Brain Training wins <i>Edge</i> award

EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND--A 'close to unanimous' jury, chosen by Edge magazine, today awarded its annual innovation in gaming award to Nintendo. The EIEF06 Edge Award, presented by editor Margaret Robertson, was awarded to Dr. Kawashima's Brain Training (known as Brain Age: Train Your Brain in Minutes a Day in the United States) at a ceremony that closed out the first day of the Edinburgh fest.

The game beat out a short list of titles chosen for their ability to change people's expectations of gaming, rather than the game's commercial success. The other contenders were Amped 3 (Xbox 360), Dragon Quest VIII: Journey of the Cursed King (PlayStation 2), Electroplankton (Nintendo DS), Fahrenheit (PC, PS2, Xbox--known as Indigo Prophecy in the US), Guitar Hero (PS2), Killer 7 (GameCube, PS2), and Ossu! Tatakae! Ouendan! (DS--known as Elite Beat Agents in the US).

The Nintendo rep who picked up the prize said that Brain Training represented the different direction in which the company is headed, one which aims to expand the market and ultimately benefit gaming as a whole. Robertson, summing up the success of the grey-cell-testing game, said that "only Nintendo could make mental arithmetic this year's 'must have' [title]."

Alongside the main Edge award was a new award added to recognize the growing mobile sector. The EIEF 2006 Edge Mobile People's Choice Award went to Dirty Sanchez Party Games. The game, which beat mobile rivals Doom RPG, Lumines Mobile, and Digital Chocolate's Tower Blocks for the inaugural award, was praised for taking the game "beyond the handset."