It seems like it's been a year, or even two, of major titles that have held the gaming world in a vice-like grip.
Last year, Halo 3 shut down cities and set a record for the most successful opening day by any form of entertainment.
Earlier this year, Grand Theft Auto IV got the geekdom excited and anti-violence campaigners all hot under the collar.
And just weeks ago, the long-awaited Spore landed, the most anticipated PC game in years.
Now it's the turn of Sony to assume the spotlight as its LittleBigPlanet, another title to have been attracting buzz for a long time, arrives for PlayStation 3.
Innovation has become a horribly over-used word in the gaming industry, but Sony and Media Molecule, the British developers of the game, believe they have created something that is genuinely fresh.
Their hope is that LittleBigPlanet (LBP for short) will pull in adults AND children, hard-core AND casual gamers.
To do that, they've created a game that's equal parts platformer and puzzler, something combining the most basic elements of gaming with the smooth gameplay and swish graphics today's generation expects.
LBP is based around a character called Sackboy, the plainest character you can imagine.
It's a hangman-style head-body-legs-arms combination made of sack.
That's it. No weapons, no special abilities. Just a sack doll.
Gamers take ownership of their characters by outfitting them with hats, capes, shirts, boots, gloves, whatever.
More accessories are unlocked during the game.
The game itself follows a play-create-share system.
On the play side, LBP comes loaded with about 50 levels.
Each has the simple goal of moving Sackboy from the start to the finish.
It's a little like Lemmings in that regard: start at Point A, solve puzzles and overcome obstacles, finish at Point B.
Sackboy can essentially only jump and run, but there are various things to grab on to, duck through, avoid, catch a lift on, and use to get higher/lower/faster.
Things like skateboards, jet packs, twirling wheels . . . the list goes on.
In itself, the "play" part of LBP might be enough to generate plenty of interest.
But the real feature of the game, that which instantly sets it apart from other cutesy platformers, is its creation modes.
Having the ability to create levels is nothing new.
I vividly recall creating racing tracks in the old PC game Stunts about 15 years ago.
But LBP takes it a whoooole step further.
The developers have essentially included all the tools they used to create the pre-set levels.
You choose material - glass, metal, sponge, polystyrene, cardboard, rubber, you name it - and any number of shapes, and get busy building.
The palette of tools is remarkable, and more become available as you progress.
And you can make your creations behave in certain ways by adding buttons and switches and even brains.
Yes, brains. For many, this is going to be the real attraction of the game.
Actually designing your own levels, then asking others to try them out - that's quite a buzz.
So here's where the "share" element comes in.
The idea is that LBP players will create their own levels, then go online to both share the levels and see what others have designed.
Media Molecule co-founder Alex Evans has high hopes LBP will become as popular as social websites like Facebook and YouTube.
"Creators are just as important as levels, so we have world rankings of who's the coolest creator, or who's the coolest community-minded commenter or sharer," Evans told the GamesIndustry.biz website.
"So you can be a little bit competitive if you want to be, and you'll have feeds of photos of you, levels that you've been in, photos people have taken of you."
Evans said extra features would be regularly added to the game after its launch to emphasise its community aspects.
The game supports up to four players.
Competitive gameplay and co-operative gameplay are familiar concepts, but a new one has been coined "co-opetition".
So, you might need the help of a fellow gamer to complete a certain level, but you also fight for bragging rights by finishing a level first.
Evans, whose company is vastly smaller than most game designers, said it had been a wild ride since the first prototype of LittleBigPlanet was shown to an audience.
"We honestly didn't know what we were doing; where this was going to go," Evans said.
"So we showed it to Sony, and they were amazing. We pitched and they were like, 'Yeah, we love it.'
"They really pushed us in a strong direction, and it just happened to be the direction we wanted to go in anyway."
Talk of cute characters and simple gameplay will inevitably have some labelling LBP a children's game.
But Evans said that was a misconception that could be easily dismissed.
"It's not just a kids' game. We're not announcing anything about that, but user-created content is all about breadth of content and breadth of ideas. So I'm looking forward to seeing that."
• A full review of LittleBigPlanet will follow after the game's release.
