As Sylvester Stallone dons some boxing shorts for another round as Rocky, it’s amazing to think that the sixth Rocky film is upon us.  Movie sequels are nothing new of course – but it’s rare that a sequel is better than the original film.  Successful games have a similar problem – a popular franchise will be reproduced each year, but improvements aren’t always evident.  Luckily for the Xbox 360, we’re looking forward to a load of original games hitting from major developers in 2007. Mass Effect and Assassin’s Creed are just the tip of the iceberg...

This week we went to 2K Games’ offices to see The Darkness, created by Starbreeze Studios.  Starbreeze were made famous with the brilliant Chronicles of Riddick on the original Xbox – one of the best examples of a licensed game ever made.  With a cinematic feel and an engrossing storyline matched only by the fluid action game play, Riddick attracted critical acclaim worldwide and The Darkness looks set to follow in its footsteps.  Following the story of Jackie, a mafia family boss with supernatural powers drawn from the darkness within, the game is based on the popular comic series.  We’ll be sharing more on The Darkness right here on Xbox.com with the first details of the multiplayer game soon.

From the makers of the terrifying System Shock 2 comes Bioshock from 2K Games later this year.  Set in an underwater city built as a utopia for the intellectual elite, something has gone very wrong in the world of Rapture and its former residents have transformed into deadly creatures thanks to the mysterious substance Adam.  Adam allows your character to transform and adapt to different situations and the X06 trailer last year showed a man injecting himself with the substance and mutating his arm into a hive of killer insects.  If you’re a fan of horror movies, Bioshock will be for you.

EA bring a new game to the fray that is already attracting a lot of publicity since its unveiling.  Army of Two, first shown at E3 last year, promises a co-op mercenary setting with dramatic action and innovative game play elements.  The focus is on team work – whether it’s pushing over some debris to create cover or just smashing your team mate on the back of the head to warn him of incoming enemies.

Even John Woo is joining the world of gaming with a debut title under Midway’s banner called Stranglehold.   Featuring Chow Yun Fat, this looks like a real return to form for John Woo as the lead character returns from his film Hard Boiled. Promising game play that looks like Max Payne has just jumped into the next generation, Stranglehold has all kinds of crazy environments to destroy as you dual wield pistols and take down some bad guys.  And yes, all you Woo fans out there will be happy to hear that the doves are in there too.

So while we have some excellent sequels coming this year including Halo 3 and Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2, don’t forget to take some time out for the new stuff!

By Mark Eveleigh, Xbox.com Editor, Gamertag: Making Sparks