Whenever the subject of innovative game design comes up in the office I almost always think of Japanese titles, because let's face it, some of the most original concepts, ones that have shaped the entire industry, were born in Godzilla's backyard. But while Japanese designers busy themselves with cardboard 3D goggles for Metal Gear Ac!d 2 and humongous Katamari balls, there's plenty of exciting ideas coming out of Europe. My apologies for neglecting to create an entire list of our European developer friends, but here are a handful of companies whose products will forever change their respective genres. A bold claim indeed, but it's also one that I feel very confident in making.

Elemental Games (Russia): Space Rangers 2: Dominators

Space Rangers 2 is the epitome of innovation, as no game on the planet allows you to fly through space, blast apart evil robots, upgrade your space craft, sail through black holes, and become president of an entire planet within the span of an hour. Elemental Games has actually weaved several different styles of play into their product and the result is a slick sci-fi extravaganza where you can actually carve your own adventurous path without feeling constrained by any sort of linearity. The primary objective is to annihilate these evil robots known as the Dominators, but you can totally ignore the main quest and just screw around in outer space.

When inside of your space craft the gameplay is turn based, so you'll maneuver units into position, discuss strategies with your fellow allies and then obliterate the enemy. But if you land onto just one of the game's many planets it becomes a straight up RTS where you'll build and command a small army of kick ass robots, but there's still more stuff to do. Once inside of a black hole the game morphs into an arcade shooter, and there are also cool 'Choose Your Own Adventure' style side quests where you'll have to answer a series of questions correctly in order to strike deals with aliens to become their leader. There's just a hell of lot of interesting features, so many so that you could easily squeeze anywhere from 50 to 120 hours from the game and still fail to see everything. And since you can play as different races and character types (a pirate, for example), you can theoretically play a different game every time you begin a new save file.

I could certainly go on about Space Rangers 2, but to get all of the details on this game, read my exclusive preview to see why I think it could light a fire in the strategy/action adventure genres.