As any prominent honors show approaches, you'll find an outcry to include of new categories to honor overlooked contributions and satisfy the passions of followers who have specialized interests.
A fellow writer made the case supporting a scary games classification. That would be fantastic. So would tabletop games, this being a dedicated supporter's campaign. Yet I need to apologize in advance when I prioritize since similar to dedicated enthusiasts, there's a strong justification supporting my request remains most pressing above others. Here's the proposal: We need a category for puzzle games.
Organizing Gaming Categories
Organizing artistic expressions is not a science; it’s very subjective, and inevitably spark debates resulting in unclear classifications. There’s a reason film award organizations steer clear of genre categories. Yet it remains a necessary evil within the realm of interactive entertainment, that demonstrate such variety they barely qualify as a single art form.
For comprehensive acknowledgment of achievement in video games to gain proper attention, and for games of all stripes to compete fairly, genre categories are essential.
Present Award Structure
The major gaming awards currently feature genre categories for Action, Action/Adventure, Role-Playing, Combat games, Sim/Strategy, plus athletic and racing experiences. Between them, these award types effectively encompass numerous genres, and you can find room for most games within them.
This doesn't apply to logic-based experiences. No appropriate category exists to accommodate them. Think about these this year’s best games, all very different: building puzzles from a specific release, intense tile-matching of another game, and the sweetly sociological logic puzzles of a third title. What category would fit them within current classifications? Unfortunately, nowhere.
The Representation Problem
Many instances occur excellent brain-teasers launched regularly lacking appropriate categories during gaming ceremonies, unless they happen to qualify classification types such as Mobile Game, VR/AR Game, or the extremely competitive Indie races.
- A renowned logic title received no recognition for anything that year
- A different innovative game was excluded in 2019
- Popular arranging title was overlooked in 2021
- Just some puzzle games barely qualified for independent or mobile categories
Importance of Logic Titles
Frequently they represent compact experiences, yet the craft in brain-teasers is of massive significance. Well-known matching games stand as the most-played games in the world maintaining this status for an extended period.
The famous puzzle experience rivals well-known building titles for the title of most purchased experience; it also contends for top gaming experience. Puzzle games are foundational to the art of video games, and they are in conversation with almost every other genre.
The Solution and Justification
Brain-teasers wouldn't encounter such difficulty. It would be easy to populate a field of five with fascinating, diverse, deserving games each ceremony simply — or rather, with difficulty, since numerous excellent numerous deserving experiences.
Restating the point, these include experiences that otherwise have no home during prominent ceremonies. Brain-teaser creators are working at the hard edge of video game design, creating some of most fundamental forms of gaming itself. Just like movie stunt professionals, they merit acknowledgment. Don't make them wait generations.
