Develop magazine has announced the finalists for the Develop Industry Excellence Awards 2008.

There's no surprise that GTA IV developers, Rockstar, received the joint highest number of nominations - five to be exact - alongside Ninja Theory, the bods behind highly-acclaimed combat action game, Heavenly Sword.

Sony, Codemasters, Frontier and Criterion also picked up multiple nominations.

"This year's finalists showcase the massive amount of games development talent found in Europe," said Michael French, editor of Develop.

"Be it digitally-distributed games, MMOs, first-person shooters or action-adventures, there's no area of the industry that hasn't been bolstered by Europe's diverse sector of games development companies in the past year. We wish all of the nominees the best of luck and look forward to seeing them on what's set to be a great night."

The award ceremony will take place at the Develop conference in Brighton on July 30th

>> Via - Gamesindustry.biz