Xbox Gaming in South Africa

Update: The 2010 VGAs are now over. Catch the complete news round-up over here.

The last major gaming event of the year takes place this weekend, with Spike TV's 2010 Video Game Awards celebrating the best games of 2010. Of course, as many will know, the VGAs isn't really an awards ceremony, but more a Home Shopping Network show produced by Michael Bay's long last brother. Thankfully, between the millions of product endorsements and frequent "wtf" moments with some of the celebrities and awards, publishers slip in some footage of upcoming games, and this year Spike TV has announced that there will be no less than 13 world premieres for gamers to look forward to.

Here's a list of game announcements and trailers we are expecting at this year's show:

Confirmed Games

Batman: Arkham City

Rocksteady's highly anticipated Batman sequel is scheduled to get a full length trailer this weekend. In the meantime, check out the teaser trailer over here.

BioWare's next game - Mass Effect 3?

The developers behind Mass Effect and Dragon Age are set to announce a new game at the VGAs this weekend.

While it's all speculation and rumours at the moment, a "trusted source" has told Joystiq that the announcement is in fact Mass Effect 3, and that the new entry will include for the first time in the series a multiplayer component - although this new mode may or may not be revealed with the ME3 announcement.

Check out the teaser trailer and leaked image over here.

Gears of War announcement

Cliff Bleszinski will be making a Gears of War announcement at the VGAs, and right now it could be anything. Whether it's a new multiplayer mode, or more details on the beta (perhaps the date has been brought forward?), for Gears of War 3, or something a bit more meatier, it's anyone's guess right now. The good news is that it's NOT Gears of War 3 Kinect.

Guillermo Del Toro's video game

There isn't much information on the Pan's Labyrinth director's upcoming game with THQ, but it's likely the "Lovecraftian thing" mentioned by the director during an interview with MTV back in September, describing it as "a very different type of horror game".

Homefront

THQ's Danny Bilson confirmed via Twitter that Homefront will show off a trailer at the VGAs (this likely won't count towards the 13 since it will be a commercial).

Mortal Kombat

A teaser trailer confirms a Mortal Kombat character reveal at the VGAs. Interestingly enough though, NetherRealm tweeted that they will only reveal a new character if MK wins the Most Anticipated game category in the VGAs. This seems to contradict the trailer, so we imagine it will happen either way. This may or may not count towards the 13 world premieres.

Portal 2

G4TV's host, Geoff Keighley, has also confirmed via Twitter that an "exclusive new Portal 2 clip will premiere" at the VGAs.

Finally, multi-platform film-adaption Thor: The God of Thunder will join PS3 exclusives, Resistance 3 and Uncharted 3, for world premieres at the VGAs.

Unconfirmed/Rumoured Games

Prototype 2

Originally thought to be Left 4 Dead 3, or perhaps even Resident Evil, it now seems more likely that the zombie-inspired teaser images and footage is actually for the announcement of a sequel to the open world game, Prototype.

Saints Row 3

Danny Bilson confirmed earlier this year that Saints Row 3 would be shown for the first time in December at the VGAs, so barring any problems in development, we should see SR3 premiered this weekend.

New SSX game

Rumours have abounded about a return for the popular snowboarding franchise SSX, and Kotaku recently received word from "a source familiar with development of the game" that EA Canada and "much of the Skate team" has been working on a new SSX for the past two years.

Something Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker-related

For our friends over on the PS3, it looks like there could be something MGS: Peace Walker related announced at the VGAs.

--

Depending on whether Homefront and Mortal Kombat are included in the 13 world premieres or not, there may still be another game announcement/trailer. Microsoft could still do an announcement outside of Gears, perhaps Kinect related, however, we've also heard next to nothing on Codename Kingdoms since it was first announced at E3. Deep down though, I'm hoping for a Halo 1 remake announcement, but that seems unlikely.

Other possibilities include the first footage from the recently announced Tomb Raider reboot, or perhaps THQ's "Core" Kinect game hinted at by Bilson recently on Twitter.

Spike TV's 2010 Video Game Awards kicks off this Saturday, 11 December at 8PM ET in the US, or around 3AM on Sunday for us South Africans.

What games are you looking forward to seeing at this year's VGAs?