Spike TV Video Game Awards Nominees Missing One Big Thing: Social Games

Spike TV has announced its nominees for the 2009 VGA awards show, which honors the year's best video games. As an official VGA Awards judge, I get to vote on the nominees, which include a heap of fantastic games, such as Modern Warfare 2, Left 4 Dead 2, Grand Theft Auto, Batman: Arkham Asylum and the like. I'm especially pleased to see to see PopCap's "hard casual" game Plants vs. Zombies made the list.

However, I can't help but notice that there's some big gaping holes in the nominees, namely FarmVille, Mafia Wars and other social games.

This could easily lead to a huge debate on how these awards are for the "core" gamer and not for casual player, but I know plenty of people (including myself) who play Modern Warfare 2 will then turn right around and play FarmVille and Mafia Wars on Facebook.

Also take into consideration that FarmVille boasts roughly 60 million active players a month (World of Warcraft has about 12 million players). Based on that statistic alone, social games deserve to be recognized for the hours of entertainment they bring to gamers -- both core and casual -- lives on a daily (sometimes two or three times a day) basis.

So to my hard-working pals at Spike TV, I implore you to consider including a category for Best Sociable Games next year (or at the very least, an honorary tip of the hat). Millions of virtual farmers, mobsters and pet owners will thank you.

If you're interested in checking out the awards, they will air live on Spike TV, Saturday, December 12 at 8 p.m ET/PT. The show also has a fan favorite category -- so go to the official site to place your vote.

See the complete list of this year's Spike TV Video Game Awards 2009 nominees after the jump >