Grand Theft Auto IV (GTA IV) was finally released in April 2008 for Playstation 3 and Xbox 360. The anticipation for this particular game has reached insanely high levels. and for good reasons. The meteoric rise of the GTA series in the gaming world has made gamers ignore other games that have similar storyline and game play attributes. But that's not to say that there will be less anticipation for the 2009 games lineup. It has been partially eclipsed by the ruckus that GTA IV created when it broke sales records in the first day of release.



This list of highly anticipated games for 2009 should be enough to pry yourself lose from GTA's stranglehold, albeit temporarily.

1. Guitar Hero World Tour. This was initially referred to as Guitar Hero 4, but whatever the official title is, this game promises to surpass what the other Guitar Hero titles have achieved. In this new outing, players will have the option to create new songs and upload and share the songs via GHTunes.

2. Diablo 3. The rumors died because the game will see the light of day in 2009. The game play footage released in June is enough to make you scream "I want it now!".

3. World of Warcraft: The Lich King's Wrath. Blizzard Entertainment will be king in 2009 with Diablo 3 and the second expansion pack of World of Warcraft. The WoW expansion alone can easily translate into 10 million subscribers. New content will save the day. And yes, the level cap will be increased to 80. That's many months of sleepless nights.

4. UFC 2009 Undisputed. This game could kill wrestling and boxing in one swift Kimura Shoulder Lock! No holds barred fighting is always brutal and bloody. That explains why this game is highly anticipated!

5. Rock Band 2. This is for the hardcore rockers out there. If guitar is not your thing, then ditch the other game and start banging on the drums.

6. Gears of War 2. The first offering was critically acclaimed and broke sales records. This is a tough act to follow but Microsoft is confident that the sequel will be better. Halo-killer? Maybe not, but it will surely have Sony scrambling to make a worthy game title to rival GoW.

7. Bioshock 2. Meteoric sales and critical acclaims prompted 2K Games to come up with a sequel, pronto! There's no point in delaying this sequel, strike while the dystopian city is still hot!

8. Spore. How would you like to play god? That is if you are keen on controlling species arising from unicellular organisms. With that said, this could be SIMS Biology Party!

9. Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning. Just when you thought there are way too many MMORPGs in the market, here comes another one. The game is said be "geared toward ongoing, constant war". Some people believe that developers continue to create this type of game to get a slice of the WoW market share. Whatever reasons they have, Warhammer will probably be one of the stronger MMOs because it is said to be have been faithful to the Warhammer Fantasy setting, which has a cult following.