From the 23rd to the 27th of March, the Game Developers Conference will be held in San Francisco with the purpose to shed some light on the future of gaming and the opportunities mobile games, digital distribution and outsourcing bring to the table – and Google will be participating on March 25 with the new iGoogle game gadgets. Yes, the development team at Google has decided that giving iGoogle chat capabilities is not enough, so they decided to make it game-friendly as well.

There are two things that one should take note of. The first one is that the gaming industry is booming as more and more people decide to spend their hard earned money on games, rather than other sources of entertainment. The second is that the 2009 GDC is one of the most important events in the gaming industry. If you are a heavyweight in the gaming industry, your presence there is a definite must. Google is not exactly known for its gaming endeavors, but it is a big company with numerous resources and tons of users on its side, so it will be interesting to see what it showcases.

Google has officially announced its participation to the 2009 Game Developers Conference via the message which we’ve reproduced here: “

“Please join us on the night of March 25th as we give you an exclusive sneak peak at our new collection of gaming themes for iGoogle, Google’s personalized homepage. We will be creating an interactive experience that will bring the gaming industry’s most iconic characters to life and allow you to ride through their adventures. You’ll hear from some of the game publishers involved in the project and Google’s VP of Search Products and User Experience, Marissa Mayer. As an added bonus, you can see an early preview of a few of the game gadgets that developers are building for iGoogle using OpenSocial. It’s an event you won’t want to miss.”

More details on the upcoming Game Developers Conference are available here.