Mayor Greg Nickels of Seattle and the World Cyber Games Committee (WCGC) announced today that Seattle will host the 2007 World Cyber Games Grand Final, and over 700 video gamers from 70 countries are expected to attend. “Hosting the World Cyber Games in Seattle is a fitting tribute to our thriving video game industry, which has over fifty game development companies in the Puget Sound area,” said Mayor Greg Nickels. “We welcome the opportunity to host participants from around the world and show them our Seattle hospitality.” Seattle will be only the second US city to host the WCG Grand Final with the first city being San Francisco in 2004 which marked the first time the final was held outside of Korea. Last year, nearly 700 finalists from 67 countries competed in the Grand Final event in Singapore. Over 55,000 people attended the five-day festival to cheer on their respective countries.
Started as the World Cyber Challenge in 2000, the WCG was first officially held in 2001 and continues today under the slogan, “Beyond the Game.” It has grown into the world’s largest computer and video games festival with more than 1 million competing in 2005 in local, regional and national qualifying tournaments. Mr. Hank Jeong, chief executive of International Cyber Marketing, said “We appreciate the efforts by Mayor Nickels and the city of Seattle to bring this global event back to the United States next year.”
The World Cyber Games prides itself on leading the “Digital Entertainment Culture.” The WCG 2006 will be held on October 18-22, 2006 in Monza, Italy, and organizers expect up to 700 of the world’s best gamers will travel to Monza to participate in the games. For more information you can visit [a]http://www.worldcybergames.com/main.asp[aa]World Cyber Games[/a].

[i]- Travis Johnson[/i]