2006 Walk Of Game Ceremony Announced

The organizers of the 2006 Walk Of Game ceremony, honoring the new video game and video game designer inductees in the Walk of Fame-style area at San Francisco's Sony Metreon center, have announced that this year's induction ceremony will take place on the evening of Thursday, March 16th at the Metreon. Nolan Bushnell (co-founder of Atari and creator of Pong), 2005 inductee for Lifetime Achievement, will headline the invite-only event, and the space will then be open to the public on Friday, March 17, in an event timed to coincide with San Jose's Game Developers Conference 2006. The two designers chosen to receive Lifetime Achievement awards in the 2005 inductees were Sid Meier and John Carmack. Meier's contribution to the industry came in his groundbreaking simulation and strategy games, such as F-15 Strike Eagle, Civilization, Alpha Centauri, and Pirates!. Carmack's notoriety, meanwhile, stems from his programming and design landmarks, most famously seen in id Software's Doom, Quake, and Wolfenstein 3D series. Four inductees were also chosen in the Games and Characters section, including StarCraft, Blizzard Software's space-themed real-time strategy game, Final Fantasy, which catapulted developer Squaresoft to stardom in 1987, and now counts 11 main series releases, Sony Online Entertainment's EverQuest, one of the first 3D MMORPGs, and Tomb Raider star Lara Croft, who gets gets her own star independent of the series. In addition, and new to Walk Of Game's attraction in 2006, gaming fans can also come and experience why these games are the voters' choice at the Walk of Game Station - 12 unique stations featuring inducted games. The 2006 inductees will join the ranks of Nolan Bushnell, Shigeru Miyamoto, Mario, Sonic the Hedgehog, Halo and Link (The Legend of Zelda) in the special exhibit.