You already read the Game of the Year article, right? If not, click here, then check this stuff out later.

The Ones that Got Away

HDTV of the Year
Mitsubishi WD-73833 73" 1080p DLP HDTV

We reviewed a lot of HDTVs last year, but the biggest was one of the best -- and it came in right at the end of 2007. This massive rear-projection behemoth performed extremely well and was one of the few sets we could get the entire staff around comfortably for games of Scene It? and Rock Band. DLP is an outgoing technology but it offers great value for the money, so we like to think of this award as sending DLPs out on a high note.

Creepiest Packaging
Halo 3 Legendary Edition
Oh, it’s not the helmet — it’s what comes around the helmet. It’s disturbing enough that you’re basically opening a box with Master Chief’s head in it — but the black executioner’s bag that protects the helmet from scratches during transit completed the grisly mental image for us.

WTF Award
Call of Duty 4’s post-credits surprise (SPOILER ALERT)
Sit through the credits of Infinity Ward’s white-hot shooter and you’ll find yourself scrambling for the controller. Suddenly you’re back in the game, MP5 in hand, on a 747 at 30,000 feet, searching for a VIP to rescue with a clock counting down to his execution. Cap the bad guys as you move to the front of the plane, then aim carefully and pop the last one holding the target hostage, and finally jump out of the jet, sending you back to the main menu screen at terminal velocity. It’s a riveting – if completely head-scratching – sequence, and one that Infinity Ward refuses to explain to this day. Is it a teaser for their next game? Just an Easter egg? Only the Ward crew knows for sure.

2007 In Brief

Why say with a paragraph what you can say in a line? Here's our take on 2007 without wasting words.

Racing Game of the Year
Dirt

Sports Game of the Year
NCAA Football 08 (Original Xbox)

Fighting Game of the Year
Virtua Fighter 5

Enemy of the Year
Red Ring of Death

Weapon of the Year
Aperture Science Handheld Portal Device (Portal)

Controller-Throwing Moment of the Year
Guitar Battle vs. Lou (Guitar Hero III)

Best New Species
Elcor (Mass Effect)

Best Corporate Showdown
EA vs. Activision

Best Reason to Move to a Bigger House/Apartment
Rock Band

Worst Studio Name Change
2K Boston (Previously Irrational Studios)

Coolest Thing That Fanboys Found a Reason to Complain About Anyway
Xbox 360 Elite

Best Microsoft Departure
Xbox 360 Core

Worst Microsoft Departure
Peter Moore

Longest Tutorial
Assassin’s Creed

Longest Credits
Eternal Sonata

Best Third-Party Controller
HORI Ace Combat 6 ACE-EDGE Flightstick

Worst Third-Party Controller
Mad Catz Arcade GameStick

Best Inanimate Object
The Weighted Companion Cube (Portal)

Best Value
The Orange Box

Worst “Value”
Hour of Victory

Worst Cinematics
Ace Combat 6: Fires of Liberation

Worst Dialogue
Two Worlds

Worst Box Art
The Orange Box

Crowd of the Year
Assassin’s Creed

Most Disappointing Delay
Grand Theft Auto IV

Second Most Disappointing Delay
Unreal Tournament III

Least Disappointing Delay
Army of Two

Least Essential Supernatural-Themed Game
Vampire Rain

Second Least Essential Supernatural-Themed Game
Bullet Witch

Framerate of the Year
Call of Duty 4

Best Retro Revival
Castlevania: Symphony of the Night (XBLA)

Best Party Game
Scene It? Lights Camera Action

Best Game You’ve Already Forgotten About
Overlord

Just Barely Missed

Our Game of the Year awards came down to not just one or two deserving candidates, but six. Rock Band took the prize, but it wasn't without a fight. Here are the compelling arguments we waged in the office when lobbying for any one of these games to be named our Game of the Year.

Mass Effect
You will not find better storytelling in a videogame – and it’s a story only Xbox 360 gamers get to enjoy. Deep characterization, replayability, social commentary...Mass Effect does everything an RPG should do, and BioWare arguably does it better than anybody’s ever done it.

BioShock
An organic approach to problem solving showed Ken Levine and 2K Boston’s respect for every player’s ingenuity, and our need to live our own version of Rapture’s sad tale of ambition, identity, ethics, and loss. Plus, we loved the manic firefights and burning mutants. With any luck, first-person games will never be the same again.

Call of Duty 4
Eager to prove its franchise as more than just a historical relic, Infinity Ward silenced any skeptics from the first stunning scene of Modern Warfare, all the way through the tense finale. Military multiplayer action has never been tighter or more rewarding.

The Orange Box
Half-Life 2 finally got the Xbox respect it deserved, as well as a few updates to the story since we saw it last — first-person shooting and storytelling par excellence. Team Fortress 2 offered cartoon mayhem online, and the brilliant Portal invented a new genre: first-person action/puzzle/sarcasm. And how about the sheer $60 value?

Halo 3
What didn’t Halo 3 provide for its fans? Skulls, terminals, co-op play, customizable maps, saved films, a resolution to the epic storyline…all that and the run-and-gun mayhem was expertly balanced. Fans had high expectations, and they were met.

Game Of The Year 2007: The Readers Speak

Before we went to press and revealed our pick for Game of the Year, we asked our loyal readers in the OXM forums at Xbox.com to tell us what they felt was the most deserving game and why. We got a lot of interesting answers...

"A Game of the Year has to change the face of games as they are. It should rise and destroy preconceptions of games and raise the level of the genre. BioShock did [all that].” — OBEY RM

“Based on the amount of time I played, the amount of fun I had...I would have to say Halo 3. Four-player co-op and great multiplayer win the day for me.” — ZEBRA NINER

“Rock Band was the result of Harmonix being given the chance to ‘live the dream,’ and then returning the favor.” — Novellion

“Call of Duty 4 is a game of moments. Virtually every chapter in the campaign has ‘I remember that’ moments. It’s a tight, well-produced game that has Game of the Year written all over it.” — WC Sarge

“Mass Effect has everything — it’s an RPG, it’s a shooter, it has the best story in a game ever, and there’s omni-gel.” — Lynchtastic

“There have been a lot of great games this year. The problem is that all of these came out after Halo 3 already won the award.” — oO Z3R0 Oo

“Rock Band should be the Game of the Year. The combination of all four instruments makes you feel like you’re in a real band. When my family and I played it, we cheered when we succeeded, and we laughed a lot when we failed.” — KevinPDZ

“The Orange Box should win Game of the Year, if only for Portal, which was an extremely entertaining new concept with great humor and, more importantly, awesome gameplay. Plus, five great games for $60 should be acknowledged and rewarded.” — Frankie B

“No games live up to the envelope-pushing narrative and attention to detail in BioWare’s Mass Effect. With a fully realized world ripe with the deepest of intricacies and flexible, decision-molding gameplay, Mass Effect doesn’t just demand multiple playthroughs: it deserves them.” — MitchyD88 

“There is no other medium that could have told me the story of BioShock, as I was an active participant in it. Irrational Studios transformed my idea of what games could be.” — SHOCKERRA

Our Self-Congratulatory Awards

There's a reason these are last.

OXM Vs. of the Year
Out of all our gaming sessions against the readers, we probably had the most fun with Bomberman Live. You folks up for a rematch?

Podcast of the Year
We’re still very proud of episodes 50 and 51 of the KOXM podcast, which were…the audio awards show for last year’s GOTY awards. Milk it!

Guest Column of the Year
That’s a tie between Tim Schafer’s “Invasion of the Future Box” in the July issue and Randy Pitchford’s “Reeking Havoc” in September.

T-Shirt of the Year
What could top the cheeky “Space Giraffe is Rubbish” shirts that Space Giraffe’s own creator, Jeff Minter, made and sold online?

Oops of the Year
We printed a nice announcement of a Gamerchix scholarship program in our April issue…only to find out, um, it didn’t exist. Here’s hoping for 2008.

That's it for this year. Go back and read the Game of the Year article if you missed anything!.