Spike VGA 2011 Nominees Announced (Getting better, but it's still Spike VGA)

BTP

http://www.spike.com/events/video-game-awards-2011

Game Of The Year:
Batman: Arkham City
The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
The Legend Of Zelda: Skyward Sword
Portal 2
Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception

Studio Of The Year:
Bethesda Game Studios
Naughty Dog
Rocksteady
Valve

Best Xbox 360 Game:
Batman: Arkham City
Forza Motorsport 4
Gears of War 3
Portal 2

Best PS3 Game:
Infamous 2
Killzone 3
LittleBigPlanet 2
Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception

Best Wii Game:
Disney's Epic Mickey
Kirby's Return To Dream Land
Lost In Shadow
The Legend Of Zelda: Skyward Sword

Best PC Game:
Battlefield 3
Minecraft
The Witcher 2: Assassins Of Kings
Portal 2

Best Handheld/Mobile Game:
Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective
Infinity Blade
Super Mario 3D Land
Jetpack Joyride

Best Shooter:
Battlefield 3
Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 3
Gears of War 3
Rage

Best Action Adventure Game:
Assassin's Creed: Revelations
Batman: Arkham City
The Legend Of Zelda: Skyward Sword
Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception

Best RPG:
Dark Souls
Deus Ex: Human Revolution
Dragon Age 2
The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

Best Multi-Player:
Battlefield 3
Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 3
Gears Of War 3
Portal 2

Best Individual Sports Game:
Fight Night Champion
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 12: The Masters
Top Spin 4
Virtua Tennis 4

Best Team Sports Game:
FIFA Soccer 12
NBA 2K12
NHL 12
MLB '11: The Show

Best Driving Game:
Dirt 3
Driver: San Francisco
Forza Motorsport 4
Need For Speed: The Run

Best Fighting Game:
The King Of Fighters XIII
Marvel Vs. Capcom 3
Mortal Kombat
WWE All Stars

Best Motion Game:
Child Of Eden
Dance Central 2
The Legend Of Zelda: Skyward Sword
The Gunstringer

Best Independent Game:
Bastion
Minecraft
Superbrothers: Sword And Sworcery EP
The Binding Of Isaac

Best Adapted Video Game:
Back To The Future: The Game
Batman: Arkham City
Captain America: Super Soldier
Lego Star Wars III: The Clone Wars

Best Song In A Game:
Bastion: "Build that Wall (Zia’s Theme)” by Darren Korb
Portal 2: "Exile Vilify" by The National
Dragon Age 2: “I'm Not Calling You a Liar” by Florence + the Machine
Bastion: "Setting Sail, Coming Home (End Theme)" by Darren Korb

Best Original Score:
Bastion
Batman: Arkham City
Deus Ex: Human Revolution
Portal 2

Best Graphics:
Batman: Arkham City
L.A. Noire
Rage
Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception

Best Performance By A Human Male:
Portal 2: J.K. Simmons as Cave Johnson
Batman: Arkham City: Mark Hamill as The Joker
Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception: Nolan North as Nathan Drake
Portal 2: Stephen Merchant as Wheatley

Best Performance By A Human Female:
Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception: Claudia Black as Chloe Frazer
Portal 2: Ellen McLain as GLaDOS
Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception: Emily Rose as Elena Fisher
Batman: Arkham City: Tara Strong as Harley Quinn

Best Downloadable Game:
Bastion
Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet
Stacking
Trenched

Best DLC:
Fallout: New Vegas - Old World Blues
Mass Effect 2: Arrival
Mortal Kombat: Freddy Krueger
Portal 2

Edit: A little something I missed. The following group of people nominated the above games, and will ultimately decide who wins. The actual awards are not decided by the vote on the website outside of Best Trailer and Most Anticipated Game.

Andy McNamara (Editor in Chief, Game Informer Magazine)
Brian Crecente (Editor in Chief, Kotaku)
Chris Baker (Senior Editor, Wired Magazine)
Chris Kohler (Games Editor, Wired.com)
Chris Slate (Editor-In-Chief, Nintendo Power Magazine)
Christopher Grant (Editor in Chief, Joystiq)
Dale North (Editor in Chief, Destructoid)
Francesca Reyes (Editor in Chief, Official Xbox Magazine)
Gary Steinman (Editor in Chief, GamesRadar)
Geoff Keighley (Host, SPIKE)
Jeff Gerstmann (Editor in Chief, Giant Bomb)
Jeff Jensen (Senior Writer, Entertainment Weekly)
Jerry Holkins (Writer / Co-Creator, Penny Arcade)
John Davison (VP of Programming, GameSpot & Metacritic)
Logan Decker (Editor in Chief, PC Gamer Magazine)
Lou Kesten (Reviewer/Editor, The Associated Press)
Mike Krahulik (Artist / Co-Creator, Penny Arcade)
Mike Snider (Technology Reporter, USA Today)
Rich Greenhill (Director of Content and Programming, Yahoo Games)
Sam Kennedy (Director of Audience Generation, IGN.com/1UP.com)
Scott Alexander (Freelance Writer, Playboy & Family Circle)
Shane Satterfield (VP of Content, SPIKE Digital Entertainment)
Stephen Totilo (Deputy Editor, Kotaku)
Tal Blevins (VP Games Content, IGN Entertainment)
Tina Amini (Assistant Editor / Video Games Channel Manager, Complex Magazine)

Last year's thread: http://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/133047/spike-vgas-uncharted-3-mass-effect-3-batman-arkham-city-groan-worthy-filler

Personal rant that I will spoiler in case you don't care.

Spoiler:

It's no secret that these have been nothing more than a huge popularity contest for PS3 and 360, with games on Nintendo platforms and Nintendo themselves getting shunned like crazy. Just take a look at the video below based on last year's nominee announcement. Sound is NSFW, though.



But they have gotten better this year. Ghost Trick being recognized (hopefully not only for the iOS version) for Best Handheld game, Zelda being in the GOTY's with no COD or COD-like game is a huge surprise.

Still it bit sad that Epic Mickey is in this year's Best Wii game when it was released last year when Trackmania Wii could have been in there. Or even Trackmania 2 for Best Driving. Gotta love how last year is the one year Wii gets in own fighting game (Tatsunoko vs. Capcom) is the one year there is magically no Best Fighting Game category, and yet it returns this year for Marvel 3 (and not even Ultimate Marvel 3 at that). And every studio involved in this year's GOTY is in the running for Best Studio of the Year.....except for one. Guess who?

And the awards still have interesting paradoxes. The Witcher 2 got nominated for Best PC game but not for Best RPG, while some games that did get nominated for Best RPG are PC games.

But hey, a Wii game in the GOTY's, a Best Motion game category (even if seems a bit like segregation from "normal" gaming, at least it's being recognized), iOS games in Best Handheld, no noticeable Mountain Dew anywhere....I can only hope this kind of improvement continues with each year though. There's no reason there can't be equal acceptance among all kinds of gaming, especially if iOS gaming is getting involved in these, and the sooner that happens, the better.

Warlock82

Gabe & Tycho are actually judges? They actually have some decent journalists on there too.

The_Scarab

There's still an awful lot wrong there. Mainly, as you said, in terms of curious paradoxes. Which leads me to believe there was no cohesive panel adjudicating this shit. They probably farmed out each separate category to separate, unconnected people.

Furthermore, the nominations seem to be trying to cover every possible demographic, every possible user base to get as many viewers/participants as possible. Every popular indie title, second tier game or cult icon has been shoehorned in wherever possible. Minecraft for example. Or the annoying deviation of individual sports and team sports.

Xenogears of Bore

Epic Mickey was after the release date cutoff for voting so it makes sense that it is here.

Dragon Age 2 being nominated even once though...Sigh.

Rakai

I can't really hate the VGA's because they reflect the review industry as a whole (in that most popular = best), but the one category that makes no sense is best graphics. The two graphical powerhouses (BF3, Witcher 2) are somehow absent, and it's not as if the others are using unique art styles to skew the award. Best graphics is a stupid award to begin with though, and should be changed to best artistic design. Also DA2 for best RPG over the Witcher 2 seems odd, to put it mildly.

And studio of the year is the most redundant award. They just re-list their GotY candidates minus Nintendo (probably because they couldn't be bothered to figure out which studio made Zelda as Nintendo doesn't give them special names). I can't see any reason for the award as studios generally don't put out more than 1 game in a given year, so judging them based on a single game is no different than GotY.

The_Scarab

I can forgive that mainly because best graphics is a formality. Uncharted has already won.

cloudeagle

The_Scarab wrote:

There's still an awful lot wrong there. Mainly, as you said, in terms of curious paradoxes. Which leads me to believe there was no cohesive panel adjudicating this shit. They probably farmed out each separate category to separate, unconnected people.

Furthermore, the nominations seem to be trying to cover every possible demographic, every possible user base to get as many viewers/participants as possible. Every popular indie title, second tier game or cult icon has been shoehorned in wherever possible. Minecraft for example. Or the annoying deviation of individual sports and team sports.

Well, I'm guessing that each person nominated their own list of stuff for each category, and the top vote-getters made the cut. Which cuts down on overrated or moneyhatted crap making it in, but makes the list very "safe" and dominated by games that were extremely popular.

Bursar

Games that aren't even out yet being nominated is a puzzlement. They must really be hurting for fighting games.

reVerse

It's kind of interesting that both Best PS3 and Best Wii Game categories are 100% console exclusives whereas half the nominated 360 games are multiplatform releases.

The_Scarab

cloudeagle wrote:

The_Scarab wrote:

There's still an awful lot wrong there. Mainly, as you said, in terms of curious paradoxes. Which leads me to believe there was no cohesive panel adjudicating this shit. They probably farmed out each separate category to separate, unconnected people.

Furthermore, the nominations seem to be trying to cover every possible demographic, every possible user base to get as many viewers/participants as possible. Every popular indie title, second tier game or cult icon has been shoehorned in wherever possible. Minecraft for example. Or the annoying deviation of individual sports and team sports.

Well, I'm guessing that each person nominated their own list of stuff for each category, and the top vote-getters made the cut. Which cuts down on overrated or moneyhatted crap making it in, but makes the list very "safe" and dominated by games that were extremely popular.

Probably true. You make a good point.

Though that sorta defeats the purpose of awards then. If they are merely an aggregated popularity contest why not just go off sales? Awards are supposed to reflect a specific personal taste or direction. I mean, the Oscars are far, far from being a benchmark for good taste but at least the Academy has a defined, consistent voice that is represented by what specific kind of films they award. It has value, if not any sense.

Rakai

Bursar wrote:

Games that aren't even out yet being nominated is a puzzlement. They must really be hurting for fighting games.

They've covered this before. There is a cut-off date for review copies to get in the hands of reviewers. Stuff like Zelda and Skyrim have been played by the nominators long before the nominations went out even though the nominations were released before the games.

Lord_Snot

I do dislike how Bastion gets two entries in the "Best Song in a Game" gong, seems slightly unfair.

I'd say Bastion should win best song for "Build That Wall", but Portal 2 should get best OST.

And yeah, it's shocking, the panel's composed of people who know what they're talking about. Apart from the handful of people from official mags and Kotaku, who really shouldn't have any input, due to bias/crappiness.

mere_immortal

I struggle to believe that anyone actually watches the VGA's for the awards rather than just the trailers and announcements.

BF3 missing from best graphics, Witcher 2 missing from graphics and RPG just for starters.

I mean when you have the pointless skin sacks from Jersey Shore presenting an award something is wrong.

reVerse

Mass Effect 2's Arrival nominated for best DLC? Now, I didn't play it myself, but I thought the general consensus is that it's a tiny dry pile of rat droppings?

Rakai

Also, shouldn't "Best Adapted" be "Best use of a license"? Some of those are original stories.

Zephiran

Still no Best Voice Acting award?

Preorder cancelled.

Salvation122

reVerse wrote:

Mass Effect 2's Arrival nominated for best DLC? Now, I didn't play it myself, but I thought the general consensus is that it's a tiny dry pile of rat droppings?

No, Arrival was pretty good. It just wasn't nearly as good as Shadow Broker or Kasumi.

Magic Pink

mere_immortal wrote:

I struggle to believe that anyone actually watches the VGA's

Fix'd for me.

corky842

Why do they even have "studio of the year" when the only thing each of those studios put out is a contender for game of the year?

Zxerol

GOTY is for the studio that produced the best game. SOTY is for studio with the most raditiude. (Which is why Nintendo wasn't nominated obviously. Old farts.)

Rorus Raz

So...one woman is a judge?

Well, I guess Sam could also be a woman.

-SPI-

Does animation really count as graphics? Because while the facial tech in LA Noire was amazing, the rest of the game looked ok but nothing special.

mntorankusu

It's nice to see Ghost Trick made it into the handheld nominees. But I guess they didn't have too many outstanding games to choose from.

I think it's actually the best game that came out this year for any platform.

Maddoc

This may be a little nit-picky, but once I saw that they added Skyrim and Skyward Sword to the list prior even to their release, I more or less stopped paying attention. (Not that I was particularly at the edge of my seat over this or anything anyway, but still)

Rakai

Maddoc wrote:

This may be a little nit-picky, but once I saw that they added Skyrim and Skyward Sword to the list prior even to their release, I more or less stopped paying attention. (Not that I was particularly at the edge of my seat over this or anything anyway, but still)

Again, the nominators have had their hands on review copies before nominations went out. Not that this validates the show as a whole, but it's just not a point to which to hold against them.

Unco-ordinated

Dang, I was going to make the thread again this year. Ah well.

Really don't care about the awards themselves (though lol at the Best PS3 and Wii categories being 100% exclusives, while the 360 is half exclusive and half multiplatform), I just want to see the unveilings. MGS Rising and Alan Wake XBL are confirmed so far.

reVerse

BioWare's new game will also be revealed.

Unco-ordinated

Rakai wrote:

Maddoc wrote:

This may be a little nit-picky, but once I saw that they added Skyrim and Skyward Sword to the list prior even to their release, I more or less stopped paying attention. (Not that I was particularly at the edge of my seat over this or anything anyway, but still)

Again, the nominators have had their hands on review copies before nominations went out. Not that this validates the show as a whole, but it's just not a point to which to hold against them.

It's still pretty bullshit though. Assuming the judges have actually played every nomination (which I'm betting they haven't), how can you compare a Q4 game that you only finished a month ago to a Q1 game that you finished 10 months ago? This is why the film industry has this shit around Feb/March, because by then the marketing/hype has died down and it gives everyone a chance to watch all the nominations.

And thanks reVerse for remembering the Bioware unveil. I'm not sure what exactly to think of that one, the concept art didn't really scream Bioware to me.

The new Rainbow Six is a shoe-in for an unveil, though they've already released that concept video a month or two back.

Dirty

Aside from inconsistent nominations (Uncharted 3 is the only shooter up for GOTY, but isn't good enough for Best Shooter?), and somewhat bullshit categories (SOTY), there are really only 2 things that get on my nerves. Platform specific categories. Either go all the way and make it only exclusives, or drop it it entirely. The best 360 game of the year shouldn't be "also on PlayStation".

Also, from what I can tell, MMA and WWE games have more in common with games like Fight Night than games like Street Fighter. Either put boxing in the fighting category, or move MMA/WWE games to sports.

I don't mind sports split into 2 categories. I'd like to see some more splits. Aside from the Best Downloadable, and Indie award (provided you're small time enough to be indie, yet big time enough for the show), there isn't a lot of love for the PSN/XBLA. They never get nods for the genre awards or best on platform. I would add Best PSN and Best XBLA.

reVerse

Uncharted 3 isn't nominated for shooters because it's nominated for action adventure, which I feel is a much more apt category for it.

Dirty

UC3 wears a lot of hats. Platforming, brawling, puzzle-solving, sneaking, etc. But the one hat it wears more often than any other is the shoot-people-in-the-face hat. Once you factor in the multi-player, which has even more emphasis on the gunplay, you can see why I think of it as a shooter.

reVerse

There's a lot of shooting in it but that's just a representation of the action elements. If the game took place in medieval times the action would be sword fighting, but everything else you do and the overall tone of the game would still mark it as an action adventure game.

Dirty

I didn't really want to start a genre debate over it. I don't think either of us is going to change the mind of the other. But that point aside, there are some inconsistencies in their nominations, as others have also pointed out.

Unco-ordinated

Dirty wrote:

Aside from inconsistent nominations (Uncharted 3 is the only shooter up for GOTY, but isn't good enough for Best Shooter?), and somewhat bullshit categories (SOTY), there are really only 2 things that get on my nerves. Platform specific categories. Either go all the way and make it only exclusives, or drop it it entirely. The best 360 game of the year shouldn't be "also on PlayStation".

They probably would've if there were more exclusives on the system but what'd it get this year? Forza, Gears, Halo re-release (which they're clearly avoiding, otherwise SotC would be GOTY) and...? I really can't think of anything else.

Rex Dart

Even though I don't care about the VGAs, have never watched them, and never plan to, I'm glad to see KOF XIII nominated for best fighting game.

Even though it doesn't actually come out until next week. But I guess the arcade version has been out for a while? Actually, that might make it a 2010 game. Whatever.

Spoit

Unco-ordinated wrote:

Rakai wrote:

Maddoc wrote:

This may be a little nit-picky, but once I saw that they added Skyrim and Skyward Sword to the list prior even to their release, I more or less stopped paying attention. (Not that I was particularly at the edge of my seat over this or anything anyway, but still)

Again, the nominators have had their hands on review copies before nominations went out. Not that this validates the show as a whole, but it's just not a point to which to hold against them.

It's still pretty bullshit though. Assuming the judges have actually played every nomination (which I'm betting they haven't), how can you compare a Q4 game that you only finished a month ago to a Q1 game that you finished 10 months ago? This is why the film industry has this shit around Feb/March, because by then the marketing/hype has died down and it gives everyone a chance to watch all the nominations.

And thanks reVerse for remembering the Bioware unveil. I'm not sure what exactly to think of that one, the concept art didn't really scream Bioware to me.

The new Rainbow Six is a shoe-in for an unveil, though they've already released that concept video a month or two back.

Yeah, but that's making the assumption that the awards are based around actually awarding accomplishments, rather than yet another marketing method. Because there's a very good reason for the awards to take place before the end of the year, namely the holliday sales money

The_Spaniard

There are some pretty blatant and alarming snubs in that list.

Peewi

Lord_Snot wrote:

I do dislike how Bastion gets two entries in the "Best Song in a Game" gong, seems slightly unfair.

I'd say Bastion should win best song for "Build That Wall", but Portal 2 should get best OST.

And yeah, it's shocking, the panel's composed of people who know what they're talking about. Apart from the handful of people from official mags and Kotaku, who really shouldn't have any input, due to bias/crappiness.

Portal 2 also has two entries in best song with Exile Vilify and Want You Gone. Also, I guess I'm the opposite of you. I'd vote for Exile Vilify for best song and Bastion for best OST.

Not specific to this year, but I don't get why they specify performances by a human. Last I heard, there aren't any animal performances in video games.

Lilnoobs

I'm a little iffy on the "valve" as best studio of the year. They released one game and they are the best studio? They are a great company, but in terms of quality and production for this year, I don't think they really deserve that nomination.

And what's with the qualifications of the voice actors? A human male and a human female? Like, are there best voice actor awards for the mountain lions in RDR? Or the sabre tooths in Skyrim?

Just fun little nitpicks, but Spike awards still seem to be a joke.

Lanrutcon

Plus: wtf is Rage doing there? It's Best Graphics, not Best Graphics Once Patched Several Times And Config Files Edited And Specific Drivers Installed And Background Software Tweaked And Hope You Don't Look At Textures Too Closely.

Zxerol

Lilnoobs wrote:

I'm a little iffy on the "valve" as best studio of the year. They released one game and they are the best studio? They are a great company, but in terms of quality and production for this year, I don't think they really deserve that nomination.

They've released the exact same amount of games this year as the rest of the nominees. You can make a case for Bethesda's output in that they backed and published three other games in '11 apart from their own Skyrim*. But in the end, a single development studio can only produce and release a game once every so often (and frankly, Valve is relatively productive in this regard, having released about a game a year for a while now).

So I guess basically the VGAs are looking for something else? Some killer X-factor that cannot be described than in terms of "we released a dope game this year"? I have no clue what their criteria is, except someone mentioned above they all made the same exact games that were also nominated for GOTY (excepting Nintendo because fuck them, we only have room for four).

Basically, that entire category is bunk. But we already knew that, durr.


*I guess you can count Rage too here, depending if you view id as their own "studio" after being bought out.