Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Red Rescue Team Pokemon Mystery Dungeon took the popular “gotta catch ‘em all” franchise and mixed it up a bit, allowing players to don the roles of Pokemon and go on special "rescue" adventures. But beyond that interesting switch, the game implements a neat Rogue-like style of gameplay which adds a lot of replayability due to the randomness of each adventure. Of course you have access to all those wonderful Pokemon attacks as you take your team on incursions into the deep dungeons to rescue other Pokemon that find themselves in a bad way. Pokemon Mystery Dungeon really took the popular franchise in a new direction, and for those gamers who like Rogue-likes, it's a wonderfully clever and entertaining role-playing game experience.

Justice League Heroes: The Flash Justice League Heroes - The Flash is a well crafted but simple game that takes good advantage of the system's capabilities to deliver gameplay that is quick, engaging and fun. The storyline is played out between acts using comic book style panels as Flash interacts with his team mates and an all-star line-up of familiar villains that includes Killer Frost, Grod and Zoom - all leading to a mysterious and powerful enemy. The Flash is a pure arcade game complete with power-ups, life ups, health and other goodies that you'll use as you battle hundreds of robots, thugs and super villains. Unlike the DS Justice League game, there's a lot of variety in the enemies you'll face. For standing on its own and delivering a fun little arcade experience, Justice League Heroes: The Flash gets a top spot on our best of 2006 list.

Final Fantasy V Advance This thoroughly excellent installment of the classic role-playing series offers some nice open-ended gameplay along with challenging quests and the signature style and presentation of the early Final Fantasy series. Final Fantasy V also deserves some serious credit for introducing some marquee gameplay elements that were later refined in other popular Final Fantasy titles. The highlights of the GBA remake include the popular job system, graphics and sound that are true to the original game and a faithful recreation of all the popular key elements from V. For delivering an authentic classic Final Fantasy experience on the Game Boy Advance, Final Fantasy V Advance gets its due on our list.

Yggdra Union Yggdra Union is different from most other games from Japan, because it's not so easily understood without a little dedication. Sure this import from Atlus offers anime graphics, animated combat sequences, strategic battles and it's share of Princesses and cocky heroes, but the game at its heart is pretty complex - though it does share a lot of elements from games like Ogre Battle or Final Fantasy Tactics, most fans will have a hard time getting by the game’s steep learning curve. That’s a real shame, because those that hang in there and figure it all out, will understand why we’ve added this game to our best of 2006 list For being different, and yet offering some familiar RPG elements, Yggdra Union gets some well deserved respect.

Super Robot Taisen: Original Generation Super Robot Taisen: Original Generation is an unusual turn-based role-playing game that fans of importing quirky Japanese games have been begging for for a very long time. At the heart of the game is a combat system where players use mechanized robots to take on other powered armor on a grid-style map. The game is similar in style to Advance Wars, but with a slick layer of anime style characters and a combat presentation that really makes the action a lot more intriguing. The series is ultra popular in Japan because it borrowed liberally from some of the most popular anime properties and used corporate names to add some street cred. While Super Robot Taisen: Original Generation is obviously a niche title, it is nonetheless a unique game offering that deserves some attention due to its deep role-playing game elements, cool characters and oftentimes over-the-top anime inspired moments.