Valve's Portal and 2K Boston/Australia's BioShock lead the nominees for the eighth annual Game Developers Choice Awards with five nominations each, including the coveted Game of the Year title, organizers have announced.

The Game of the Year category also includes Infinity Ward's Call of Duty 4, which follows with four nominations and, with both games receiving two nominations each, Harmonix's Rock Band and Nintendo's Super Mario Galaxy.
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Game Critics Awards: "The judges of the Game Critics Awards are honored to announce the first annual Game of the Year awards. Considering games across all platforms, released commercially in North America between January 1, 2007 and December 31, 2007, the judges have voted to decide on the best of the best for the year.

To arrive at the top ten games of 2007, the judges applied a points system. Each judge nominated 10 games and awarded a score between 5 and 30 points to their chosen games, with a total point allotment of exactly 100. The cumulative total for each nominated game was then calculated to generate the ten highest scoring games. More details are available in the rules section".
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Videogamer writes:

"Welcome to Heads-up, VideoGamer.com's weekly feature which gives you an at-a-glance run-down on the games you'll be able to buy or rent this weekend. Every Tuesday we'll pick out the best of the bunch, link to our reviews and previews and keep you in the video game loop so you have enough time to pre-order for Friday's post. Time to splash the cash."

Released as part of the Platinum range, God of War 2 is now available for the bargain price of only £14.99. For those yet to pick up this bloody, action sequel, now is the time especially given the barren landscape that is the release schedule. Kratos returns and is quickly returned to his non-godly form and once again finds himself battling monsters from Greek mythology.

Those with a backwards compatible PlayStation 3 or PlayStation 2 should pick up God of War 2 without reservation. As Tom points out in his review: "If Sony were to choose a game to see off the greatest console of the previous generation, God of War 2 would be it."

Also released this week is Ratchet & Clank: Size Matters Platinum for PSP, making the very solid action platformer available for only £14.99. After a very solid run on PS2 the game made its PSP debut last summer and delivered the goods, scoring a very commendable 9/10 in the VideoGamer.com review.
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Kotaku announces the winners of Reader's Choice GOTY for the DS, PC, PS2, PS3, Wii, Xbox 360, XBLA, PSN, and Overall. (Mon Dec 31 2007)
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ActionTrip's 2007 Game of the Year voting poll registered 10673 participants. 1809 registered users voted for Call of Duty 4, 1279 for Halo 3, 1192 for Assassin's Creed, 837 for "None of the Above", 716 for BioShock, 710 for Crysis, 627 for The Orange Box, and so on. The rest of the results can be viewed in ActionTrip's voting poll section.

¿ People's Choice: Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare
¿ Runners-up: Halo 3, Assassin's Creed, Crysis, Half-Life 2: The Orange Box

¿ Game of the Year (ActionTrip Staff): Portal
¿ Runners-up: Mass Effect, Halo 3, BioShock, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, The Witcher

¿ Best Action Game: Halo 3
¿ Runners-up: Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, Half-Life 2: The Orange Box, God of War II, BioShock, Crysis

¿ Best Strategy Game: World in Conflict
¿ Runners-up: Supreme Commander, Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars

¿ Best RPG: Mass Effect
¿ Runners-up: The Witcher, Neverwinter Nights 2: Mask of the Betrayer

¿ Best Sports Game: FIFA 08
¿ Runners-up: SSX Blur, NHL 08, Winning Eleven: Pro Evolution Soccer 2008

¿ Best MMOG: World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade
¿ Runners-up: Tabula Rasa, The Lord of the Rings Online: Shadows of Angmar

¿ Best Rhythm/Music Game: Rock Band
¿ Runners-up: Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock

¿ Babe of the Year: Joanna Krupa
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Provided below via the source link is IGN entire list of individual platform picks for Best of 2007. Here are selected categories and winners:

¿ PC Game of the Year -- BioShock
¿ PS2 Game of the Year -- God of War II
¿ PS3 Game of the Year -- Uncharted: Drake's Fortune
¿ Best PlayStation Store Game -- Super Stardust HD
¿ PSP Game of the Year -- Syphon Filter: Logan's Shadow
¿ Xbox 360 Game of the Year -- Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare
¿ Best Xbox Live Arcade Game -- Puzzle Quest: Challenge of the Warlords
¿ Wii Game of the Year -- Super Mario Galaxy
¿ DS Game of the Year -- The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass
¿ Wireless Game of the Year -- Digital Chocolate Cafe

For each applicable platform, IGN also picks the Best Action Game, Best Adventure Game, Best Expansion, Best Fighting Game, Best First-Person Shooter, Best Music Game, Best Persistent World Game, Best Platform Game, Best Puzzle Game, Best Racing/Driving Game, Best RPG, Best Simulation, Best Sports Game, Best Strategy Game, Best Graphics Technology, Best Artistic Design, Best Original Score, Best Licensed Soundtrack, Best End Credit Song, Best Use of Sound, Best Story, Best Local Multiplayer Game, Best Online Multiplayer Game, Best Downloadable Content, Most Innovative Design, Best Use of the Wii-Mote, Best Game No One Played, Best Revival, Biggest Surprise, and Best Developer.

IGN Best of 2007 Awards also feature gaming and non-gaming categories in Movies, TV, DVD (includes HD DVD and Blu-ray Discs), Music, Comics, Gears, Sports, and Stars. Of those categories, the gaming-related winners are:

¿ Best Videogame Adaptation (Movies) -- Hitman
¿ Best Videogame Soundtrack/Score (Music) -- Super Mario Galaxy Soundtrack
¿ Best Best PC Peripheral (Gears) -- Novint Falcon
¿ Best Console Peripheral (Gears) -- Rock Band: Special Edition
¿ Best HDTV (Gears) -- Pioneer Project Kuro Plasm...
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The Chanticleer's Art & Entertainment editor Toni Merriss picks her ten best games of 2007.
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1UP just received word that SCEA Santa Monica game director Cory Barlog, best known for his work on God of War II, will soon leave the studio to pursue other opportunities.

"We can confirm that Cory Barlog, game director for God of War II, is leaving the SCEA SM Studio and we are grateful for his work and creative vision for the critically acclaimed God of War franchise," says a Sony spokesperson. "Moving forward, we are confident in the God of War team, as they are an extremely talented group of people that are passionate about the franchise and dedicated to creating even more epic content with God of War: Chains of Olympus for the PSP and God of War III for PS3."

Notably, this statement also provides the first instance of Sony saying the words "God of War III" in public.
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Tens of thousands of gamers voted for the true people's awards, held Friday in London, which highlighted the elite titles from the past year across a diverse range of categories.

Undoubtedly the big winner at this year's awards was Microsoft and Epic's stellar third-person shooter Gears of War, which took four top honors. Gears triumphed in the Ultimate Game of the Year, Xbox Game of the Year, The Nuts All-Nighter and the Editor's Choice categories. It also placed third in the 1Xtra Soundtrack of the Year and The GameTribe Online Game of the Year categories.

Codemasters received the UK Developer of the Year award for 2007 sponsored by Next-Gen.biz, while Game took the prizes for Retailer of the Year. Nintendo took the Publisher of the Year award ahead of Microsoft Game Studios and Codemasters, while the Wii was labeled Innovation of the Year.
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Acclaimed God of War composer Cris Velasco has delivered a "haunting" orchestral score for Clive Barker's upcoming action-horror game Jericho.
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David Jaffe confirmed in an interview with GamePro that Eat Sleep Play's three upcoming games would in fact be original PS3 exclusives.

Jaffe clarified statements that in addition to the Twisted Metal: Head-On port for PS2, his new independent studio of 20 employees will concurrently be working on the first of three original games exclusively for PlayStation 3.

"I can't disclose themes," Jaffe said, "but the new game is medium to hardcore in terms of game play and will focus heavily on multiplayer."
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Sony's PlayStation 2 sequel God of War II has taken the top two spots in the Spanish all-formats charts, while also recording strong sales in Italy.

Both the standard edition and the Special Edition of the game are performing well, proving there's still plenty of life in Sony's current-gen home console.

Other successes in the Spanish market include Activision's Spider-Man 3 and the budget and platinum release of Konami's Pro Evolution Soccer 6.
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Surely Sony Computer Entertainment would be mad not to bring its flagship gore-fest God of War to the PlayStation 3 - and if the latest hints are anything to go by, the Santa Monica studio is at least considering it. "There's definitely the enthusiasm of us wanting to do that, to make the God of War III," series director Cory Barlog told ShackNews, "but there's obviously no commitment to that right now." Right, so officially they're not working on it but that doesn't stop him offering ... » Read More

The big problem with cell phone games is that they tend to be designed for non-gamers. Sure, we know there are probably a zillion more copies of Snake out there slithering around on cell phones than there are Gears of War spinning in 360s, but that doesn't mean Snake doesn't suck. However, that may all be about to change with the release of God of War Betrayal, the first mobile game we've seen that actually had us pricing a new phone. Slated to hit this June for Verizon customers and in July ... » Read More

God of War II for PlayStation 2 prevails over its rivals, topping the bestsellers charts in Australia. Competition from Wii, DS, Xbox 360 and even the PS3 allegedly don't even come close.
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Joystiq spoke with Daphna Nachminovitch, Director of Domestic Animal and Wildlife Rescue & Information at PETA, and she told them that they received several dozen emails and phone calls about the incident over the weekend as the story broke. She says that the reason PETA didn't make a public statement is because the public was already well aware of the incident and clearly found it objectionable.
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Sony has issued a statement regarding the use of a beheaded goat in a God of War II promotion in Athens, Greece.

Full Statement

"The media event for the PS2 title God of War ll took place in Athens, Greece on 1st March. Approximately 20 journalists from European countries attended the event from a variety of gaming and lifestyle media - although none were from the UK.

The event was a theatrical dramatisation with a Greek mythological theme and, as part of the set dressing, a dead goat was provided by the production company from a qualified local butcher. Following the mainstream popularity of shows such as 'I'm a Celebrity, Get me out of here' a series of challenges were set for the journalists. The 'warm entrails' referred to in the invitation and in the Mail on Sunday article was actually a meat soup, made to a traditional Greek recipe and served to attendees in china bowls direct from the caterers. There was never any question of journalists being able to touch the goat, or indeed eat the soup direct from the body of the goat, as one report has alleged. The goat was returned to the butcher at the end of the event.

The article in UK Official PlayStation Magazine (OPSM), from which the Mail on Sunday article was sourced, was written by a journalist who did not attend and done on the basis of the invitation for the event, which employed a degree of hyperbole in order to encourage attendance - the journalist chose to take it as fact!

The photograph was one of many supplied to the magazine to provide a balanced view of the event. Unfortunately, the article was sensationalised and focused on a picture that was unrepresentative of the wider event. When we saw the article for the first time on Thursday of last week we contacted the Publisher of OPSM who accepted that the article was not appropriate for their broad audience. On Friday, before we had received any contact from the media, they agreed t...
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The Daily Mail reports that Sony's bizarre PR campaigns may of finally crossed the line when the corpse of the decapitated animal was the centrepiece of a party to celebrate the launch of the God Of War II game for the company's PlayStation 2 console.

Sony has said that "It has come to our attention that at the God Of War II launch showcase, an element of the event was of an unsuitable nature. We are conducting an internal inquiry into aspects of the event in order to learn from the occurrence and put into place measures to ensure that this does not happen again."
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Sony Computer Entertainment appears to have dropped the name of Kratos' ultra-violent PSP outing, God of War: Chains of Olympus. The news comes from super-secret marketing site Island of Rhodes, which seems to have spelled out the entire title of the mysterious God of War game. We're assuming Chains of Olympus is the much-touted PSP series entry, because we can't really see a 'III' fitting on the end of that logo - though the third, PS3 entry is undoubtedly under construction. We'll let you ... » Read More