SAN FRANCISCO, Dec. 20 /PRNewswire/ -- The CMP 2008 Game Developers Choice Awards, the highest honors in game development acknowledging excellence in game creation, have named the recipients of two of the special awards. Electronic engineer Ralph Baer, known to many as the "Father of Video Games" for inventing the first home video game system, commercialized as the Magnavox Odyssey game system, will receive the Pioneer Award; and Jason Della Rocca, Executive Director of the International Game Developers Association (IGDA), a professional society committed to advancing the careers and enhancing the lives of game developers, will receive the Ambassador Award.

Presented by CMP's Game Developers Conference (GDC) and Webby-award winning Gamasutra.com, this year's awards ceremony, held in conjunction with the Independent Games Festival, will be hosted on Wednesday, February 20, during GDC 2008 in the Esplanade Room in the South Hall of San Francisco's Moscone Center. For complete details, please visit http://www.gamechoiceawards.com/.

The Pioneer Award celebrates those individuals responsible for developing a breakthrough technology, game concept, or gameplay design at a crucial juncture in video game history, paving the way for the myriad developers who followed them. Ralph Baer, best known as the "Father of Video Games," holds the pioneer patents covering both the method and apparatus of video games. His work in the sixties resulted in the Magnavox Odyssey game system, which was the first commercial home video game. His early video game hardware already resides in such places as the Smithsonian and the Japanese National Science Museum, and replicas are on display all over the world.

"Ralph Baer invented video games. In the inaugural year of the Pioneer Award at the Game Developers Choice Awards, it felt natural to bestow that award on the man who established our entire industry," said Jamil Moledina, executive director of the Game Developers Conference. "Ralph is an inspiration to all who attend our conference, and we are proud to host this opportunity for our attendees to recognize and thank the creator of their vocation and art form."

The Ambassador Award honors an individual or group of individuals who have helped the game industry advance to a better place, either through facilitating a better game community from within, or by reaching outside the industry to be an advocate for video games to help further the art. Jason Della Rocca's focus as executive director of the IGDA on connecting developers with their peers, promoting professional development and advocating on issues such as quality of life, creative freedoms, workforce diversity and credit standards are qualities for which the Choice Awards Advisory Committee are naming him this year's recipient.

This year, the editors of Gamasutra.com, newly in charge of award management, worked in association with a distinguished Advisory Committee that included Clint Hocking (Ubisoft), Raph Koster (Areae), Ray Muzyka (BioWare), Ryan Lesser (Harmonix) and Brian Reynolds (Big Huge Games) to pick the Special Award winners following audience nominations. The Committee concurred with multiple developer nominations in deciding that Della Rocca deserved this first-ever Ambassador Award.

"Jason Della Rocca continues to advocate for game developers on multiple vital levels, from quality of life through crediting and beyond," said Simon Carless, publisher and editorial director of Gamasutra.com. "The Advisory Committee felt it was high time to recognize him as a true Ambassador to our industry."

For further information about the Choice Awards, please visit http://www.gamechoiceawards.com/. For further information about GDC and to register for attendance, please visit http://www.gdconf.com/.

Ralph H. Baer is an electronic engineer and engineering consultant with nearly 60 years of hands-on engineering management and product licensing experience. In the sixties and seventies Mr. Baer was the Chief Engineer for Equipment design at Sanders Associates in Nashua, NH and later became Sanders/Lockheed first Engineering Fellow. Mr. Baer has over 150 US and foreign patents. He is probably best known as the "Father of Video Games" and holds the pioneer patents covering both the method and apparatus of video games. His work in the sixties resulted in the Magnavox Odyssey game system, which was the first commercial home video game. His early video game hardware already resides in such places as the Smithsonian and the Japanese National Science Museum. Replicas are on display all over the map, including German and German museums. Mr. Baer also spent the better part of a decade in support of patent attorneys in pursuit of infringers of his and his associates' patents and in the support and surveillance of licensees. For over fifty years Mr. Baer has been active in both the commercial and defense electronics development and production business; and in electronic toy and game invention, design and licensing. Many well-known handheld electronic toys such as Milton-Bradley's "Simon" came from his lab. His home has been Manchester, New Hampshire for the past 48 years.

Jason Della Rocca is the executive director of the International Game Developers Association (IGDA), a professional society committed to advancing the careers and enhancing the lives of game developers. Jason and the IGDA focus on connecting developers with their peers, promoting professional development, and advocating on issues that affect the developer community -- such as quality of life, creative freedoms, workforce diversity and credit standards. As the spokesperson for the IGDA, Jason has appeared in countless news outlets (e.g., Wired, Nightline, LA Times, NPR, Wall Street Journal, G4, etc.) and has spoken at conferences around the world (e.g., GDC, E3, TGS, SIGGRAPH, ChinaJoy, DiGRA, etc). Jason has been a member of the game development community for over a decade, and has spent time at Matrox Graphics, Quazal and Silicon Graphics. He blogs at http://www.realitypanic.com/ and can be reached at jason@igda.org.

About the Game Developers Conference (http://www.gdconf.com/)

The Game Developers Conference (GDC) is the world's largest professionals-only game industry event. Presented every spring in San Francisco, it is the essential forum for learning, inspiration, and networking for the creators of computer, console, handheld, mobile, and online games. The GDC attracts over 16,000 attendees, and is the primary forum where programmers, artists, producers, game designers, audio professionals, business decision-makers and others involved in the development of interactive games gather to exchange ideas and shape the future of the industry. The GDC is produced by the CMP Game Group, a division of CMP Technology.

About CMP (http://www.cmp.com/)

CMP (http://www.cmp.com/) is a media and marketing solutions company serving the technology industry. With the leading online, event and print brands in all technology market categories, and with services and tools that reach beyond traditional advertising, CMP shapes and influences the technology industry worldwide. CMP publishes highly respected media brands such as TechWeb, InformationWeek, ChannelWeb, CRN, EE Times and TechOnline; produces major industry events such as Interop, Web 2.0 Expo, XChange, Game Developers Conference and the Embedded Systems Conferences; and provides business information and marketing services such as the International Customer Management Institute, Semiconductor Insights and Second Life consulting for technology marketers. CMP is a subsidiary of United Business Media (http://www.unitedbusinessmedia.com/), a global provider of news distribution and specialist information services with a market capitalization of more than $3 billion. For more CMP news, go to cmp.com/news.

CONTACT: Loria Ryan of CMP Game Group, +1-415-947-6287, lryan@cmp.com; or
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of fortyseven communications, for CMP Game Group, +1-323-658-1200

Web site: http://www.gamechoiceawards.com/
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