Whenever a major honors show nears, there’s always a clamor to include additional classifications to acknowledge overlooked contributions and satisfy the spirits of enthusiasts who have specialized interests.
Another commentator has already made for a horror game category. That would be fantastic. Equally deserving are tabletop games, representing someone's personal cause. But they will have to forgive me when I prioritize because like all single-minded supporters, I possess a compelling case for why my demand remains most pressing and significant. Here's the proposal: It's essential to create a category for puzzle games.
Organizing Gaming Categories
Categorizing art by genre is not a science; it’s very subjective, and typically generate discussions resulting in unclear classifications. This explains why cinema institutions steer clear of genre categories. But it is an unavoidable compromise for the industry of video games, showing incredible range they hardly constitute a single creative category.
To recognize the complete range of interactive entertainment excellence to be recognized, and to ensure all game types to receive proper recognition, genre categories are essential.
Current Gaming Award Categories
Leading game ceremonies presently include award types recognizing Action, Adventure-action titles, RPG experiences, Combat games, Sim/Strategy, and Sports/Racing games. Between them, these six categories effectively encompass a lot of ground, making space possible for most games within them.
Different situation exists for puzzle games. There’s simply nowhere to put them. Examine these examples from recent excellent titles, each quite distinct: the architectural riddles in a particular game, intense tile-matching of another game, thought-provoking social scenarios from additional release. Which classification works within current classifications? Unfortunately, nowhere.
The Representation Problem
Numerous examples exist excellent brain-teasers released every year that have no home in entertainment awards, unless they happen to qualify classification types such as Mobile Game, Virtual reality experiences, or the intensely contested small studio competitions.
- A renowned logic title wasn’t nominated for anything that year
- A different innovative game missed out during that ceremony
- Well-received sorting experience received no acknowledgment in 2021
- Just some puzzle games barely qualified for independent or mobile categories
Value of Brain-Teasers
Frequently they represent small games, yet the craft of the puzzle game holds tremendous importance. Famous handheld logic titles count as the most-played games worldwide maintaining this status for many years.
The iconic tile-matching title rivals well-known building titles for the title of highest-selling title ever; it also contends as greatest title ever. Brain-teasers form essential building blocks for gaming as medium, while interacting across multiple categories.
Recommendation and Reasoning
Puzzle games wouldn’t have such difficulty. It would be easy to populate multiple candidates engaging, different, qualified experiences annually without trouble — actually, with challenge, since numerous excellent numerous deserving experiences.
And to reiterate, these are games without proper classification at major gaming awards. Logic title developers are working at the demanding boundary of video game design, producing among the purest expressions of gaming itself. Just like movie stunt professionals, they deserve recognition. We shouldn't delay decades.
