I arrived at the show with Christophe, Amy and Bruce and we walked the red carpet, which was a pretty cool way to start the evening off. There were tons of media lined up with cameras and microphones ready for interviews. We stopped for a few interviews and Christophe even played a game of Wii Resort Table Tennis against one of our interviewers (he let her win…so he says). Continuing down the carpet, we ran into a bunch of people arriving at the same time as us like Marty O’Donnell from Bungie (who walked away with the award for Best Score for Halo: ODST… congrats!), our friends from Infinity Ward (Modern Warfare 2 won Best Shooter and Best Multi-player!) and Stig Asmussen (God of War III won Most Anticipated Game!). It’s humbling to be around the people who make your favorite games.

Once we found our seats (VIP…thanks, Geoff Keighley) we sat around and waited nervously for the show to start. I had to control my inner fanboy as Mark Hamill, Samuel Jackson and Alyssa Milano sat down in front of us. The setup was amazing! The back of the stage was a huge video screen that actually wrapped around the sides to create a really cool 3D effect. SPIKE really stepped it up this year and pulled out all the stops.

As the show began, it was awesome to hear Claudia Black’s voice as the MC for the evening. She had only found out the night before that they wanted her for the job and she jumped right in and nailed it. A consummate professional, as always. Unfortunately we soon found out that both she and Nolan North lost out to Jack Black for Best Voice which was the start of our losing streak, and had us worried we might walk away empty-handed. The competition was tough this year…in each of the 8 categories we were nominated in, we were going up against my favorite games of the year.

After losing Best Studio, Best Action Adventure Game, and Best Score we were up to 0 for 5! We were definitely getting even more anxious. The show was coming to a close, and after the amazing Halo Reach world premiere they announced that it was time for the Game of the Year presentation. I cheated and looked at the teleprompter so I could see a split second before it was announced and there it was…UNCHARTED 2: Among Thieves! It was an amazing feeling walking up on stage to accept the award. They announced we had also won Best PS3 Game and Best Graphics at the same time. The night belonged to the team back at Naughty Dog but I couldn’t imagine two people better to represent them than our Game and Creative Directors, Bruce and Amy. So they gave their heartfelt acceptance speeches and the show was over.

From there it was off to the parties and time to celebrate with the rest of the Dogs. A bunch of coworkers who were at the community event/viewing party in Hollywood drove downtown to meet us. It was a great night and I couldn’t have been more proud to have been part of such an amazing project. We’re so glad that a bunch of us got to share the moment with the fans at the community event because in the end, that’s really why we work so hard on our games. Knowing that we have an audience that appreciates the end result keeps us coming back to do better next time.

This was only the second time in Naughty Dog’s 15-year history of making PlayStation games that we had won an industry award of this caliber, and we tripled that in one night. We’ve definitely raised the bar for ourselves in so many ways. But everyone on the team is looking forward to the challenge and we couldn’t be more excited to do it again.

Now it’s time to enjoy the holidays, but then it’s time to put our noses back to the grind stone and see what happens next.

Which turned out to be a good thing because it was pretty hectic and intense there. Did you know going down a red carpet can take an hour?!? I don’t know how seasoned veterans like David Jaffe can do it!

These Mt. Dew-themed drinks helped us get through the pre-show schmooze-fest, though. It was great to be surrounded by almost all of the other Best Indie Game nominees – I definitely felt more grounded. I mean, how do you handle waiting in line for the port-o-potty and encountering Samuel L. Jackson?

(Waiting for the show to begin.)

And then there were the REAL celebrities – Rocksteady, Naughty Dog, Infinity Ward…I was nerding out all over the place. Very unlady-like. But I love any opportunity to straight-up shower love on some of my favorite game makers, because I know how much it has meant to us to get emails and hear from you guys about Flower.

Of course, then it got to our category. Our hearts were in our throats, which I think you could hear when we gave our acceptance speech. As Jenova said, Flower has come a long way since the day he said, “Let’s make a game about flowers and love,” to actually being awarded by Spike TV.

And because I was so nervous, I totally cut off Jenova before he could thank the most important people – you guys. We heard some of you got to be at the viewing party in Hollywood and were cheering right alongside us, and that really means a lot to us. Making experimental games is an emotional and scary process, and we really couldn’t do it without you guys. Thanks so much for all of your support these last three and a half years, and we hope we can continue to entertain you!

First things first: congratulations to Naughty Dog (UNCHARTED 2 won three awards, including Game of the Year), thatgamecompany (Flower took Best Independent Game), and Sony Santa Monica Studios (God of War III is your Most Anticipated Game) for their Video Game Awards wins this weekend.

And thanks go to the 100 PlayStation fans who joined us to celebrate these wins in Hollywood on Saturday evening. It was a truly fun time, and the reaction of the crowd when UNCHARTED 2 claimed Game of the Year/Best PS3 Game/Best Graphics was made all the sweeter by the fact that several Naughty Dogs were there to watch along with us.

Along the way we raffled off multiple copies of our biggest games of the year (Killzone 2, inFAMOUS, Ratchet & Clank Future: A Crack in Time, UNCHARTED 2 and more), a couple of super-rare James Grayson-inspired Resistance: Retribution leather jackets, and a so-tough-to-get-that-even-we-don’t-have-one UNCHARTED 2: Among Thieves Fortune Hunter’s Edition. It’s the least we could do for fans that came out to see us on the sloppiest day I’ve ever seen in Southern California. See all the pics here.

So, a lot of you asked why we didn’t hold our VGAs viewing party somewhere else. Here’s the reason: We were able to score two extra tickets to the live show, courtesy of one Geoff Keighley. The plan all along was to pluck the first two people out of line and send them into a waiting limo for the night of their video-gaming lives. Nobody deserved it more than Eric and Brittanie of Ontario, CA. The couple stood – in the driving rain – for 8 hours (!) to attend the meetup.

Unfortunately, the limo was late, and that same freak LA rainstorm turned what is normally a 15 minute drive to the Nokia Theater (even in LA traffic) into a nearly hourlong slog downtown. We just missed the seating window. Fortunately, Brittanie and Eric are really good sports, and we returned to the meet-up to watch the VGAs on Spike. They’ll be getting a nice schwag bag for their awesomeness.

Thanks again to Naughty Dog and everyone else who came out to see us, making this another successful community event. Let’s do this again.

Join us (Jeff and Chris) and fellow PlayStation.Blog readers for a special VGA viewing party in Los Angeles to celebrate our 17 nominations. You’ll want to get there early because we can only get 100 of you in, and there just might be something special for those early birds (hint, hint). Be sure to bring your photo ID, any UNCHARTED 2 schwag you want signed as the Naughty Dog crew will also be joining us! We’ll have plenty of food, drinks and giveaways…

So what are you waiting for? RSVP now on our Facebook page. We’ll see you there!

Event Details:

Capitol City (Main Dining Hall)
1615 N. Cahuenga Boulevard (map)
Los Angeles, CA 90028
(323) 465.1750

Saturday, December 12
4:00 – 7:30 p.m. (The VGA’s start at 5 p.m.)
Parking: Valet, numerous lots nearby, and meters

As the saying goes, “It’s an honor just to be nominated.” If that’s the case, then we here at PlayStation are pretty well honored; The 2009 Video Game Awards nominees have just been announced, and Sony Computer Entertainment is up for 17 awards, more than any other publisher! UNCHARTED 2 leads all games with a record eight nominations, including GAME OF THE YEAR. See below for the full list of SCE titles and what award they’re up for.

But going back to that saying – being honored is nice, but winning is better. Fortunately, the decision isn’t left up to a shadowy cabal of Illuminati; for the first time ever, gamers from around the world get to vote for the victors between now and Saturday, December 12th. Hat in hand, we kindly ask you to vote for your favorite PlayStation games on Spike’s VGAs site.

In honor of our record number of VGA nominations, we’re currently planning a viewing party near the LA studios where the VGAs will be broadcast live to the world. We might even be able to get some of you fine readers into the event itself… So vote now, and stay tuned for more details here on the PlayStation.Blog!

PlayStation’s 2009 Video Game Award Nominees

UNCHARTED 2: Among Thieves (8)

• Game of the Year
• Studio of the Year (Naughty Dog)
• Best Graphics
• Best Action Adventure Game
• Best PS3 Game
• Best Original Score
• Best Voice (Claudia Black as Chloe Frazer)
• Best Voice (Nolan North as Nathan Drake)

Killzone 2 (3)

• Best Shooter
• Best Graphics
• Best PS3 Game

Gran Turismo (PSP) (1)

• Best Driving Game

inFAMOUS (1)

• Best PS3 Game

Ratchet & Clank Future: A Crack in Time (1)

• Best PS3 Game

Fat Princess (1)

• Best Downloadable Game

Flower (1)

• Best Independent Game Fueled by Dew

God of War III (1)

• Most Anticipated Game

Also, don’t forget to vote for PS3-exclusive Demon’s Souls as Best RPG.