The fifth best videogame(s) of 2008

(Part of our series counting down the top ten videogames of 2008 -- with interruptions for the most disappointing and most overrated -- according to Variety critics Leigh Alexander, Tom Chick, Chris Dahlen and Ben Fritz. Full details are here. To check out the rest of the list, click here. Most importantly, vote for your favorite games of 2008 in the Cut Scene reader awards here.)

Chris Dahlen

Professor Layton and the Curious Village (Nintendo / Level 5)

I love solving puzzles. I love being patted on the head when I get one right. And I love a game that will give me little, helpful hints but never hand me the answer, no matter how much I beg.

Ben Fritz

de Blob (THQ / Blue Tongue)

This unlikely translation of a Dutch student project into a AAA American release is the most unjustly overlooked videogame of the year, both critically and commercially. Its embrace of color and music over gray monotony may be simple, but it’s the infusion of those aesthetics into the gameplay, so that the visual and aural richness of the world grows along with the player’s progress, that makes “de Blob” so impressive and infectious.

Leigh Alexander

PixelJunk Eden (Sony / Q Games)

Quickly glance at its undulating colors, ambient techno and iconic floral design (which I wholly believe is ripped off in the graphic design for some current Sears ads) and it's easy to dismiss "PixelJunk Eden" as an "art" game. In fact, it's deceptively accessible in its simplicity, sometimes deliciously frustrating, and often luminously trance-inducing. Its taut design subtly graduates the player into ever more expansive challenges and provides a real sense of growth and unfurling along the way.

Tom Chick

EndWar (Ubisoft / Ubisoft Shanghai)

Okay, I'm going to get wonky here. "EndWar" is not your normal real time strategy game, and not just because it finally cracks the code for how to play an RTS on a console system (The key? Voice commands!). "EndWar" is a gamble. In fact, I think it misreads the appeal of the genre. I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if this turned out to be a commercial fiasco for Ubisoft. But that's what you risk when you cannily rework how real time strategy games play. "EndWar" is about moving pieces on a board and psyching out your opponent. It's about knowing when to push and when to give. It's about carefully upgrading your units over the course of a perhaps too dynamic campaign. This is one of the most subversive game designs of the year for how it takes the fussy action movie motif of a typical RTS and recasts it as an elegant European board game. If Reiner Knizia made RTSs, this is the one he'd make. See, I told you I was going to get wonky.

Coming this afternoon: The fourth best videogame(s) of 2008.