Sure, the Hulk gals had the sexiest outfits. And the cute-faced ladies from Gothic 3 broke the stereotype that booth babes are "total Monets." But the real winners are the ladies from THQ's Saint's Row. E3 is all about putting on a show, and these girls had the audience (and each other) in the palms of their hands. 

Sometimes a picture really is worth a thousand words. Of the hundreds of guys posing with booth babes, no one quite captures the spirit of E3 as well as this dude.

Most of the "shows" at E3 are little more than booth babes bouncing around a stage, tossing out t-shirts and getting the crowd excited. But NCsoft's stage performance included actual dancers, musicians and whatever those people who play with fire are called. Sweaty, edgy and sexy, the show was alot like the musical Rent--but with Auto Assault instead of heroin and AIDS.

Sure, Pac Man was adorable--especially since booth babes had to escort him everywhere he waddled. And the Katamari Damacy ball was not only cute but inspired my best E3 joke of the year ("The joy of E3: babes and blue balls."). But nothing could outshine the freakish Zelda mascot. To many, Link is a symbol of courage, strength and wisdom--but to those who saw the costumed version of him at E3, he became a symbol of WTF!?.

Trade shows are all about hype, and anyone who's been to E3 knows that once you look beyond the smoke and mirrors there's very little innovation to behold. This year's exception was Will Wright's Spore, an intriguing new SIM that allows you to create and control the evolution of a species all the way from a single-celled microorganism to a galactic conquistador. This evolution is based on a series of procedural algorythms, so players are constantly creating new content. In many ways, Spore represents not only a new type of game but a new type of game development. It's this kind of exciting innovation that we hope to catch even a glimpse of each year at E3.