As any significant awards ceremony nears, you'll find a clamor to include fresh award types to recognize unsung work and fill the passions of enthusiasts who have specialized interests.
A fellow writer has already made supporting a scary games classification. It would be amazing. The same goes for tabletop games, this being a passionate advocate's mission. Yet I need to apologize in advance if I try to elbow in front since similar to blinkered fanatics, there's a strong justification backing this proposal stands as crucial above others. This is the request: We need a category for puzzle games.
Categorizing Game Types
Categorizing art by genre is not a science; opinions vary greatly, and typically spark debates and end in fuzzy definitions. It's understandable that movie academies don’t do it. Yet it remains an unavoidable compromise within the realm of gaming, which are so diverse they barely qualify a single creative category.
For the full spectrum of gaming accomplishments to be recognized, and for games of all stripes to receive proper recognition, specific award classifications remain vital.
Present Award Structure
Prominent interactive entertainment events presently include genre categories for Action, Action/Adventure, RPG experiences, Fighting, Simulation and strategy titles, and Sports/Racing games. Between them, these award types actually cover many game types, allowing placement for numerous titles.
Different situation exists for brain-teasing titles. There’s simply nowhere to put them. Examine these examples from this year’s best games, each quite distinct: building puzzles in a particular game, intense tile-matching of another game, thought-provoking social scenarios of a third title. Where could they possibly go among existing types? Unfortunately, nowhere.
Acknowledgment Issues
Numerous examples exist excellent brain-teasers launched regularly that have no home during gaming ceremonies, except when they manage to fit classification types such as Mobile Game, VR/AR Game, or the intensely contested independent game categories.
- An iconic brain-teaser got overlooked for anything during that awards season
- Another imaginative release was excluded in 2019
- Well-received sorting experience received no acknowledgment in 2021
- Limited numbers of logic titles barely qualified for niche award types
Significance of Puzzle Games
Commonly they're small games, but the art in brain-teasers carries substantial weight. Iconic mobile puzzle games stand as most engaged experiences globally maintaining this status for over a decade.
The iconic tile-matching title challenges well-known building titles for the title of most purchased experience; it’s also in the running for top gaming experience. Brain-teasers form essential building blocks within interactive entertainment, and they are in conversation across multiple categories.
The Solution and Justification
Puzzle games wouldn’t have such difficulty. It would be easy to populate five nominees interesting, varied, worthy titles annually without trouble — actually, with challenge, given the need to exclude numerous deserving experiences.
And to reiterate, these represent titles lacking appropriate categories during prominent ceremonies. Puzzle game makers operate at the hard edge game development, creating some of essential manifestations within interactive entertainment. Just like film action specialists, they merit acknowledgment. We shouldn't delay decades.
