Each time a major prize-giving event draws close, you'll find a demand for the addition additional classifications to honor overlooked contributions and fill the hearts of enthusiasts who have specialized interests.
A fellow writer has already made for a horror game category. That would rule. Equally deserving are strategy board titles, this being a dedicated supporter's campaign. However, I must insist when I prioritize because like all single-minded supporters, I have a cast-iron argument for why my demand remains most pressing and important of all. The demand is this: There should be a classification for brain-teasing titles.
Categorizing Game Types
Categorizing art by genre defies precise measurement; it’s very subjective, and typically start arguments resulting in unclear classifications. It's understandable that cinema institutions avoid this approach. But it is a necessary evil within the realm of gaming, which are so diverse it's challenging to consider them one unified medium.
To recognize the complete range of gaming accomplishments to be recognized, while allowing diverse titles to receive proper recognition, classification by type becomes crucial.
Present Award Structure
Prominent interactive entertainment events presently include award types recognizing Action-oriented games, Action/Adventure, RPG experiences, Fighting, Simulation and strategy titles, and Sports/Racing games. Collectively, these six categories effectively encompass numerous genres, making space possible accommodating various experiences.
Not so for puzzle games. No suitable classification appears to put them. Examine these examples from this year’s best games, showing diverse approaches: structural challenges in a particular game, the pulse-pounding block-matching from another release, and the sweetly sociological logic puzzles in another game. What category would fit them between these six categories? Unfortunately, nowhere.
Recognition Challenges
There are dozens outstanding logic titles released every year that have no home in entertainment awards, except when they manage to fit award groups including Mobile Game, VR/AR Game, or the extremely competitive independent game categories.
- An iconic brain-teaser got overlooked for anything that year
- A different innovative game was excluded during that ceremony
- A beloved organization game got ignored that year
- Just some logic titles barely qualified for small studio or handheld classifications
Value of Brain-Teasers
Commonly they're small games, yet the craft behind logic titles holds tremendous importance. Iconic mobile puzzle games rank among the most-played games worldwide maintaining this status for an extended period.
The famous puzzle experience rivals popular creative games for the title of best-selling game of all time; it additionally competes for top gaming experience. Puzzle games are foundational to the art of video games, and they are in conversation with almost every other genre.
Recommendation and Reasoning
Puzzle games wouldn’t have such difficulty. One could readily select multiple candidates engaging, different, qualified experiences annually without trouble — or rather, with difficulty, because you’d have to leave so many good games out.
And to reiterate, these include experiences lacking appropriate categories during prominent ceremonies. Puzzle game makers are working at the challenging frontier of video game design, producing among most fundamental forms of gaming itself. Comparable to film action specialists, they deserve recognition. Let’s not keep them waiting decades.
