As any significant honors show nears, there’s always an outcry for the addition of new categories to honor overlooked contributions and fill the spirits of fans who have specialized interests.
Another commentator has already made supporting a scary games classification. It would be amazing. Equally deserving are strategy board titles, which is someone's personal cause. But they will have to forgive me if I try to elbow in front because like all dedicated enthusiasts, there's a strong justification supporting my request remains most pressing and significant. The demand is this: There should be a category for puzzle games.
Categorizing Game Types
Categorizing art by genre defies precise measurement; it’s very subjective, and inevitably start arguments resulting in unclear classifications. There’s a reason movie academies steer clear of genre categories. Yet it remains an essential concession in the world of gaming, which are so diverse they barely qualify as a single art form.
To recognize the complete range of interactive entertainment excellence to receive acknowledgment, while allowing diverse titles to compete fairly, genre categories are essential.
Current Gaming Award Categories
Prominent interactive entertainment events currently feature award types recognizing Action-oriented games, Adventure-action titles, RPG experiences, Fighting, Simulation and strategy titles, and Sports/Racing games. Between them, these six categories successfully include a lot of ground, and you can find room accommodating various experiences.
Not so for logic-based experiences. No suitable classification appears to put them. Consider three of this year’s best games, showing diverse approaches: structural challenges of one title, intense tile-matching of another game, and the sweetly sociological logic puzzles in another game. Where could they possibly go between these six categories? Unfortunately, nowhere.
Acknowledgment Issues
Numerous examples exist of brilliant puzzle games released every year lacking appropriate categories at major award shows, if they accidentally match classification types such as Handheld titles, Virtual reality experiences, or the intensely contested independent game categories.
- A renowned logic title received no recognition completely that year
- A different innovative game received no nominations in 2019
- Well-received sorting experience was overlooked that year
- Limited numbers of brain-teasers managed to sneak into niche award types
Importance of Logic Titles
These are often small games, but the art behind logic titles carries substantial weight. Well-known matching games rank among most popular titles worldwide and have been for an extended period.
The famous puzzle experience challenges famous sandbox experiences competing to become most purchased experience; it also contends for top gaming experience. Brain-teasers form essential building blocks within interactive entertainment, and they are in conversation across multiple categories.
Proposal and Rationale
Puzzle games wouldn’t have that issue. It would be easy to populate five nominees engaging, different, qualified experiences annually without trouble — actually, with challenge, given the need to exclude many worthy titles.
To emphasize again, these are games that otherwise have no home in important events. Brain-teaser creators operate at the hard edge of video game design, producing among the purest expressions within interactive entertainment. Similar to cinema stunt performers, they merit acknowledgment. We shouldn't delay decades.
