As gifts go, serious gamers want serious games, but only they seem to know what they're talking about. For everyone else, especially this year's gift givers, here are some new games they might not own already (be sure to check), all about "the one with that guy that does that thing."

Call of Duty 2
From: Activsion
For: Windows PC
Price (CDN): $49.99 - $64.99
Price (USD): $39.99 - $49.99
ESRB Rating: Teen (13+) (Blood, Mild Language, Violence)

For the Warmongers on your list, there's no shortage of superlative titles this year, with Call of Duty 2 for Windows PC leading the pack. Rather than simply shooting everything in sight of a WWII as a backdrop, players live and breathe a series of fact-based vignettes with the dial set on "shell shock." Intense on a cinematic scale, its one of the few games that conveys a sense that life is precious, "war is hell," and dying means you've let your buddies down.

The console version, Call of Duty 2: The Big Red, offers a similar but scaled back, more console-conventional WWII experience while focusing squarely on the missions of famed "Fighting First" infantry division.

Battlefield 2
From: EA
For: Windows PC, PlayStation2, Xbox
Price (CDN): $39.99 - $59.99
Price (USD): $24.99 - $39.99
ESRB Rating: Teen (13+) (Language, Violence)

Meanwhile, Battlefield 2 (Windows PC), Battlefield 2: Special Forces (Windows PC expansion pack), and Battlefield 2: Modern Combat (PlayStation2, Xbox) offers highly evolved and ultra-involved with hypothetical modern warfare that's best played online with dozens of other like-minded mongers (there's also great single player modes, with the console versions going so far as to let you swap out control to any soldier on the field on the fly, which makes up for the fact that computer controlled soldiers are rather stupid when left alone).

With a more "war is fun" sensibility, you need tenacity and patience to get good at BF2 and experience all it has to offer. You're rewarded for you efforts and long-term dedication, however, with equipment upgrades and promotions through the ranks as well as a visceral sense satisfaction with a job well done, which is a little disturbing, because it means you killed all the right people (repeatedly, in most cases).

Brothers in Arms: Earned in Blood
From: Ubisoft
For: Windows PC, Xbox
Price (CDN): $54.99 - $55.99
Price (USD): $39.99 - $49.99
ESRB Rating: Mature (17+) (Blood and Gore, Intense Violence, Strong Language)

Brothers in Arms: Earned in Blood is a likewise deep and dramatic war sim and easily the most graphic of the bunch. Furthermore, it lets player command an entire squad on-the-fly, executing complex manures that the artificial intelligence system manages to execute with amazing deftness.

Similarly, Earned in Blood's online multiplayer skirmishing is a thoroughly accomplished experience that's worth the purchase price all by itself (save for the PS2 version, which is a miserable experience and not recommended).

SOCOM 3: U.S. Navy Seals
From: Sony
For: PlayStation 2
Price (CDN) $56.99
Price (USD): $49.99
ESRB Rating: Mature (17+) (Blood, Violence)

And third time's a charm for the Sony's SOCOM franchise as SOCOM 3 proves that large scale, online warfare is not only feasible on the middling-powered PS2, but exceptional.

It helps, of course, that you don't play as a generic grunt in the trenches, but an exceedingly talented US Navy Seal with all sorts of skills (including driving, for the first time) and cool weapons out of the gate. An established, skilled fan base and a glut of online players to be found helps, too, as does the game's cross-compatibility with it's portable counterpart, SOCOM: Fireteam Bravo on PSP.

SSX On Tour
From: EA Sports Big
For: GameCube, PlayStation 2, Xbox
Price (CDN): $39.99
Price (USD): $29.95
ESRB Rating: Everyone 10+ (Crude Humor, Mild Violence)

Though EA's SSX extreme snow sport franchise is getting a little long in the tooth, SSX On Tour offers enough "new and improved" stuff to the superhuman stunt riding gameplay of its lineage to make a worthy purchase. Most notably, an extensive career mode as well as the new ability to go old school, on skis. It's a game where "Uber" moves are so commonplace that you have to shoot for "Super Uber" moves to shine.

Tony Hawk's American Wasteland
From: Activision
For: GameCube, PlayStation2, Windows PC, Xbox
Price (CDN): $62.99 - $64.99
Price (USD): $39.99 - $49.99
ESRB Rating: Teen (13+) (Blood, Crude Humor, Language, Suggestive Themes, Violence)

Likewise, the Tony Hawk franchise is getting long so long the tooth it's liable to pierce its own tongue. That said, Tony Hawk's American Wasteland is a must-have for "sk8" fans.

Bearing mind that the game assumes you already know how to play (the serious gamer will), THAW ramps up the expectation level at every turn, letting you scour a huge, interactive world looking for challenges then demanding you execute those firmly implausible tricks and impossible grinds or suffer the trademark skull smacks and near-palpable groin cracks on the pavement and rails, which are almost as fun if they weren't so definitively embarrassing, especially when you take it online (except GameCube version) for some otherwise great multiplayer competition.

Tiger Woods PGA Tour 06
From: EA Sports
For: GameCube, PlayStation 2, Windows PC, Xbox
Price (CDN): $45.99 - $59.99
Price (USD): $30.99 - $49.95
ESRB Rating: Everyone

It seems only golfers and gamers understand the cathartic escapisms found in an otherwise brutally frustrating day on the links.

On the virtual side, there's nothing quite like a round of Tiger Woods PGA Tour 06 as a respite from all the hardcore shooting, warfare-mongering or extreme athleticism-ing of all their other games.

It's Mark Twain's "good walk spoiled"; serene locals and measured pacing but, ultimately, almost oxymoronically, intense and challenging. EA's done a bang up job with a polished control scheme that actually takes some time for duffers to master, simulating the actual frustration of the game as much as the visual verisimilitude of it all, which makes it all the more rewarding when you do get as good as Tiger himself, and all you shot were birdies.

Blitz: The League
From: Midway
For: PlayStation 2, Xbox
Price (CDN): $44.99
Price (USD): $39.99
ESRB Rating: Mature (17+) (Blood, Strong Language, Suggestive Themes, Use of Drugs, Violence)

Assuming the sports-minded gamer on your gift list most likely owns the superlative Madden NFL 06 already, an excellent companion piece (or alternative) is found in Blitz: The League (Midway; PlayStation2, Xbox), an over-the-top gridiron game that flouts attitude and excessive aggression using fictional, sometimes seedy players and self-styled teams. It's essentially the Anti-NFL game - and a lot of violent, gritty, in-your-face, extreme fun because of it.

Peter Jackson's King Kong: The Official Game of the Movie
From: Ubisoft
For: PlayStation 2, Xbox
Price (CDN): $49.99 - $55.99
Price (USD): $49.99
ESRB Rating: Teen (13+) (Blood, Violence)

Then there's Peter Jackson's King Kong: The Official Game of the Movie, the game with the unwieldy named distinguish here for two reasons: First, it's neither a sports nor warfare game; and second, it's one of the best movie-to-game translations ever made.

It's mostly a first-person shooter (FPS) with remarkable style, striking visuals and a cleverly delineated, puzzle-laden plotline that manages to terrify you like nothing else, because everything in Kong's world is larger than life - and louder - and convincingly heck-bent on ending yours.

Plus, for about a third of the game, you get to play as Kong himself (from the third-person perspective), which offsets the sense of perma-fear as a woefully under-quipped shooter with the gratifying sense of being a giant ape.

Of course, this list is no where near representative of all the great titles currently vying for your holiday shopping dollars, but it's a good, sure-fire start.

Also See:

Gift Guide 2005 Part 1: Game Systems

Gift Guide 2005 Part 2: Kid's Stuff

Gift Guide 2005 Part 3: Gamer Gear

Gift Guide 2005 Part 4: Serious Games

Gift Guide 2005 Part 5: Family Fun Games

Gift Guide 2005 Part 6: Value Priced Games