Laughter filled me at the gala night of voice over artists and animation at Royce Hall for the Annie Awards for animation. It wasn't the presenters nor the incompetence of the teleprompter that had me laughing deeply into my chair. No, it was Sony not picking up the award for Best Animated Video Game that they won for Journey.In a surprise set up for anyone who didn't read their program the category of video games was up first. As a video played silently, due to a technical error that the Annie Awards are well known for, we saw, but didn't hear the nominated games. Then the envelope was opened and Journey was declared winner. After the camera looked out into the audience and saw no movement the presenter shouted out, "No one from Sony is here to pick it up? Fine, I keep it." It was the same disaster from the 2011 awards. Sony hadn't cared at all if it won the award or not.
I say it was the same disaster from 2011, because that's when PlayDead won for Limbo and didn't show up. I e-mailed them shortly after and they gave the honest answer that they lived and worked in Denmark and didn't want to go if they only had a chance at winning. The difference for Sony is they are located on Santa Monica, between 7-9 miles away from Royce Hall. Different people from Sony Animation were also present for other awards. Sony Pictures Animation is a Bronze sponsor of the awards. Now it's not very unlikely that the two different divsions of Sony don't communicate, but you'd think there'd be some sort of reminder between the two.
Writing about reminders, I actually e-mailed a Sony Rep about the awards, but never received word back. I wanted to interview some of the people from thatgamecompany(they made it) about the game. I never got word back from my Sony rep. However, I know for a fact that Lab Zero Games behind SkullGirls was there as I talked with them prior and they tried to get a hold of me, but I got swamped by the red carpet. Heavy Iron Studios for Family Guy Multiverse was there, because I talked with them at the Red Carpet. At this time unsure if Borderlands 2's Gearbox Software was there, but I'll be e-mailing them. I'll also being e-mailing Sony about this one, but who knows if they'll care with the PS4 coming out.
I don't believe anyone who made the game from the developer "thatgamecompany" was told they were up for the award by Sony. It was not listed as the nominee, but Sony Computer Entertainment America was, because they made the game under contract with Sony. I believe Sony didn't tell "thatgamecompany", because they forgot to, which is just kind of sad. The original team of "thatgamecompany" has split up slighlty and lost some of the orginal team, which may have caused problems. However, I met some of the team just a few months back at IndieCade in Culver City and I can't think they moved that far. There facebook page says their still located in Santa Monica.
