As any prominent awards ceremony nears, you'll find an outcry to include additional classifications to recognize overlooked contributions and fill the hearts of enthusiasts with niche passions.
Another commentator made the case advocating for terror-themed awards. That would be fantastic. The same goes for board games, which is someone's personal cause. Yet I need to apologize in advance when I prioritize just as with other blinkered fanatics, I have a cast-iron argument supporting my request remains most pressing and significant. The demand is this: There should be a classification for brain-teasing titles.
Organizing Gaming Categories
Organizing artistic expressions defies precise measurement; it’s very subjective, and inevitably generate discussions concluding with vague boundaries. This explains why cinema institutions steer clear of genre categories. Yet it remains an unavoidable compromise for the industry of video games, which are so diverse they barely qualify one unified medium.
For comprehensive acknowledgment of gaming accomplishments to gain proper attention, and for games of all stripes to receive proper recognition, genre categories are essential.
Existing Game Classification System
The major gaming awards currently feature classifications covering Action-oriented games, Action/Adventure, RPG experiences, Fighting, Sim/Strategy, plus athletic and racing experiences. Between them, these classifications successfully include numerous genres, making space possible accommodating various experiences.
Different situation exists for logic-based experiences. No suitable classification appears to put them. Think about these this year’s best games, all very different: structural challenges from a specific release, intense tile-matching in a different title, and the sweetly sociological logic puzzles of a third title. Which classification works between these six categories? Simply put, no category fits.
The Representation Problem
There are dozens of brilliant puzzle games published annually lacking appropriate categories in entertainment awards, except when they manage to fit classification types such as Handheld titles, Virtual reality experiences, or the extremely competitive Indie races.
- An iconic brain-teaser wasn’t nominated for anything during that awards season
- Another creative title missed out during that ceremony
- Well-received sorting experience received no acknowledgment recently
- Only a few brain-teasers scraped into independent or mobile categories
Value of Brain-Teasers
Frequently they represent compact experiences, but the art of the puzzle game carries substantial weight. Iconic mobile puzzle games stand as most engaged experiences globally continuing this trend for over a decade.
The legendary block-stacking game challenges famous sandbox experiences for the title of best-selling game of all time; it also contends as greatest title ever. Logic titles represent cornerstones for gaming as medium, and they are in conversation across multiple categories.
Proposal and Rationale
Puzzle games wouldn’t have that issue. One could readily select a field of five interesting, varied, worthy titles each ceremony simply — or rather, with difficulty, since numerous excellent many worthy titles.
Restating the point, these are games that otherwise have no home at major gaming awards. Puzzle game makers operate at the hard edge of video game design, producing among the purest expressions within interactive entertainment. Similar to cinema stunt performers, they merit acknowledgment. Let’s not keep them waiting generations.
