Each time a prominent honors show approaches, you'll find an outcry to include additional classifications to honor unsung work and delight the spirits of enthusiasts who have specialized interests.
My colleague made the case for a horror game category. That would be fantastic. So would tabletop games, representing someone's personal cause. However, I must insist when I prioritize because like all single-minded supporters, I have a cast-iron argument for why my demand stands as crucial and important of all. The demand is this: There should be a classification for brain-teasing titles.
Categorizing Game Types
Classifying creative works isn't exact; it’s very subjective, and it will always spark debates and end in fuzzy definitions. It's understandable that cinema institutions don’t do it. Yet it remains a necessary evil for the industry of interactive entertainment, that demonstrate such variety they barely qualify one unified medium.
For comprehensive acknowledgment of interactive entertainment excellence to receive acknowledgment, and for games of all stripes to compete fairly, genre categories are essential.
Current Gaming Award Categories
Leading game ceremonies currently feature classifications covering Action, Adventure-action titles, RPG experiences, Fighting, Sim/Strategy, and Sports/Racing games. Collectively, these award types effectively encompass a lot of ground, allowing placement for most games within them.
This doesn't apply to puzzle games. No appropriate category exists to put them. Examine these examples from this year’s best games, all very different: structural challenges from a specific release, fast-paced pattern recognition of another game, thought-provoking social scenarios from additional release. Which classification works within current classifications? Simply put, no category fits.
Acknowledgment Issues
There are dozens outstanding logic titles published annually without proper recognition in entertainment awards, unless they happen to qualify classification types such as Handheld titles, VR/AR Game, or the extremely competitive Indie races.
- A renowned logic title got overlooked in any category during that awards season
- Another creative title missed out during that ceremony
- A beloved organization game got ignored in 2021
- Just some logic titles managed to sneak into small studio or handheld classifications
Value of Brain-Teasers
These are often compact experiences, however the design behind logic titles holds tremendous importance. Famous handheld logic titles count as most engaged experiences in the world maintaining this status for many years.
The legendary block-stacking game competes with popular creative games claiming status as highest-selling title ever; it also contends for best game of all time. Brain-teasers form essential building blocks to the art of video games, and they are in conversation with almost every other genre.
Proposal and Rationale
Puzzle games wouldn’t have this problem. You could fill five nominees interesting, varied, worthy titles each ceremony simply — perhaps, with difficulty, because you’d have to leave so many good games out.
Restating the point, these include experiences that otherwise have no home in important events. Logic title developers function at the hard edge of video game design, producing among the purest expressions of gaming itself. Just like film action specialists, they deserve recognition. Don't make them wait decades.
