In Burnout Paradise, there is a lot of cars driving around, but not a human in sight.

Does that count?

 Exactly right. This is one of the major problems I have with the backstory of Killzone 2. They have developer a space ship that can travel near the speed of light. They then develop a cryotek system to prevent the astronauts from aging which is entirely useless. Couple that with an ability to instantly communicate with a planet that is nearly 10 light years away and I have completely lost my ability to take the story seriously. Don't use a scifi background if you don't understand the basics behind the technology. I can accept technology that may or may not ever be possible because that is what scifi is about. I can't accept using it poorly.

Incidentally, this is another thing that Halo handles pretty well.

Why nobody have mentioned conscious AI? :)

Anyway... I have some of my own too, but you will find those out after I publish some scifi stuff.

I'll brief you on the various dimeneions in string theory.

Dimension 1 - A single point.

Dimension 2 - 2 points with an intersecting line between them.

Dimension 3 - A fold between those points allowing the them to touch (roll up a piece of paper into a tube and thus 2D becomes 3D). 

Dimension 4 - Time.  The difference in status between various points in a timeline.

Dimension 5 - Two dimensional time. Branching paths off any given time stream.

Dimension 6 - Time travel.  3D time.  Folding time back in on itself (likes the piece of paper).

Dimension 7 - All possible timelines from the beginning to the end of time. Infinity.

Dimension 8 - A line between the infinity in our universe and the infinity in an alternate universe.

Dimension 9 - Folding infinities between those universes.  Travel between universes.

Dimension 10 - The infinity of all infinities of all universes.

I guess technically it's more a lesson in the 9th dimension, than the 7th.

AS someone suggested, Star Ocean 3 is a great pick, not only the twist in the end (excellent, by the way) but most of the game has good science fiction concepts inserted (creation engines, for example)

The best choice I'd suggest is Xenosaga, that series oozes with interesting science fiction concepts (from things like the android-like realians to the parallel universes and hyperspace travel)

you don't need research to know your single person targetted virus or group of people is possible... you just need to make the virus a retrovirus that installs itself in stead of a specific DNA sequence making all the carryers of that DNA sequence the only targets...

(this is the same thing as gene therapy...)

modification of the sequence through mutation would surely affect other people, but the scale of this would depend on the lenght of the sequence (and thus the broadness of the initial virus).
The longer the sequence, the more specific, but also the least likely to mutate into a mass murderer virus. However, if your virus targets all the people with A blood type, it is more likely that a little mutation will make it target also B blood type...

Give me five minutes to put my heads back together after it exploded.

Okay, done.

I think you might be giving Silicon Knights - well, not too much credit, but credit in the wrong direction. If you want more direct influences which caused them to work with travel between universes, you should probably read Howard Phillips Lovecraft's dream sequence, specifically the stories surrounding Randolph Carter (and the city of Celephais, I guess), in whihch a man travels betwee universes and is hounded by a Mantorok-like entity. I guess, looked at from a scientific perspective, those stories would also be immensely interesting.

Lovecraft is actually responsible for a lot of science fiction concepts, incidentally, tthe most notable one being the concept of aliens among us (from Whisperer in the Darkness).

You guys will probably discard this but what Sonic Adventure II and research on developing the ultimate lifeform that can manipulate time and space with the use of a gem.

That's all pretty generic and not very specific. And you in fallout you are missing a big part of what it's meant to be... my guess is you only played Fallout 3.