Each time a prominent awards ceremony draws close, there’s always a demand for the addition additional classifications to acknowledge underappreciated efforts and satisfy the hearts of fans with niche passions.
My colleague made the case for a horror game category. That would rule. So would strategy board titles, which is a dedicated supporter's campaign. Yet I need to apologize in advance for pushing forward because like all single-minded supporters, I possess a compelling case for why my demand is the most urgent and significant. This is the request: We need a category for puzzle games.
Categorizing Game Types
Categorizing art by genre is not a science; it remains highly personal, and typically generate discussions concluding with vague boundaries. It's understandable that movie academies avoid this approach. Yet it remains an essential concession for the industry of video games, which are so diverse they hardly constitute one unified medium.
To recognize the complete range of gaming accomplishments to gain proper attention, and to ensure all game types to have a chance for representation, genre categories are essential.
Current Gaming Award Categories
The major gaming awards currently feature classifications covering Action, Adventure-action titles, Role-Playing, Fighting, Simulation and strategy titles, and Sports/Racing games. Between them, these classifications actually cover numerous genres, making space possible for most games within them.
This doesn't apply to brain-teasing titles. No suitable classification appears to put them. Examine these examples from outstanding current releases, all very different: building puzzles from a specific release, intense tile-matching from another release, thought-provoking social scenarios in another game. What category would fit them within current classifications? Unfortunately, nowhere.
Recognition Challenges
There are dozens excellent brain-teasers released every year lacking appropriate categories in entertainment awards, except when they manage to fit classification types such as Mobile Game, VR/AR Game, and the highly challenging small studio competitions.
- One classic puzzle game received no recognition for anything during that awards season
- Another creative title missed out in 2019
- Popular arranging title got ignored that year
- Just some puzzle games scraped into niche award types
Value of Brain-Teasers
These are often compact experiences, however the design of the puzzle game carries substantial weight. Well-known matching games rank among most engaged experiences worldwide maintaining this status for many years.
The iconic tile-matching title rivals popular creative games for the title of best-selling game of all time; it’s also in the running for best game of all time. Logic titles represent cornerstones within interactive entertainment, while interacting across multiple categories.
Proposal and Rationale
Brain-teasers wouldn't encounter such difficulty. One could readily select a field of five with fascinating, diverse, deserving games each ceremony simply — actually, with challenge, because you’d have to leave so many good games out.
And to reiterate, these represent titles without proper classification during prominent ceremonies. Brain-teaser creators operate at the demanding boundary interactive creation, developing some of essential manifestations of the video game form. Similar to movie stunt professionals, they merit acknowledgment. Let’s not keep them waiting generations.
