GDC Awards 2015 Nominees Announced

The full list of nominees for the 2015 Game Developers Choice Awards were announced today. Here are the games and developers being honored this year by their peers:

Game of the Year

Bayonetta 2 (Platinum Games/Nintendo)

Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor (Monolith Productions/Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment)

Destiny (Bungie/Activision)

Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft (Blizzard)

Alien: Isolation (Creative Assembly/Sega)

Honorable Mentions: Titanfall (Respawn/Electronic Arts), Valiant Hearts: The Great War (Ubisoft Montpellier/Ubisoft), Far Cry 4 (Ubisoft Montreal/Ubisoft), Dragon Age: Inquisition (BioWare/Electronic Arts), Super Smash Bros. for Wii U (Sora Ltd. and BANDAI NAMCO/Nintendo)

Innovation Award

Bounden (Game Oven)

Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor (Monolith Productions/Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment)

This War of Mine (11 bit studios)

The Vanishing of Ethan Carter (The Astronauts)

Monument Valley (Ustwo)

Honorable Mentions: Crypt of the Necrodancer (Brace Yourself Games), Extrasolar (Lazy 8 Studios), Elite: Dangerous (Frontier Developments), Elegy For A Dead World (Dejobaan Games), 80 Days (Inkle Studios)

Best Debut

Yacht Club Games (Shovel Knight)

Respawn Entertainment (Titanfall)

The Astronauts (The Vanishing of Ethan Carter)

Stoic Studio (The Banner Saga)

Upper One Games (Never Alone)

Honorable Mentions: Dynamighty (CounterSpy), Hinterland Games (The Long Dark), 1337 & Senri (Leo's Fortune), MachineGames (Wolfenstein: The New Order), Hipster Whale (Crossy Road)

Best Design

Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor (Monolith Productions/Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment)

Shovel Knight (Yacht Club Games)

Dragon Age: Inquisition (BioWare/Electronic Arts)

Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker (Nintendo EAD Tokyo and 1-Up Studio/Nintendo)

Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft (Blizzard)

Honorable Mentions: Mario Kart 8 (Nintendo EAD Tokyo/Nintendo), Alien: Isolation (Creative Assembly/Sega), Destiny (Bungie/Activision), Monument Valley (Ustwo), Far Cry 4 (Ubisoft Montreal/Ubisoft)

Best Handheld/Mobile Game

Threes! (Sirvo)

Super Smash Bros. 3DS (Sora Ltd. and BANDAI NAMCO/Nintendo)

Hearthstone (Blizzard)

80 Days (Inkle Studios)

Monument Valley (Ustwo)

Honorable Mentions: Bounden (Game Oven), Bravely Default (Silicon Studio and Square Enix/Nintendo and Square Enix), Desert Golfing (Blinkbat Games), Velocity 2X (FuturLab), Fantasy Life (Level-5/Nintendo)

Best Visual Art

Monument Valley (Ustwo)

Hohokum (Honeyslug and Sony Santa Monica/Sony)

Child of Light (Ubisoft Montreal/Ubisoft)

Bayonetta 2 (Platinum Games/Nintendo)

Alien: Isolation (Creative Assembly/Sega)

Honorable Mentions: Never Alone (Upper One Games/E-Line Media), The Vanishing of Ethan Carter (The Astronauts), Transistor (Supergiant Games), Broken Age: Act 1 (Double Fine Productions), Destiny (Bungie/Activision)

Best Narrative

80 Days (Inkle Studios)

This War of Mine (11 bit studios)

Kentucky Route Zero: Episode 3 (Cardboard Computer)

Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor (Monolith Productions/Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment)

The Vanishing of Ethan Carter (The Astronauts)

Honorable Mentions: Dragon Age: Inquisition (BioWare/Electronic Arts), Valiant Hearts: The Great War (Ubisoft Montpellier/Ubisoft), Tales From The Borderlands: Episode 1 (Gearbox Software/Telltale Games), D4: Dark Dreams Don't Die (Access Games/Microsoft), Hatoful Boyfriend (Mediatonic/Devolver Digital)

Best Audio

Alien: Isolation (Creative Assembly/Sega)

Hohokum (Honeyslug/Sony)

Destiny (Bungie/Activision)

Transistor (Supergiant Games)

The Vanishing of Ethan Carter (The Astronauts)

Honorable Mentions: Child of Light (Ubisoft Montreal/Ubisoft), Far Cry 4 (Ubisoft Montreal/Ubisoft), D4: Dark Dreams Don't Die (Access Games/Microsoft), Bayonetta 2 (Platinum Games/Nintendo), Crypt of the Necrodancer (Brace Yourself Games)

Best Technology

Destiny (Bungie/Activision)

Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor (Monolith Productions/Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment)

Wolfenstein: The New Order (MachineGames/Bethesda)

Elite: Dangerous (Frontier Developments)

Far Cry 4 (Ubisoft Montreal/Ubisoft)

Honorable Mentions: Assassin's Creed Unity (Ubisoft Montreal/Ubisoft), The Last of Us: Remastered (Naughty Dog/Sony), Sunset Overdrive (Insomniac Games/Microsoft), Alien: Isolation (Creative Assembly/Sega), Infamous: Second Son (Sucker Punch Productions/Sony)

Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor leads all games with five nominations. Indie adventure game The Vanishing Ethan Carter picked up four. Other games with multiple nominations include Alien: Isolation, Hearthstone, Destiny and Bayonetta 2.

Every year, the GDC Awards also include three special honors: the Pioneer, Ambassador and Lifetime Achievement awards. GI.biz announces that the Pioneer awards will be given to Ralph Baer, creator of the first video game system, and Al Alcorn, designer of Pong. The Ambassador and Lifetime Achievement Award recipients haven't been announced yet.

The 2015 GDC Awards will be held at the Moscone Convention Center in San Francisco on Wednesday, March 4th. The ceremony will run from 6:30 to 8:30. We'll be sure to post the winners list afterward.