'Fallout 3' Wins Game Of The Year At GDC

Fallout 3, the post-apocalyptic role-playing video game developed by Bethesda Softworks, won game of the year at the Game Developers Choice Awards.

The annual awards ceremony held Wednesday at the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco also handed Bethesda and Fallout 3 the best writing award. Media Molecule's LittleBigPlanet won the most awards with four: best game design, best technology, best debut game, and the innovation award. LittleBigPlanet is a user-generated content game for Sony's PlayStation 3.

The best visual arts award went to Ubisoft's latest iteration of the Prince Of Persia, an action-adventure game for the family. Best audio went to EA Redwood Shores' horror title Dead Space, and the best handheld game was awarded to Ready at Dawn's action-adventure God Of War: Chains Of Olympus.

The World Of Goo won the best downloadable game award. Goo developer 2D Boy won the 2008 Independent Games Festival's design innovation award and technical experience award.

The Game Developers Choice Awards are voted on by developers, who this year presented the lifetime achievement award to Hideo Kojima, director of Kojima Productions and creator of the Metal Gear series. Kojima was honored for his influence on game development and his 20 years of works on Metal Gear and other successful franchises.

Video games are key to the success of the industry, driving sales of consoles, such as the Nintendo Wii, Microsoft Xbox 360, and Sony PlayStation 3, as well as portable gaming devices and a large market for accessories. Communications market researcher TMNG predicts the industry will reach $40 billion in annual worldwide revenue by 2012.

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