Split/Second for PS3

Split/Second is a car racing game, and I'm hit-or-miss on my opinion of those, but I just finished playing this one all the way through. You know those crazy car chases in movies, where they're flying through an abandoned industrial sector, with stuff blowing up all over the place? It's like playing those scenes, yourself. You're racing on and off streets, with "real" cars -- but you accumulate powerups that let you trigger explosions in front of the competition, which plays like a kart racing game. The AIs match your skill well (if you pick slow cars, they pick slow cars) and the courses are varied enough to be interesting, but repeated enough to be familiar by the end of the game. And there's nothing like triggering an explosion moments before the finish line, to knock the opposition out and jump to first place just in time. Zoom!

ModNation Racers for PS3

In the words of days-gone-by search engines, "More like this!"  Sure, I'm a sucker for user-generated content, so I was looking forward to ModNation ever since last year's E3 demo, but it's lived up to my hopes.  It's great!
It's a fun kart racer, with balanced power-ups and smooth controls, and a few tricks that sometimes mean the race leader loses, right at the last second.  Everything you expect from a kart racer game.

But the track-creation tool is the really awesome part.  (Well, that and the car creation tool, or the character creation tool, actually.)  Like any good level generator, your first few are awesome because you don't care, then the next few are all messed up because you have something in mind, and then the rest after that work because you find a groove and the tools don't get in the way.  Then you go multiplayer and play your maps with other folks.  And then folks tell you what works and doesn't work about them.  And then you make more!  You gotta try this.

Burnout Paradise for PS3

I love this game, and not just because it boots up to the rock anthem "Paradise City" by Guns 'n' Roses.

It's a driving game, where you start out with a basic car, driving around town, finding challenges. Challenges can be a race, or a challenge to destroy other cars, or a trial to do stunts in a time limit ... each time you succeed, you collect new cars and things. Some are easy, some are hard, and your choice of car and strategy change things subtly.

It's an incredibly detailed world. The challenges are varied enough you can "just pick one" and never get bored. There are persistent challenges, too, like jumping through all the billboards you can find/reach. The music that plays throughout is great.

The best part, though, are the slow-motion playbacks of your spectacular crashes. Kaaaaaaa--boooooom!