A few weeks back, the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) showered gamers with a deluge of news and announcements highlighting the newest games in store for us this season and beyond. In addition, we saw a potential game-changing move with Microsoft’s unveiling of their self-aware Project Natal. We’re one step closer to Judgment Day with that one.

Anyway, I covered the Microsoft and Nintendo conferences in three separate Blog posts, which is becoming an annual tradition now that I’ve done two of them. Those pieces were focused on my reactions to the news coming from the console manufacturers, not necessarily about the games themselves (although it would be impossible to overlook that piece). This week, I intend to give you my Top 5 most anticipated games of 2009.

And therein lies the rub. We saw some amazing looking titles at E3, but a fair share of them are slated for 2010 and beyond. So, in order to make this list, a game has to release between now and December 31st.

My Top 5 are the ones that rate Must Have status – at least from this far away vantage point. Let’s hope they live up to it. (After all – last year I had Too Human on my list and while it wasn’t bad it also wasn’t Top 5 material either).

Game on.

5. Bioshock 2 (Xbox 360 – November 3rd)

Following the 2 year rule of franchise development, it appears that every big title from the Fall of 2007 is primed to see a subsequent release this Fall – including Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 and Halo: ODST. While those titles make my honorable mention list, it was the original Bioshock that ignited my imagination when it made a splash at the tail end of summer 2007.

Now, I debated tossing this title on the list. Due to my love for the first game, it seems like a no-brainer, but that said, I felt that the first title was so successful primarily because it was so different. The developers at Irrational Games (now 2K Boston) did a masterful job of creating a unique undersea dystopia and then immersing the player in its decay. It was a perfect haunted house environment that really tickled the adventure gamer in me, as I tread cautiously into each new area, peering around every corner in hopes to find it vacant of a lumbering Big Daddy or creepy Little Sister and scouring the area for those audio tapes that told of Rapture’s tragic demise.

The tale also featured a fantastic twist that, in the perfect Sixth Sense tradition, sent your mind spinning back through past events as you realized the truth was in front of you the entire time. The innocuous refrain, “Would you kindly”, suddenly took on a much deeper meaning.