I attended the Spike Videogame Awards in Vegas on friday, so I wanted to give you some early impressions before it airs tonight. We'll have some more coverage and some red carpet shenanigans soon, but this should give you a good idea of what to expect from the show.

First off, I'm happy to say that these were by far the best VGAs yet (though if you've read my comments on previous years you know this isn't saying too much). I mean, it's still very much a Spike TV production -- the thing certainly met the network's quota of guns and girls -- so you definitely have to keep that in mind going in. But in terms of the games that won, the comedy bits, the entertainers (Kid Rock aside -- definitely could have done without him), this was my favorite yet, and I've been to all of them. Having hosted for the third year in a row now, Sam Jackson seemed pretty comfortable and looked like he enjoyed himself quite a bit. And as for the other celebrity talent at the awards, this year's VGAs were perhaps a bit lighter than usual, likely due to the Vegas location (MTV Networks called upon a bunch of its own talent like Heidi Montag and Spencer Pratt from the Hills and A Shot at Love's Tila Tequila, and there were some local Vegas guys like Mindfreak's Chris Angel). But overall, the turnout was pretty good, and I particularly enjoyed seeing guys like Stan Lee, Simpsons creator Matt Groening, and Ratatouille's Patton Oswalt. There was a good selection of top gaming personalities on hand too, such as Grant Collier from Infinity Ward, Ken Levine from 2K Boston, and Frank O'Conner from Bungie.

One person you won't see on the show, though, is Jackass' Steve-O. He was way too drunk at rehearsal, so they didn't use him on the show. Actually, I can personally attest to this. Before the awards Rob and I were sitting at a bar at the Mandalay Bay and Stevo-O was there next to us drinking even more (this was already after he'd been kicked off the show for that night). He started talking to us about politics and how Obama needs to be elected, which we could all agree upon, but then he started getting somewhat belligerent with the bartender and ended up getting kicked out of the place. Which ended up being cool for us actually, because a few minutes later Ralphie May from Last Comic Standing sat down in the same spot and we had a good chat with him. On the show he does a funny enough bit about how his Xbox 360's broken down like 4 times now.

The show also boasted several "World Premiere" looks at some of next year's big games, some of which were cool, some that were pretty blah, and some that probably didn't deserve being called "World Premiere" (unless Spike's asserting that its audience doesn't have access to the internet). The Borderlands trailer was easily the best -- make sure you look out for that one -- and I also particularly liked the clip for Sega's Iron Man. Teases for stuff like Rainbow Six Vegas 2 and Afro Samurai seemed pretty appropriate (R6 given the location of the awards and Afro because it's Sam Jackson's voice in the game), but both lacked any gameplay footage (though in talking with some Namco Bandai people after the show, they indicated that they would have preferred to show gameplay but the request came so late that they didn't have time to put together footage). Also worth noting were some new clips of LittleBigPlanet (note to Sony: getting kind of tired of that theme song now, K?), and GT5 Prologue.


The Borderlands clip is pretty awesome

This year's comedy bits were overall pretty good, though. Sure, there was some of the expected juvenile stuff, but there were also some genuine laugh out loud moments. I'm also happy to say that I didn't feel insulted by this year's comedians, unlike in past years when certain people resorted to stereotypical gamer jokes and practically got booed off stage.

There was one really annoying moment in the show, though, and I'm curious how it'll turn out when edited for tonight's broadcast. I had seen some of the Gamecock guys walking around in costume earlier in the night and was wondering what the deal was with that (apparently Spike allowed them to be there because they had some cosplayers at the show and these guys sort of fit in with that). Anyway, just as the final award for the night was being given out to Bioshock for Game of the Year, the Gamecock guys rushed up on stage and hijacked the mic for some self promotion. So not only did they steal the limelight from the very deserving 2K Boston, but it threw off the pacing so that Ken Levine didn't even get a chance to say anything (as he approached the microphone he was already being ushered off stage). Gamecock's anti-establishment attitude can be cool at times, but this was a pretty dick move. (Update: Gamecock was cool enough to send out an apology note about this -- they didn't intend to disrupt Ken Levine's recognition).


Bioshock was GOTY

Anyway, I'm curious what you guys will think of the show when it airs tonight. Like I said, as long as you approach it with the mentality of this being a Spike TV awards show (see: rest of the channel's lineup), I think you'll be pretty satisfied. What I'm most happy to see, though, is that for the first year ever it feels like a show from people who actually appreciate and want to celebrate games -- less like a bunch of outsiders just looking in to our world for a night. And hey, that's a big step.

For those interested, here's a list of all the winners. Oh, and related to the Spike awards, I was on a Xfire roundtable chat with some other members of the press talking about some of the best and worst games of the year. They're supposed to have the transcript up on their site any day now.


GAME OF THE YEAR
BioShock

STUDIO OF THE YEAR
Harmonix

BEST SHOOTER
Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (Activision/ Infinity Ward)

BEST RPG
Mass Effect (Microsoft Game Studios/ BioWare)

BEST MILITARY GAME
Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (Activision/ Infinity Ward)

BEST INDIVIDUAL SPORTS GAME
skate (Electronic Arts/ EA Black Box)

BEST HANDHELD GAME
The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass (Nintendo/ Nintendo)

BEST GRAPHICS
Crysis (Electronic Arts/ Crytek)

BEST GAME BASED ON A MOVIE OR TV SHOW
The Simpsons Game (Electronic Arts/ EA Redwood Shores)

BEST RHYTHM GAME
Rock Band (MTV Games/ Harmonix)

BEST DRIVING GAME
DiRT (Codemasters/ Codemasters)

BEST ACTION GAME
Super Mario Galaxy (Nintendo/ Nintendo)

BEST TEAM SPORTS GAME
Madden NFL 08 (Electronic Arts/ EA Tiburon)

BEST SOUNDTRACK
Rock Band (MTV Games/ Harmonix)

BREAKTHROUGH TECHNOLOGY
The Orange Box/ Portal (Valve/ Valve)

BEST XBOX 360 GAME
BioShock

BEST WII GAME
Super Mario Galaxy (Nintendo/ Nintendo)

BEST PS3 GAME
Ratchet & Clank Future: Tools of Destruction (Sony Computer Entertainment/
Insomniac Games)

BEST PC GAME
The Orange Box (Valve/ Valve)

BEST ORIGINAL SCORE
BioShock

BEST MULTI-PLAYER GAME
Halo 3 (Microsoft Game Studios/ Bungie Studios)

MOST ADDICTIVE VIDEO GAME FUELED BY DEW
Halo 3 (Microsoft Game Studios/ Bungie Studios)



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