Epic Games walked away with two awards Sunday night for its smash hit “Gears of War 2” at the sixth-annual Spike TV VGAs (Video Game Awards) show, which was held live for the first time in Los Angeles at Sony Picture Studios.
However, the game, which has already sold more than 3 million copies at a faster pace than the original release two years ago, fell short in three other categories, including game of the year.
Epic received the first award for the night, taking home the Best Shooter trophy. It latter won Best Xbox 360 Game.
Epic Games’ Cliff Bleszinski, lead games designer, and Rod Ferguson, producer, were on hand for the live awards show, which actor Jack Black hosted. Black debuted the trailer for his 2009 heavy-metal action game from Electronic Arts and Double Fine Productions, “Brutal Legend.”
Bleszinski and Ferguson, who were seated in the first row, gave very short thank-you speeches that included the fans, family and friends. "Gears of War 2" was nominated for five awards in all: Game of the Year, Best Shooter, Best Graphics, Best Xbox 360 Game and Best Multiplayer Game.
Two years ago, the original "Gears" won several awards, and Epic took home the prestigious Studio of the Year award.
The theme of this year’s show was exclusive game content in the form of trailers for some of next year’s most-anticipated games like "God of War III," "Mafia II," "Grand Theft Auto IV: The Lost and the Damned," "Uncharted 2: Among Thieves," "Terminator: Salvation," "Dante’s Inferno," "Watchmen: The End is Nigh" and "Fight Night Round 4." Epic Games was involved in the mix as one of the 10 world premieres, which can in the form of new downloadable content for "Gears of War 2."
Black opened the show with a song and dance number in his underwear and then handed the microphone over to supermodel Marissa Miller to debut the "Gears of War 2" Combustible Map Pack video. Epic also made a short video clip of Delta Squad’s Augustus Cole from the game, who interacted with Marissa and then ran through the three new maps for the game.
Available at midnight Pacific Time on Xbox Live Marketplace, gamers can download the three new environments – Flood, Gold Rush and Fuel Station – which are playable in the addictive five-player Horde mode of "Gears of War 2."
The first map, Flood, takes place amidst crumbling ruins surrounded by deadly Imulsion, which rises as players fight their way through the hordes of enemies. Gold Rush takes place in an abandoned factory that once processed and transferred millions of barrels of refined Imulsion before Emergence Day. This is one of the rare environments that offers two large towers and plenty of verticality for taking out enemies below. Rounding out the new maps is an abandoned fossil fuel-based station. The team that secures and controls the Fuel Station is likely to be the side that wins the match.
"Gears of War 2" sold over 1.56 million copies in the U.S. last month, according to The NPD Group. Microsoft announced that the sequel has topped 3 million units worldwide and is the top draw on Xbox Live.
The new Combustible Map Pack should help keep "Gears of War 2" a top online draw, especially since this new content is coming just five weeks after the game launched.
Rockstar Games’ "Grand Theft Auto IV" won Best Game of the Year and Best Action Adventure Game. Other two-award winners included MTV Games’ "Rock Band 2," Konami Digital Entertainment’s "Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots" and "Gears of War 2."
While Spike TV focused more on world premieres than talent this year, the network did manage to get Keifer Sutherland to return to the VGAs, this time as the Big Name in the Game Male Award winner for "Call of Duty: World at War." He’d debuted the world premiere of “24: The Game” a few years ago. Megan Fox, Tony Hawk, Kristin Kreuk, Chris Klein, Eliza Dushku, Stacy Keibler, 50 Cent, Weezer, Mike Tyson, Rampage Jackson, Weezer and LL Cool J were among the stars in attendance.
There was plenty of time dedicated to the people behind the games. Will Wright was awarded the first-ever "gamer god" honor for his lifetime work on games from "Sim City" to "The Sims" to "Spore." Tim Schaefer, creator of "Brutal Legend," was part of a skit involving Black (armed with a flame thrower) and Judas Priest lead singer Rob Halford. The entire show came in on time, just under two hours.
