2009 was a blast.

I would start off by saying that 2009 was “the year of the sequel,” but we all know that every year has its fair share of follow-ups, so taking the easy way out won’t work for me this time. We did get our first good Batman game, however, and the Ghostbusters made their triumphant return to game screens this year, much to the delight of 1980s children everywhere. And even though both are items that can’t be counted as new intellectual property, each was handled well enough by their respective developers to make us forget any prior interpretations of those games ever existed. That’s success, as far as I’m concerned.

Yet reading this might lure you into a false assumption that I was going to pick one of those two as my 2009 Game of the Year, and that’s to be expected. I mean, I should probably pick Batman: Arkham Asylum because it hits all the right notes and gives players the best Dark Knight experience of all time. Or maybe Ghostbusters, which touched my nostalgia nerve in a way only my 5-year-old self remembers. But no, despite all of Arkham’s appeals and Bill Murray’s quips, my pick is firmly planted in sequel-land. I’m not talking about Modern Warfare 2 or Left 4 Dead 2 as one would expect, either. I’m talking about a far smaller blip on 2009’s radar, the game I had the most fun playing all year.

My game of 2009 is Red Faction: Guerrilla.

Yes, I said it, but before you hit me with an ostrich sledgehammer, allow me a moment of explanation.

I love sandbox games, and rarely do I find one that meets my technological criteria like RF: Guerrilla did. I was never concerned with what the main character was striving for, and I don’t remember anything about the final boss battle; it was so understated that I killed the boss and made my way to the next large structure with explosive charges in hand like nothing happened. I spent hours beyond a responsible bedtime figuring out the best way to topple a tower, and had moments with my son when we both clapped our hands over our mouths as some gigantic structure buckled and weaved before crashing to the ground. There simply hasn’t been any other experience this year that compares to driving the equivalent of a Martian garbage truck off a high peak to bring it crashing down violently on an enemy stronghold – nothing at all. Put a jetpack on that and you’ve got a happy gamer in me. In fact, I’m pretty sure that every aspect of Guerrilla was placed specifically to appeal to my basal male traits. Success, Volition! I now want to hunt a deer with my bare hands and drink a waterfall of beer.

Yes, I’m savvy enough to realize that Guerrilla‘s not a super blast-o-rama perfect-in-every-way experience as GOTY criteria suggest. The story is paper thin, the voice acting barely hits for bogey and the Martian landscape is appropriately (and disappointingly) barren in most cases. Yet the moments I had in that game rivaled some of the asinine hijinks I pulled off in Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, a game that stayed in my PS2 from day one until its untimely death.

So just be clear: I know choosing Red Faction: Guerrilla is going to get me some raspberries. But remember that it’s not always about a completely perfect experience for me. Sometimes it’s about just having fun playing a game.