Spike TV’s Video Game Awards have become a popular annual event for both gamers and developers – with the channel honoring the year’s best games in over 25 categories. The 2009 awards were held on December 12, and saw winning titles that featured the efforts of a number of Full Sail graduates working throughout the industry.
This included the evening’s big winner, Uncharted 2: Among Thieves, which received the coveted Game of the Year award, as well as Best Action/Adventure Game, Best PS3 Game, and Best Graphics. The Playstation 3 exclusive was created with the help of Game Development graduate Joseph Thomas (Tools Programmer), and Computer Animation grads Rodrigo Gonzalez (Animator), and Justin Falgout (Cinematic Animator), who worked on the project at acclaimed developer Naughty Dog.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 also won multiple awards, for Best Shooter and Best Multiplayer Game. The game’s arsenal of weapons were animated by Chance Glasco, a 2001 Computer Animation graduate who has been working on the popular war series at Infinity Ward since its debut.
Other winners at the event included Dragon Age: Origins, which grabbed Best PC Game. The role-playing epic had four grads on it, creating everything from the character animations to the game engine – Kyle Gaulin (Animator), Jonathan Logsdon (QA Tester), Michael Ramos (Modeler), and Clark Smith (Programmer).
There was also the award for Best Racing Game, which went to Forza Motorsport 3. The third entry in the acclaimed Xbox driving simulation featured car models developed by Vehicle Artist David Finlay, with Mark Kilborn’s work as Sound Designer recreating the roar of the racetrack.
More graduates saw their work receive nominations in other major categories, like Best Music Game. Nominees in this genre included The Beatles: Rock Band (Michael Helms – Artist, and Mike Lattiak – QA Tester), and Band Hero (Alejandro Garcia-Tunon – Software Engineer, and Michael Masterson – QA Tester).
Spike TV’s Video Game Awards celebrate the hundreds of hours of work that go into creating this entertainment, and Full Sail’s gaming staff is proud to see the work of so many alumni recognized at this year’s show. The event is a unique honor in the industry, with all of the winners being voted on by the public, and this list of titles obviously resonated with people – helping make 2009 a great year to be a gamer.
