The ceremony, produced and hosted by CMP Technology's Game Developers Conference (GDC) and presented by the International Game Developers Association (IGDA), honors the developers of the best videogames released during the previous calendar year. The Game Developers Choice Awards is the only awards program in the industry with an open peer-based nomination system where honors are bestowed to developers by developers, shining the spotlight on the artists who so often remain behind the scenes. Recipients will be announced during the GDC, which will take place March 5-9, 2007 at San Francisco's Moscone Center.

"The GDC derives its authenticity from the developers themselves, who teach and share at the show -- the Game Developers Choice Awards is then the natural validation of their collective artistic effort, voted on and awarded to individual game creators," said Jamil Moledina, Executive Director of the Game Developers Conference. "Since the Choice Awards have an open nomination process and reflect the judgement of peers, the awards have earned the highest respect of the community."

The Game Developers Choice Award ceremony, hosted by development community darling and 2006 award recipient Tim Schafer of Double Fine Productions, will take place Wednesday, March 7 at 6:30 p.m. within the Esplanade Ballroom of the Moscone Center's South Hall. Entertainers appearing include DJ Chris and Mega64. The Independent Game Festival Awards will be announced at the same ceremony in a program hosted by PocketWatch Games' Andy Schatz.

"Yet again, we received thousands of nomination submissions from around the world, a fact that makes it an enormous honor just to be named as one of the five finalists from each category," said Jason Della Rocca, executive director of the IGDA. "Nobody knows what goes into game development better than the developers themselves, so we are excited to see who the community votes to receive each of these very competitive awards."

Nominations for the 7th annual Game Developer Choice Awards were free of charge and all IGDA members were able to participate, ensuring that the nominees reflect the international development community's opinions. The IGDA membership will vote on the finalists. In addition to the voted award categories, honors will be presented for the Lifetime Achievement, First Penguin, Community Contribution, Maverick and Innovation awards.

The complete list of nominees is (all names listed alphabetically):

Best Game

• Gears of War (Epic Games / Microsoft Game Studios) - Cliff Bleszinski, Michael Capps, Rod Fergusson
• Okami (Clover Studio / Capcom Entertainment) - Atsushi Inaba, Hideki Kamiya
• The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion (Bethesda Game Studios / 2K Games/Bethesda Softworks) - Todd Howard
• The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (Nintendo EAD / Nintendo) - Eiji Aonuma, Satoru Iwata, Shigeru Miyamoto
• Wii Sports (Nintendo) - Satoru Iwata, Shigeru Miyamoto, Keizo Ohta, Takayuki Shimamura, Yoshiaki Yamashita

Audio

• Company of Heroes (Relic Entertainment / THQ) - Crispin Hands, John Johnson, Jennifer Lewis, John Tennant
• DEFCON: Everybody Dies (Introversion Software) - Alistair Lindsay, Michael Maidment
• Guitar Hero II (Harmonix Music Systems / RedOctane) - Jeff Allen, Eric Brosius, Izzy Maxwell
• Lara Croft Tomb Raider: Legend (Crystal Dynamics / Eidos Interactive) - Troels Folmann, Karl Gallagher, Mike Peaslee, Gregg Stephens
• LocoRoco (Sony Computer Entertainment) - Kemmei Adachi, Tomonobu Kikuchi, Kouji Niikura, Nobuyuki Shimizu

Character Design

• Final Fantasy XII (Square Enix) - Hideo Minaba, Hiroshi Minagawa, Akihiko Yoshida
• LocoRoco (Sony Computer Entertainment) - Tsutomu Kouno, Keigo Tsuchiya
• Okami (Clover Studio / Capcom Entertainment) - Mari Shimazaki, Sawaki Takeyasu, Kenichirou Yoshimura
• Rayman Raving Rabbids (Ubisoft Montpellier Studio / Ubisoft Entertainment) - Michel Ancel, Charles Beirnaert, Hubert Chevillard, Florent Sacre
• Viva Pinata (Rare / Microsoft Game Studios) - Ryan Stevenson

Game Design

• Bully (Rockstar Vancouver / Rockstar Games) - Michael Skupa
• Okami (Clover Studio / Capcom Entertainment) - Hideki Kamiya
• The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion (Bethesda Game Studios / 2K Games/Bethesda Softworks) - Todd Howard
• Viva Pinata (Rare / Microsoft Game Studios) - Justin Cook, Gregg Mayles
• Wii Sports (Nintendo) - Keizo Ohta, Takayuki Shimamura, Yoshiaki Yamashita

Technology

• Company of Heroes (Relic Entertainment / THQ) - Drew Dunlop, Shelby Hubick, David Swinerd, Ian Thomson
• Dead Rising (Capcom Entertainment) - Shinya Ikuta, Tomofumi Ishida, Yasuhide Sawada, Tomohiro Ueda
• Gears of War (Epic Games / Microsoft Game Studios) - Michael Capps, Ray Davis, Tim Sweeney, Daniel Vogel
• Rockstar Games presents Table Tennis (Rockstar San Diego / Rockstar Games) - Ted Carson, Eugene Foss, Wil Paredes, Steve Reed
• Wii Sports (Nintendo) - Takuhiro Dohta, Takeshi Miyamoto, Keizo Ohta, Kenta Sato

Visual Arts

• Final Fantasy XII (Square Enix) - Isamu Kamikokuryo, Hideo Minaba, Akihiko Yoshida
• Gears of War (Epic Games / Microsoft Game Studios) - Jerry O'Flaherty, Chris Perna
• Okami (Clover Studio / Capcom Entertainment) - Naoki Katakai, Kenichirou Yoshimura
• The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion (Bethesda Game Studios / 2K Games/Bethesda Softworks) - Matthew Carofano, Christiane Meister, Istvan Pely
• Viva Pinata (Rare / Microsoft Game Studios) - Ed Bryan, Ryan Stevenson

Writing

• Bully (Rockstar Vancouver / Rockstar Games) - Dan Houser, Jacob Krarup
• Dreamfall: The Longest Journey (Funcom / Aspyr Media) - Dag Scheve, Ragnar Tørnquist
• Sam & Max Episode 1: Culture Shock (Telltale Games / GameTap) - Brendan Ferguson, Dave Grossman, Steve Purcell
• The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion (Bethesda Game Studios / 2K Games/Bethesda Softworks) - Ken Rolston
• The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (Nintendo EAD / Nintendo) - Kyogoku Aya, Nate Bihldorff, Mitsuhiro Takano

New Studio

• Gastronaut Studios (Small Arms) - Jacob Van Wingen, Don Wurster
• Iron Lore Entertainment (Titan Quest) - Paul Chieffo, Jeff Goodsill, Brian Sullivan
• Naked Sky Entertainment (RoboBlitz) - Joshua Glazer, Tian Mu, Sam Thibault
• Ready At Dawn Studios (Daxter) - Didier Malenfant, Andrea Pessino, Ru Weerasuriya
• Wadjet Eye Games (The Shiva) - Chris Femo, Dave Gilbert, Peter Gresser, Ian Schlaepfer