The fourth entry in Sid Meier's globe-and-history-spanning empire-building simulation game, Civilization IV is the latest refinement of the Civilization formula. Rather than introducing a lot of new features, Civilization IV tends to stick with the tried-and-true aspects of the series.

A sim game set on an alien space station, StarTopia also has a great Douglas-Adams style sense of humor.

The sequel to the tourist resort management sim, "Tropico 2" takes the concept of running a tropical island and then goes back a few hundred years to when said islands were under the control of brutal, ruthless pirates.

An intriguing psychic-based game by Free Radical, Second Sight is difficult to categorize; it's a third-person stealth action adventure game. It's got a lot of interesting design elements and choices and has a pretty good mix of action and stealth.

An adaptation of the comic of the same name, "Rogue Trooper" takes the futuristic setting and characters of the comic world and transfers them into a playable form.

The third game in the Thief series, "Deadly Shadows" has done a good job of keeping the traditions and gameplay style that made the earlier games so great.

A revival of the old LucasArts adventure game "Sam and Max Hit the Road", the new "Sam and Max" games are new, shorter adventures released periodically on the GameTap downloading service.

One of the best RPGs of all time was Planescape Torment, created by Chris Avellone. Learn more about what it's like to work in the gaming industry and to have been a part of this incredibly popular and well-rated project. Questions by James Shea.

One of the best RPGs of all time was Planescape Torment, created by Chris Avellone. Learn more about what it's like to work in the gaming industry and to have been a part of this incredibly popular and well-rated project. Questions by Lisa Shea.

Kohan II is a Real Time Strategy with a wide selection of units and races and some fairly interesting gameplay mechanics. Though in many ways it seems a mishmash of other RTS games, it has a couple twists to it that make it more of its own game