Aw I can’t include MGS3 because it wasn’t out in Europe until March 2005.
1. Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door; It has many fun aspects including: imaginative levels, being able to turn into a plane or boat, using Crystal Star abilities such as the supernova, charming graphics, catchy music, a funny story, innovative and interactive partner abilities like being able to be veiled underground, loads of variety in the levels such as a train detective mystery as wall as the fighting championship.
2. Tales of Symphonia; This is set in on an epic scale of two parallel worlds with a complex, interesting history. The battle system is very interactive and is comparable to a fighting game which are played on 2D arenas with potentially multi-player. Raine, Presea, Kratos and Regal are some of the mature characters in the team. The dungeons have a variety of puzzles; some of the towns are nice in their pastel-style way including the snowy Flanoir and sun-set Altamira. It’s a beautiful game.
3. Metroid Prime 2: Echoes; Here's another game with dual parallel worlds, Metroid Prime 2 is a challenging adventure through Light Aether and Dark Aether, the latter in which the player must find shields of light or die quickly. This is one of the hardest Metroids because of the harsh world and a limited ammo of light/dark firepower compared to Samus’ unlimited ammo in the past. After the best Metroid game that was Prime, Retro Studios decided to make one of the more risky entries in the series, it’s a masterpiece that is not for everyone.
4. Half-Life 2; This game was revolutionary, the Source and Havoc engine was popularised by this and would be used in years to come. I could go on all day about the great moments: playing catch with Dog the giant robot, controlling the ant lions to invade the prison of Nova Prospekt, throwing a saw at a head-crab infested Zombie in Ravenholdm, being chased by a helicopter on a boat through the canals of what’s left of the lake that is being drained, seeing the Combine conversion process and then that ending which leaves you flabbergasted yet eager for more.
5. The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap; This was the last great Zelda, it was about exploring a varied world as usual but now with some nice novelties. Unlike the steamboat or the train, these new additions such as shrinking and the environmental-changing Kinstones only served to make Hyrule a more elaborate world. The classic Zelda controls didn’t need to be changed; Capcom knew what worked in the past and paid tribute to the good qualities of the series. One of the best moments included Link reaching the Palace of Winds in the clouds when Link must fight one of the great bosses, a Gyor and Link has to ride a manta ray-like creature in order to defeat it. Also exploring the shoes of Hyrule Town as a borrower is just too good to pass on.
6. Ratchet & Clank 3; It has all the expected spectacle of a Ratchet game, now with some silly Captain Qwark 2D levels and introducing one of the series' best villains… Doctor Nefarious, a cackling robot scientist who has the misfortune of having his brain accidentally synchronised a to TV soap called Lance and Janice. So this game has that trademark Ratchet humour, now with your own Starship Phoenix filled with training missions. There’s also a bigger emphasis or bite-sized missions that involve using a Turbo Slider buggy, turrets and of course the first multi-player in the series.
7. Jak 3; From its humble beginning as another clone of Super Mario 64, the Jak series became more dark and desolate as time when on. Jak 3 took the series outside of Haven City again, which had made the genre change to a sand box in Jak 2. Now Jak can explore Precursor ruins in a hazardous desert where only a tribe of Wastelanders manage to survive. Introduced here are: the Leaper Lizards, a flying light mode, a variety of buggies and an impending alien invasion. It’s a unique setting and the game represents well the diversity of the series.
8. Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas; It’s both a prequel to the revolutionary GTA 3 and a sequel to Vice City, but with a more humble protagonist, Carl Johnson is a young man caught up with gangs which is far different than the professional hit man of 3 and the narcissistic gang lord in VC. It’s this shake-up of a protagonist, era and setting that kept the GTA games fresh. Now set in the 90s' sunny districts of a state inspired by Las Vegas, Los Angeles and San Francisco, so as you’d expect SA has almost everything: jet-packs, harriers, Area 51 and "hill-billies" chasing you through the forest with a flame thrower. It’s difficult to complain about the amount of content.
9. Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes; It includes many subjective changes: the cut scenes have Snake perform fantasy athletics, the music is changed and the voice-acting is a bit different. There are the new controls: such as being able to hang off a ledge, tranquillizing guards, shooting in first person, place books to distract the enemy, drag and hide guards as well as shooting from corners. These changes now make it easier to not have to deal with the hassle of standing next to a guard or having to shoot several times to achieve a head shot and they make the controls more complicated, I loved the new controls and can’t go back to the original.
10. Metroid: Zero Mission; Another remake that radically changes the original, Crateria now looks awe-inspiring, Brinstar looks more alien and Norfair suddenly looks like hell. Who knows if the sprites can be any better on the Game Boy Advance, unlike the original it’s certain that this game won’t age. Kraid is now a giant which says all you need to know about how the GBA took the design of the original NES game and magnified it, with influence from the SNES game too. What’s great about this remake is not just that it’s faithful but that it offers surprises even after you think it’s over with the defeat of Mother Brain.
Honourable mention; Legacy of Kain: Defiance.
That was the best gaming year ever, so much that the order of this list doesn’t mean much.