Spike TV Video Game Awards Coverage

We were setup to attend Spike TV’s first annual Video Game Awards
show last night, but were unable to cover the show for several reason,
which we won’t go into here. Instead, we were able to watch the show on
DVR, an invention which has proved its worth yet again, with the
ability to fast forward through recorded programming (some of you may
remember another device, the VCR, having such a function).

The
show was dismal, to but it bluntly. I’ll give it credit for being a
first try, but just like G4’s G-Phoria annual awards, the show panders
to media hype and gives out ridiculous awards by celebrities that have
little to do with the games or the industry at all. We kid you not, an
award was given to Burnout 3 (a worthy game) for the category of Most
Addicitve Game Fueled by Mountain FREAKIN Dew.

Blatant
commercialism (another award was ‘sponsored’ by Pontiac GMC) defeats
the purpose of providing awards based on the talents of game makers and
does more to harm the overall view of players rather than show them as
regular human beings, instead of the shut-ins that occasionally go
nuts, fueled by caffeine, and attempt murder.

I will give Spike
another hint of credit for including a Designer of the Year award,
honoring Jason Jones for his work on Halo 2, but little of the other
awards were specific to the people, only the games.

Maybe we
need to take these shows OFF the air and actually give honor and credit
to the people that bring us the good games. Rather than go off on my
own though, I point you to an excellent editorial written by Zonk on Slashdot.org. He says it all and more, comparing the BS of this awards show to its opposite, the Childs Play charity auction and dinner, held now annualy, by the gamers at Penny-Arcade.com. These guys are setting the best example and aren’t getting the kickbacks from Pepsi to fuel it.