BAFTA. Not to be confused with BAMFTA.

​The British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) recently announced a new category featuring video games would be added to its roster of annual recognitions next year.

 

BAFTA is now set to become one of the first major awards-giving bodies to recognize social gaming with its newest category in the GAME British Academy Video Games Awards.

 

According to Ray Maguire, Chairman of BAFTA's video games committee, BAFTA is indentifying and rewarding excellence and innovation within social gaming in order to recognize and further encourage creativity in this area.

 

"The rise in popularity and sophistication of social media gaming has been meteoric," Maguire said. "It is only right to recognize the hard work, fantastic creativity and great success being demonstrated in this new area of the industry."

With games like FarmVille netting about 60 million active players on a monthly basis and a reported 50 percent of all Facebook users taking part in some sort of social gaming, it's no wonder this latest branch of gaming is earning some serious attention.

 

BAFTA is currently considering dozens of titles for the new award, which will be announced Wednesday, March 16, of next year, and the presentation will be streamed live at bafta.org.

 

No word on whether all current social games are eligible or if a title has to have come out within the past year. Still, we wonder what games you fine readers might nominate for such a prestigious award.