Gaming’s “Game of the Year” Problem

Spike TV’s annual gaming awards show, now called VGX (putting a meaningless X in the title to make it seem “cool” is the least annoying part of the show) aired on Saturday. A quick search online will reveal that the general consensus is that the show was an unbelievably terrible train wreck of unfunny, insulting quips at gaming’s expense and awkward interviews with industry execs so they could sell their latest products.  But I’m not interested in getting into that. One, because you can find many many other people talking about it in great detail and offering a lot of great solutions to try and fix the show elsewhere and, two, because I think the show is a symptom of a larger problem that has created other problems in the game industry.