....and here's where it gets really exciting. Five down, five to go. Feel free to berate us in the comments thread for any blinders you feel we've unfairly overlooked, or even praise us for our excellent taste if you happen to agree with our choices. Looking at the ten, it's clear we've had to leave out some quality games - unlucky, Heavenly Sword; hard lines, Motorstorm - which proves that PS3 isn't as short of brilliant titles as some people would have you believe.

Anyway, enough waffling - here's our Top Five. Enjoy!

5. Warhawk That embarrassing E3 performance seems a long way away now, doesn't it? Warhawk overcame its early development troubles to provide an online experience that remains extremely popular some several months after its release. Sony took the brave step of launching Warhawk as a download-only title in August, before its retail release (with a packaged Bluetooth headset) in late September, and it paid off handsomely - at only £15, it represented terrific value for money. It's a supremely well-balanced shooter, with each weapon and vehicle having its own strengths and weaknesses - and mastering the tricky but effective Sixaxis controls of the aircraft is vital to ensuring your own survival if you take to the skies. With five sizeable and well-designed maps supporting 32 players at a time, this fast-paced and fun third-person blaster should pave the way for some even better first-party online games in the future.

4. Riff: Everyday Shooter Proof that even the smallest developers can thrive on PSN, Everyday Shooter is the creation of one man, the supremely talented Jonathan Mak. In the game's notes, he claims to have been influenced by the likes of Tetsuya Mizuguchi and Kenta Cho, but this wonderfully abstract game has a personality all of its own. As Mak himself puts it, it's an album of games - each level is a different variety of twin-stick shooter, requiring a different approach from the previous stage. Half the enjoyment comes from working out exactly how to progress instead of just destroying enemies at will, and the fantastic guitar-based soundtrack feels unique within the genre. It's a game of synaesthetic, geometric beauty - if you haven't already, you must download this immediately.

3. PixelJunk: Monsters Its predecessor PixelJunk: Racers was a divisive beast, but once Monsters stomped onto PSN, it was time to sit up and take notice of Q Games' new brand. It's a fresh take on the tower defence shooter, which sees the player creating weapons from trees in an attempt to hold back the waves of attacking critters. Preventing them from reaching your castle is no mean feat, requiring on-the-fly tactical thinking as this advancing menace approaches, and you often find you've got the wrong towers for the job. Frantic, funny and furiously addictive, this game is probably responsible for more late nights among this site's editorial team than any other. As long as you're prepared for the resultant bloodshot eyes and 4am staggers to bed, then this is the best thing on PSN.

2. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare It's strange to think that there wasn't a massive amount of hype surrounding Modern Warfare's release - at least compared to a particular first-person shooter on a certain rival console released a little earlier in 2007. Yet, for our money, it's a comfortably superior game to Halo 3 - and, thanks to the coding genii at Infinity Ward, it's just a smidge better on PS3, from a technical standpoint at least. Weaker ports be damned, THIS is how it should be done - other third party developers, take note. Ranting aside, Call of Duty 4 is perhaps the pinnacle of linear shooters in its (admittedly brief) single-player mode, providing a staggeringly exciting - and surprisingly varied - experience that's always immersive, frequently astonishing, and polished to a standard 99% of games can't possible hope to live up to. But that would be to ignore its multiplayer aspect, which is quite simply one of the most complete online experiences you could ever hope for. Smooth, balanced, and immaculately produced throughout, this could conceivably keep you going until the PS4 arrives.

1. Uncharted: Drake's Fortune Sure, it's hardly the most revolutionary game ever. It doesn't have a multiplayer. And it's only around ten to twelve hours long. But there isn't a game on PS3 that can put a grin on your face quite like this one. It might draw inspiration from several influences - a pinch of Tomb Raider here, a dash of Gears Of War there - but it blends them so perfectly, that you can't fail to be uproariously entertained throughout. It's a thrilling, brilliantly-paced quest with genuinely cinematic presentation that strikes an absolutely perfect tone - a mix of humour and derring-do that characterises the very best adventure movies. And, in hero Nathan Drake, it has a protagonist that's believably flawed, tremendously charming and hugely likeable - channeling by turns Harrison Ford and particularly Firefly's Nathan Fillion. Its fast-moving story takes Drake to several retina-scorchingly gorgeous locations, with the water effects in particular seemingly besting anything on 360. Uncharted is arguably the first game that genuinely looks like it could only have been made on PS3, and it's for that reason - and the many others listed above - that it sits proudly at top spot on our list.

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So there you have it. It's a subjective list, so inevitably some of you are bound to disagree with our Top Ten. Some of you may even think we're absolutely spot on - and to you, the cheques are in the post. By all means, feel free to tell us where we went hopelessly wrong (or so, so right) by adding a comment below. But somewhere, in among all the suggestions and arguments, we'll all undoubtedly come to a similar conclusion: that the PS3 has some bloody good games for it. And from the looks of the forthcoming releases for 2008, this next twelve months should be even better than the last. Surely, now, that's something to celebrate. A Happy Easter to you all - and a happy birthday, PlayStation 3!

Related post: Happy Birthday PS3! The Ten Best Games (part one)

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