[Analyzing the weekend’s Spike TV Video Game Awards, Gamasutra editor-at-large Chris Morris reveals this year’s dwindling ratings for the show — despite “minimal signs of improvement” in quality and diversity.]

It wouldn’t be the holidays if the gaming world wasn’t in an uproar about U.S. cable channel Spike TV’s Video Game Awards. For the eighth consecutive year, the network has raised the ire of industry gadflys and gamers, who feel the show does more to set back video games than celebrate them.

Ratings for the VGAs are never spectacular. This year’s installment, hosted by Neil Patrick Harris, attracted 627,000 viewers, according to Nielsen. That’s 20,000 fewer than last year and marks the fourth consecutive year of declines. Since 2007, ratings for the show have fallen 32 percent.

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