Press Release from Nickelodeon
SAN FRANCISCO, June 1 -- Nickelodeon's AddictingGames, the largest source of the best free games on the web and one of CNET's top five gaming sites (December 2008), today announced the nominees for the first-ever "The AddictingGames Showdown," a convergent, prime-time TV event honoring the best in online games. "Pencil Racer 3: Drive It", "50 States", "Porta-Pusher" and "Bloons" are among the coolest, funniest and most addicting games nominated from the site's library of 3,000 games across 10 different categories. The cream of the gaming crop, chosen by AddictingGamers themselves, will jump from the web to prime-time TV and back again on Saturday, June 27, from 8 to 10 p.m. ET/PT, in a first-of-its-kind fun and quirky on-air "Showdown" across Nickelodeon and AddictingGames.
"There is an incredible amount of talent and creativity that goes into making these online games," said Dave Williams, Senior Vice President and General Manager, Nickelodeon Kids and Family Games Group. "Online gamers have grown by 23 percent to 86 million players a year per comScore, fueled in part by the content from the one-thousand plus developers with whom AddictingGames works. This event will give them the recognition they deserve."
AddictingGames has ranked as the top independent gaming site for more than two and a half years and is the number-one place to reach Men 12 to 24 who are gaming online (source: comScore, April 2009). The site just had its best month ever with 11.6 million unique visitors (source: comScore U.S., April 2009). With 50 new games launching every month, AddictingGames provides games that are fresh, timely and relevant to pop culture. AddictingGames' recently launched "NewsGames," which focus on current events, including "Hero on the Hudson," "Trillion Dollar Bailout," and "Baseball Juiced," have independently generated nearly 8 million game plays since January 2009.
Voting for "The AddictingGames Showdown" begins June 3 and runs through June 27 on http://www.addictinggames.com/showdown. AddictingGamers can pay tribute to the best games across the web by voting in categories including: "Most Adrenaline Pumping Game"; "Greatest Escape Game"; "Mostest Edumacational Game"; and "Most AddictingGame"; among others. On June 27, between brand-new episodes of iCarly and True Jackson, VP, the winners will be announced on AddictingGames and Nickelodeon through humorous and witty on-air vignettes -- hosted by iCarly's Jerry Trainor -- that will bring the online games to life.
"The AddictingGames Showdown" nominees include:
Most AddictingGame-- Parking Lot-- Stunt Dirt Bike-- World Wars-- Worlds Hardest Game
Best Performance by a Monkey-- Bloons-- Dance Monkey Dance-- Monkey Go Happy-- Pencil Racer XL
Most Courageous Stick Figure Stunt-- Electric Man 2-- Fancy Pants Adventure-- Pencil Racer 3: Drive It-- Porta-Pusher
Greatest Escape Game-- Charger Escape-- Escape the Car-- Escape the Phone Booth-- Synapsis
Best Game from Planet Random-- Dibs Adventure to Mount Wafers-- Headspin Storybook-- Hide the Farta in Sparta-- Tattoo Artist
Your Mom's Favorite Game-- Bubble Spinner-- Daily Jigsaw-- Let's Get Cookin'-- Sara's Super Spa
Best Performance by a Robot-- Agent Platformer-- Build a Robot 3-- Chronotron-- Pixel Mission
Most Adrenaline Pumping Game-- Moto Rush-- Ragdoll Volleyball-- Redline Rumble
-- Supreme Extreme Snowboarding
Poppiest Pop Culture Game-- Baseball Juiced-- Hero on the Hudson-- Mix Master
-- Trillion Dollar Bailout
Mostest Edumacational Game-- 50 States-- Battleground States 2008-- Globe Game-- Magic Pen
AddictingGames is part of the Nickelodeon Kids and Family Group portfolio of digital sites, which serves kids, tweens and teens, and parents, and focuses on the pre-eminent activities that its audiences participate in online: games, social networks and community, and video. Nickelodeon Kids and Family Group's portfolio of digital sites registered its second straight month at number one in all key metrics with 29 million monthly visitors; 124 million total visits; 1.8 billion page views; and 81.6 minutes for average time spent per visitor, according to April's comScore Media Metrix.
