As any prominent honors show nears, you'll find a clamor to include fresh award types to honor unsung work and satisfy the passions of fans dedicated to specific genres.
My colleague made the case supporting a scary games classification. That would be fantastic. Equally deserving are tabletop games, this being a dedicated supporter's campaign. Yet I need to apologize in advance for pushing forward because like all dedicated enthusiasts, I have a cast-iron argument supporting my request is the most urgent and significant. The demand is this: There should be a category for puzzle games.
The Genre Classification Challenge
Categorizing art by genre is not a science; it remains highly personal, and inevitably generate discussions concluding with vague boundaries. This explains why cinema institutions steer clear of genre categories. Yet it remains a necessary evil in the world of interactive entertainment, showing incredible range it's challenging to consider them as a single art form.
To recognize the complete range of interactive entertainment excellence to gain proper attention, and to ensure all game types to receive proper recognition, classification by type becomes crucial.
Current Gaming Award Categories
The major gaming awards offer these genre categories for Action, Adventure-action titles, RPG experiences, Fighting, Simulation and strategy titles, and Sports/Racing games. Collectively, these award types successfully include a lot of ground, allowing placement for numerous titles.
Different situation exists for puzzle games. No suitable classification appears for their placement. Examine these examples from this year’s best games, all very different: building puzzles in a particular game, fast-paced pattern recognition of another game, engaging interpersonal challenges from additional release. Which classification works within current classifications? Nowhere, that’s where.
Acknowledgment Issues
Numerous examples exist outstanding logic titles released every year that have no home during gaming ceremonies, except when they manage to fit award groups including Handheld titles, Virtual reality experiences, or the extremely competitive small studio competitions.
- One classic puzzle game got overlooked completely during that awards season
- A different innovative game missed out in 2019
- A beloved organization game received no acknowledgment in 2021
- Only a few puzzle games barely qualified for niche award types
Importance of Logic Titles
Commonly they're modest productions, however the design behind logic titles holds tremendous importance. Well-known matching games rank among most popular titles globally and have been for many years.
The famous puzzle experience competes with well-known building titles claiming status as most purchased experience; it’s also in the running as greatest title ever. Brain-teasers form essential building blocks for gaming as medium, and engaging with almost every other genre.
Recommendation and Reasoning
Puzzle games wouldn’t have this problem. It would be easy to populate five nominees engaging, different, qualified experiences each ceremony simply — or rather, with difficulty, because you’d have to leave so many good games out.
To emphasize again, these represent titles lacking appropriate categories at major gaming awards. Brain-teaser creators operate at the challenging frontier of video game design, producing among the purest expressions of gaming itself. Just like cinema stunt performers, they deserve recognition. We shouldn't delay 35 years.
