mode. As high-def blizzards buffet you about and the conspiracy-laden plot careens through a confusing story of colonization, snow pirates, evil corporations and a dead daddy, it becomes clear that Lost Planet is not quite on par with Gears. But it is still a pretty great way to while away the winter – so long as you don't mind a little interspecies genocide.