Gamescrap has 7 chronicles

1. Why Video Game Award Shows Suck
   

   Player Chronicle -- Posted on Apr 24 2008

   Before I got my PHD in bad games, swankdom, and how to make a bad ass tater tot casserole, I was a young lad with a Vectrex and a NES. When I was growing up, I always wished that gaming, the hobby I loved and lived, would someday be taken seriously. Now here I am some twenty years later and I’d like to officially retract my childhood wish. After years of piss-poor video game award shows, namely the Spike VGA’s and G-Phoria as the most vile offenders, I’ve finally given up on any hope of any kind of legit and entertaining event showcasing the best of gaming. After seeing Spike’s nominees for this year’s awards, I can’t help but feel embarrassed for the presenters, the numerous B-List celebs, and the developers most of all who ultimately end up playing second fiddle to the likes of William Shatner. So before I start going off on an anger-fueled harangue, let’s look a little more in-depth as to why video game award shows just plain suck.
   
   
   

   The Nominees Are…..WTF?!
   
   No matter what the award is, whether it’s music, movies, or whatever, there’s always bound to be some sort of controversy with the nominations. While the Oscars and Grammys have the bitter, decrepit old mummies to blame for their lame nominations – it’s safe to assume there’s some sort of method to their arcane madness and they might know a thing or two about the subject matter they’re nominating. Whoever deems games worthy of nomination for video game award shows either doesn’t know games or is most likely getting a little something under the table from sponsors – and I’m sure it’s more than money if you catch my drift.
   
   Case in point, let’s take a look at the Spike VGAs. This year saw games such as Assassin’s Creed, Rock Band, and even Mass Effect get nominated before they were even released, to which the latter is up for game of the year. Nor can you overlook the glaring oversight of 2005’s shooter of the year award, which went to Halo – a PC port of a game from 2001, or this year’s nomination of Wii Sports – a game that was brought into the world over a year ago. Let’s not look past the fact that two out of the three nominees for game of the year are from Microsoft Game Studios and a third was an Xbox 360 exclusive.
   
   
   
   Spike TV, in a partnership with PepsiCo wants your money.
   
   If unreleased games don’t show you how willing the corporations that are supposedly giving us “award shows for gamers by gamers” are to selling out, look no further than the product placement so shameless, it makes EA blush. This year both G-Phoria and the Spike VGAs featured special categories such as the “Best Stride [gum] Longest Lasting Game” or this year’s “Most Addictive Game Fueled by Dew” to which Spike has Halo 3, Wii Sports, Rock Band, and the Orange Box have been nominated. I’ve got a 24-pack of Game Fuel for anyone who’s betting that Halo 3 takes the award. We’ll find out December 9th, won’t we?
   
   This isn’t the first time that the Spike VGAs have received criticism for being bought out. In 2005, gamers everywhere cried foul at the nominations of Peter Jackson’s King Kong and 50 Cent: Bulletproof well before their respective release dates, and the latter receiving a game of the year nomination despite getting panned by critics everywhere and so many other games deserving that spot.
   
   Of course, there’s still plenty to say about the cluelessness of these supposed gamers that are nominating these games that they deem to be the best of the best. After all, any gamer wouldn’t mistake a popular PSP game for a Nintendo DS game that hasn’t even been released in the US yet would they? Thank you very much, GameTrailers. Let’s not forget the large omission of any Wii-specific games that aren’t Super Mario Galaxy or the well-aged Wii sports. To this I ask where’s Metroid Prime 3 which garnered its fair share of hype or even WarioWare: Smooth Moves, which was in itself a unique and entertaining game.
   
   It’s just obvious that the people backing these supposed award shows are nothing but money-grubbing prostitutes of advertising and marketing willing to suck off or toss anyone’s salad as long as they get a buck out of it. Don’t be fooled by the pseudo trendy, hip, and “stick it to the man” exterior these shows attempt to emulate – behind the scenes these supposed trendsetters are on all fours presenting themselves to the next wave of advertisers lining up to taint next year’s award show.
   
   Here to promote his new TekWar book…William Shatner!
   
   ....Also, some guy who made Halo won an award.
   
   While Spike’s VGAs amount to nothing more than an exhibition of just how out of touch the mainstream is when it comes to video games, it’s not the only thing wrong with video game award shows, not even by a long shot. The real cancer to these shows are the numerous B-D list celebrities that come out in force to get another fifteen minutes of face time on the TV. Nothing sickens me more when you get a bunch of supposed gaming journalists gushing over Wilbur Valderama or William Shatner for ten minutes, then thirty seconds before they cut to commercial, you see the dev team for Halo 2 receiving an award.
   
   
   
   Up until recent years, G4 was the main offender of “almost famous” or “famous for nothing” celeb abuse. After all, they used to air a show entitled “Players” where celebrities would talk about what big gamers they were, but when it came to a multiplayer game of Halo, they were effin’ clueless. At G-Phoria 2005, one G4 correspondent even made mention that the main reason why she was there was “for the celebrities”. The 2005 G-Phoria was wrought with musical performances, Anna Nicole Smith bumbling through reasons why they play games, and the most up-to-date news of what Winnie from The Wonder Years is up to nowadays. Somewhere between the lame music from the Killers, lame skits performed by G4 personalities looking to pad their resumes to get real TV jobs, and G4 correspondents acting like fourteen year-olds at an N’Sync show in the presence of anyone who had a background cameo in an Ugly Betty episode, there was about ten minutes of award show to be seen. Good on them, especially after tons of criticism they decided to tone down this year’s G-Phoria to just lame skits from Adam Sessler and Morgan Webb. That, my friends, is progress.
   
   
   
   Sure, there’s nothing wrong with celebrities who obviously have no interest in being there and give us their most awkward performances. After all, award shows are notoriously boring. It’s another thing when these celebs, much like the fluff you’ll see parading around on Spike TV or G4, try to make you believe they’re gamers. For instance, Samuel L. Jackson will go on and on about how he loves playing his “PSPTwo” and that his favorite game is “Grand Theft Auto 2” referring to GTA: San Andreas on more than one lone occasion. Even worse, the brain trust at Spike even labeled the game incorrectly when it was up for its game of the year nomination by labeling it “Grand Theft Auto 3: San Andreas”.
   
   Now I can go on and on about how Mario Galaxy lost out its game of the year nom to a collection of Valve games, question why Halo 3 is nominated for breakthrough technology on something Burnout Revenge did before it, or the fact that the best soundtrack category features only one game with an original, non-licensed soundtrack, but it’s worthless. It’s no wonder why nobody takes gaming as a serious hobby or art form, when we have cock sucking whores running these shows and reinforcing the typical “extreme gamer who loves juvenile toilet humor” stereotype all over the mainstream. Sure, I love a good fart joke as much as anyone – hell, my entire Thanksgiving holiday was me talking about how I shouldn’t eat too much because the fat burners I take cause me to piss bright orange cooking oil from my ass, but let’s face it, these shows are just embarrassing to us, the hobby, and a mockery to everyone who makes these games. Whether you make BMX XXX or Halo 3, you’ll always play second fiddle to every god forsaken K-Fed, Mo Rocca, Hal Sparks, or any other stupid celeb that has nothing better to do and looks just as uninterested in being there as you are to see them. Right now, these shows are only good for trying to pile on washed up celebs to get people to watch, and giving out their “prestigious” awards to the highest bidder. Maybe one day someone will get it right, but I’m not holding my breath.
   
   

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Gamescrap has 1 comment on this chronicle.

1. BEN
   Posted On Apr 24 2008

   So, what games win awards for you? I had Mario Galaxy winning best game of the year in 2007, even with Halo 3 being the heavy favorite!