Winner: Heavenly Sword
Sony | PS3

As Gollum and King Kong, Andy Serkis has created some of the most memorable film characters of the last decade, so it wasn't too surprising that his turn as Heavenly Sword's villainous King Bohan was nothing short of riveting. Thanks to facial-capture technology developed by the Weta Digital visual-effects studio (along with some of the most pretty graphics we've ever seen), every nuance of Serkis' über-hammy acting made it into the game, and the result was one of the slimiest, cruelest, funniest and most relentlessly entertaining bad guys in videogame history. Every time he opened his mouth or shifted his expression from gloating cheerfulness to mild annoyance, you knew whatever followed was going to be good.

The rest of the game's cast was no less stellar, handing in memorably weird and oddly sweet performances and generally giving the game much better cutscenes than it deserved. Whatever you think of Heavenly Sword's gameplay, its breathtaking non-interactive bits made it this year's most enjoyable game to just sit and watch.

Honorable mention: The Darkness
2K Games | 360, PS3

Jackie Estacado's thoughtful, spot-lit monologues didn't have the high-octane craziness of Heavenly Sword's rubber-faced weirdos, but they brought us close to a character who might have otherwise just been a walking pair of guns attached to demonic snake heads. And when grouped with cutscenes that ranged from quiet, tender moments to slick, stylized gore, they added up to an extremely watchable whole.