Red Faction: Guerrilla

In the final missions, there were so many explosions that I literally could not see anything. Red Faction: Guerrilla likes ramping up the difficulty by throwing more dudes at you, which is sometimes a nuisance. But then you find the tank, or the missile walker, and everything is peachy-keen again. So although this continuous arms race develops to a somewhat ridiculous extent, it does a great job of making every mission feel more epic than the last.

As I expected, the Marauders ended up being slightly (very slightly) more than meets the eye. There is a retarded plot twist near the end, and you enlist their help in the final battle against the EDF. I don't consider this a spoiler because the game's story is stupid. It's a good thing, then, that completely ignoring the plot is easy and fun. Sure, RF:G might have been better with a gripping narrative, but it's a fantastically entertaining game even without one.

Once the main story is wrapped up, all the game's guerrilla missions (regardless of whether or not you completed them) unlock again, and the entirety of Mars becomes your playground. This is awesome! and I'm seriously considering doing missions I skipped and finding collectibles I missed. But my urge to blow shit up is almost fully satisfied, and I still have to play through the DLC missions.

Better than: Mercenaries: Playground of Destruction
Not as good as: story-wise, Grand Theft Auto IV
More explosions than: everything else, combined

Progress: Liberated Mars