Each time a prominent honors show nears, you'll find an outcry for introducing additional classifications to recognize underappreciated efforts and delight the passions of enthusiasts with niche passions.
My colleague made the case for a horror game category. It would be amazing. So would strategy board titles, which is a dedicated supporter's campaign. However, I must insist for pushing forward because like all dedicated enthusiasts, I have a cast-iron argument backing this proposal remains most pressing and significant. Here's the proposal: We need a classification for brain-teasing titles.
Categorizing Game Types
Categorizing art by genre is not a science; it remains highly personal, and inevitably generate discussions concluding with vague boundaries. There’s a reason film award organizations steer clear of genre categories. However, it represents an essential concession in the world of video games, showing incredible range they barely qualify a single creative category.
For the full spectrum of interactive entertainment excellence to receive acknowledgment, and for games of all stripes to receive proper recognition, classification by type becomes crucial.
Present Award Structure
The major gaming awards offer these award types recognizing Action-oriented games, Adventure-action titles, Role-Playing, Combat games, Sim/Strategy, and Sports/Racing games. Collectively, these award types effectively encompass a lot of ground, allowing placement accommodating various experiences.
This doesn't apply to brain-teasing titles. No suitable classification appears to put them. Think about these outstanding current releases, all very different: structural challenges in a particular game, fast-paced pattern recognition of another game, and the sweetly sociological logic puzzles from additional release. What category would fit them between these six categories? Unfortunately, nowhere.
Recognition Challenges
Numerous examples exist of brilliant puzzle games released every year without proper recognition during gaming ceremonies, if they accidentally match for categories like Handheld titles, Virtual reality experiences, and the highly challenging small studio competitions.
- An iconic brain-teaser wasn’t nominated completely during that awards season
- Another creative title was excluded during that ceremony
- Well-received sorting experience received no acknowledgment that year
- Just some logic titles barely qualified for independent or mobile categories
Importance of Logic Titles
Frequently they represent compact experiences, yet the craft of the puzzle game holds tremendous importance. Famous handheld logic titles stand as most engaged experiences in the world continuing this trend for over a decade.
The legendary block-stacking game challenges popular creative games competing to become most purchased experience; it also contends for top gaming experience. Puzzle games are foundational to the art of video games, while interacting across multiple categories.
Recommendation and Reasoning
Brain-teasers wouldn't encounter such difficulty. One could readily select a field of five interesting, varied, worthy titles every year with ease — perhaps, with difficulty, given the need to exclude numerous deserving experiences.
To emphasize again, these represent titles that otherwise have no home at major gaming awards. Puzzle game makers are working at the demanding boundary game development, producing among the purest expressions of the video game form. Similar to cinema stunt performers, they deserve recognition. We shouldn't delay 35 years.
