As any significant prize-giving event nears, there’s always a clamor to include additional classifications to recognize overlooked contributions and satisfy the hearts of enthusiasts dedicated to specific genres.
A fellow writer made the case supporting a scary games classification. That would be fantastic. So would strategy board titles, this being someone's personal cause. But they will have to forgive me when I prioritize since similar to blinkered fanatics, I possess a compelling case for why my demand remains most pressing and important of all. The demand is this: It's essential to create a category for puzzle games.
The Genre Classification Challenge
Organizing artistic expressions is not a science; it’s very subjective, and inevitably spark debates and end in fuzzy definitions. There’s a reason cinema institutions steer clear of genre categories. However, it represents a necessary evil within the realm of gaming, showing incredible range it's challenging to consider them as a single art form.
To recognize the complete range of achievement in video games to receive acknowledgment, while allowing diverse titles to have a chance for representation, specific award classifications remain vital.
Current Gaming Award Categories
Leading game ceremonies currently feature award types recognizing Action-oriented games, Action/Adventure, Role-Playing, Fighting, Sim/Strategy, and Sports/Racing games. Collectively, these six categories actually cover a lot of ground, making space possible for numerous titles.
Different situation exists for brain-teasing titles. No appropriate category exists for their placement. Consider three of outstanding current releases, showing diverse approaches: building puzzles from a specific release, the pulse-pounding block-matching of another game, and the sweetly sociological logic puzzles of a third title. What category would fit them among existing types? Nowhere, that’s where.
Recognition Challenges
Many instances occur excellent brain-teasers published annually without proper recognition during gaming ceremonies, if they accidentally match for categories like Mobile Game, VR/AR Game, and the highly challenging small studio competitions.
- An iconic brain-teaser received no recognition in any category in 2014
- Another creative title was excluded during that ceremony
- Well-received sorting experience was overlooked that year
- Only a few logic titles scraped into niche award types
Significance of Puzzle Games
Commonly they're small games, but the art behind logic titles carries substantial weight. Iconic mobile puzzle games count as the most-played games in the world and have been for many years.
The iconic tile-matching title competes with famous sandbox experiences for the title of best-selling game of all time; it additionally competes for top gaming experience. Logic titles represent cornerstones to the art of video games, and they are in conversation across multiple categories.
Recommendation and Reasoning
Puzzle games wouldn’t have this problem. One could readily select five nominees with fascinating, diverse, deserving games every year with ease — perhaps, with difficulty, given the need to exclude numerous deserving experiences.
Restating the point, these include experiences lacking appropriate categories at major gaming awards. Logic title developers operate at the hard edge of video game design, producing among the purest expressions of the video game form. Comparable to cinema stunt performers, they warrant appreciation. We shouldn't delay 35 years.
