GameDaily's Persons of the Year 2006

5- 2 Persons
Todd Howard, executive producer of the The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion.

"that one game to really show off the power of next-gen gaming. What they got was one of the most expansive,immersive, open, and detailed games ever made."

And, Ted Price, Resistance: Fall of Man leader

"the pressure on Price to deliver an exceptional title that would (hopefully) spark PS3 sales this holiday and beyond must have been enormous."

4- Epic Games' Lead Designer Cliff Bleszinski

"it was (unsurprisingly) Epic itself that showed everyone how to harness the true power of the middleware." for Gears of War.

3- Rob Pardo, Blizzard Entertainment's VP of Game Design.

"Pardo had to build his fantasy world from scratch. Over the course of five years, Pardo created an entire history, a culture, races, geography, etc."

2- Nintendo President Satoru Iwata.

"it's Iwata's job to steer the company in the right direction, and of course to look out for the bottom line. He's arguably doing this better than anyone at Sony's or Microsoft's game divisions."

"Of course, one of the reasons that Nintendo remains profitable is that it traditionally does not lose much money (if any) on hardware sales"

"Iwata deserves an enormous amount of credit for having the courage of his conviction, sticking to his vision for the Wii and following through with a successful launch"

1- Douglas Lowenstein, Entertainment Software Association President.

"without the right man to "steer the ship" the industry would not be in the position it is in today. Think about how much the video game sector has grown since 1994, and not just financially. It's become a mainstream force to be reckoned with, rivaling movies, television and the Internet. Video games are now thoroughly embedded in U.S. culture."

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Source: biz.gamedaily.com