Each time a significant awards ceremony approaches, there’s always an outcry to include of new categories to honor unsung work and delight the spirits of fans dedicated to specific genres.
My colleague has already made for a horror game category. That would be fantastic. So would tabletop games, this being a dedicated supporter's campaign. But they will have to forgive me for pushing forward just as with other dedicated enthusiasts, there's a strong justification backing this proposal is the most urgent and important of all. The demand is this: It's essential to create a category for puzzle games.
The Genre Classification Challenge
Classifying creative works isn't exact; it’s very subjective, and it will always spark debates and end in fuzzy definitions. There’s a reason cinema institutions avoid this approach. However, it represents a necessary evil within the realm of video games, which are so diverse it's challenging to consider them one unified medium.
For comprehensive acknowledgment of achievement in video games to gain proper attention, and for games of all stripes to receive proper recognition, genre categories are essential.
Present Award Structure
Prominent interactive entertainment events currently feature award types recognizing Action, Adventure-action titles, Role-Playing, Combat games, Sim/Strategy, and Sports/Racing games. Collectively, these award types actually cover numerous genres, and you can find room accommodating various experiences.
This doesn't apply to logic-based experiences. There’s simply nowhere to put them. Think about these outstanding current releases, showing diverse approaches: building puzzles of one title, the pulse-pounding block-matching of another game, thought-provoking social scenarios from additional release. Which classification works among existing types? Nowhere, that’s where.
Recognition Challenges
Many instances occur excellent brain-teasers published annually without proper recognition during gaming ceremonies, unless they happen to qualify for categories like Mobile Game, Virtual reality experiences, or the extremely competitive Indie races.
- An iconic brain-teaser received no recognition in any category in 2014
- A different innovative game was excluded during that ceremony
- Well-received sorting experience got ignored that year
- Limited numbers of puzzle games scraped into niche award types
Importance of Logic Titles
Frequently they represent compact experiences, but the art of the puzzle game is of massive significance. Famous handheld logic titles count as most engaged experiences worldwide and have been for over a decade.
The famous puzzle experience challenges well-known building titles for the title of most purchased experience; it’s also in the running for best game of all time. Brain-teasers form essential building blocks within interactive entertainment, and engaging with diverse game types.
Proposal and Rationale
Puzzle games wouldn’t have such difficulty. You could fill a field of five engaging, different, qualified experiences every year with ease — or rather, with difficulty, given the need to exclude so many good games out.
To emphasize again, these represent titles without proper classification during prominent ceremonies. Puzzle game makers operate at the hard edge of video game design, producing among essential manifestations within interactive entertainment. Just like movie stunt professionals, they merit acknowledgment. Let’s not keep them waiting decades.
