Virtua Fighter 5 (Playstation 3, 2007)

Virtua Fighter 5 lets the graphics prowess of the PlayStation 3 shine. The question is whether great graphics alone can make a fighting game worth playing.
The graphics in Virtua Fighter 5 are spell bindingly beautiful in many situations. The landscapes are lush. The movements of the fabrics are fluid and natural. The physics engine is quite impressive. Yes, sometimes the textures can be shiny, and the water more mercury-like that truly watery. Still, this is beautiful to watch.
Quest Mode is where it's at in this game; the mode is essentially a recreation of the experience of traveling to different arcades and challenging players on a machine. To start you create a profile and choose your preferred character, and then the Quest world is open to explore. There are several different arcades with "players" of different skill levels, so there is a feeling of progression as you go from one arcade to the next, improving in your ranking and piling up wins. Winning matches and tournaments in the different arcades will earn you money and items to customize your character and beef out your profile. Not only is it addictive to collect items and personalize fighters, it's very difficult to stop trying to improve your rank and dominate different arcades.