Last week, we heard some very cool news.

When it comes to Wii games, everyone here knows there’s really nothing more violent than the black, white, and red brutality of MADWORLD. From the stylistic graphics to the fantastic beats, MADWORLD rocked reviews from both press and the people alike when it released earlier this year.

Now, the game has been nominated as one of four contenders for VGA’s  Best Wii games of 2009, and it’s up to fan votes to decide the winner! We need your help to shine the spotlight back onto Jack, and to give MADWORLD that second wind that the game most definitely deserves!

To vote, either click the button up top or just click right here, and then cast your vote for Varrigan City’s biggest antihero.  The voting is literally MADWORLD versus three Nintendo games, so we’re quite proud of our short-but-sweet candidate that the crew over at Platinum Games put together. Voting ends in just over 18 days, so we’ve got just over two weeks to spread the word!

In the event that MADWORLD does end up winning… besides one heck of a party, expect a whole lot of free, awesome swag, including one of those super rare MADWORLD Hoodies (see above!), going out to our community as a special thank you!

From Valkyria Chronicles to Phantasy Star Zero, we’ve seen the passion that many SEGA fans have – and as one among you, I know that we can pull off feats that will continue to make all the higher-ups ask questions. We’ve done it before – now let’s give them one more feat to talk about.

NOTE: Sega of Europe is conducting the giveaway this week. They will start around Noon pacific (1pm mountain, 2pm central, 3pm eastern). Big thanks to them for covering so we can enjoy our break!

On the Block

Mario & Sonic Prize Pack

1. Mario & Sonic poster

2. Mario & Sonic at the Winter Olympic Games – DS version

Phantasy Star Zero prize pack

1. Inflatable rappy

2. PSZ rappy shirt (winner chooses size S-XL)

Bleach prize pack

1. Bleach pins

2. Bleach card game

3. Bleach wrist band

4. Bleach patch

5. Bleach keychain

Planet 51 pack

1. Lem toy

2. 1 game (winner chooses platform: DS, Wii, X360, PS3)

Planet 51 pack 2

1. Chuck toy

2. 1 game (winner chooses platform: DS, Wii, X360, PS3)

Valkyria pack

1. Eleanor figurine

2. Foam grenade

Sonic Bag

Canvas Sonic-branded cross-body bag

How it Works

1. You must be following us on Twitter to be eligible. (If you don’t have a Twitter account, you can create one by going to http://www.twitter.com and click the green “get started — join!” button in the center of the page.)
2. At random times on Friday, we will announce the prize we are giving away, and what number of response you need to be to win. Send us a direct message (DM) via Twitter and be that number to win the prize. (@ replies do not count as entries!)
3. All followers are eligible to win all prizes, unless a restriction is noted. Restrictions are usually due to the prize being region-locked. For example, US games that won’t work on UK gaming systems. There may also be age restrictions due to the rating of the game.
4. We will announce the winner on our Twitter feed once eligibility is confirmed.

Make Sure We’re Following You on Twitter

If you are currently following us on Twitter, please be sure that we are following you as well. You can do this by making sure that SEGA is in your “followers” list, or by going to DoesFollow and typing SEGA in the first blank, your Twitter username in the second, and pressing the “check” button. You can reverse this to be sure that you are following us. If you are following us, but we’re not following you, please send a message to @SEGA and we will follow you. This is important, because only people we follow can send us direct messages (DMs), and DMs are the only way to enter the giveaways.

How to Send Direct Messages on Twitter

There are a few ways to send us a Direct Message on Twitter. The easiest way is to go to our Twitter page and select “message” under the “Actions” heading in the side bar. If you do not see “message”, this means that we are not following you. Please send a message to @sega to let us know, and we will follow you. When you click “message” you will be taken to a window where you can type a message and press send.

You may also select the “direct messages” tab from your Twitter homepage, and select SEGA from the drop-down menu at the top of the page. Again, if you don’t see our name there, it’s probably because we’re not following you. Let us know, and we’ll follow you.

There are also many Twitter clients that you can use instead of using the website. These include TweetDeck, Twitteriffic, Tweetie, and Twhirl. Each of these programs works differently, so you’ll want to figure out how to send a direct message on the program you use. If you want to send us a test message, we’ll let you know if we received it or not.