As any significant awards ceremony approaches, there’s always a clamor for introducing of new categories to acknowledge underappreciated efforts and delight the hearts of fans who have specialized interests.
A fellow writer previously argued for a horror game category. That would be fantastic. Equally deserving are board games, representing someone's personal cause. However, I must insist when I prioritize because like all blinkered fanatics, I have a cast-iron argument backing this proposal is the most urgent and significant. The demand is this: It's essential to create a category for puzzle games.
Organizing Gaming Categories
Categorizing art by genre defies precise measurement; opinions vary greatly, and inevitably start arguments and end in fuzzy definitions. It's understandable that movie academies steer clear of genre categories. But it is a necessary evil for the industry of video games, which are so diverse they barely qualify a single creative category.
For comprehensive acknowledgment of interactive entertainment excellence to be recognized, while allowing diverse titles to compete fairly, genre categories are essential.
Present Award Structure
Prominent interactive entertainment events offer these genre categories for Action, Action/Adventure, Role-Playing, Combat games, Sim/Strategy, plus athletic and racing experiences. Together, these classifications effectively encompass many game types, making space possible for numerous titles.
Different situation exists for logic-based experiences. There’s simply nowhere for their placement. Examine these examples from recent excellent titles, all very different: building puzzles from a specific release, intense tile-matching from another release, and the sweetly sociological logic puzzles from additional release. What category would fit them within current classifications? Simply put, no category fits.
Recognition Challenges
There are dozens excellent brain-teasers published annually without proper recognition at major award shows, unless they happen to qualify classification types such as Mobile Game, Virtual reality experiences, or the extremely competitive small studio competitions.
- An iconic brain-teaser got overlooked for anything that year
- Another imaginative release received no nominations during that ceremony
- A beloved organization game received no acknowledgment that year
- Limited numbers of puzzle games managed to sneak into small studio or handheld classifications
Value of Brain-Teasers
Commonly they're compact experiences, however the design behind logic titles holds tremendous importance. Well-known matching games stand as most engaged experiences worldwide and have been for an extended period.
The famous puzzle experience challenges famous sandbox experiences claiming status as highest-selling title ever; it’s also in the running as greatest title ever. Puzzle games are foundational for gaming as medium, and they are in conversation across multiple categories.
Proposal and Rationale
Puzzle games wouldn’t have this problem. It would be easy to populate five nominees interesting, varied, worthy titles annually without trouble — actually, with challenge, given the need to exclude so many good games out.
Restating the point, these are games lacking appropriate categories during prominent ceremonies. Puzzle game makers function at the demanding boundary game development, creating some of essential manifestations within interactive entertainment. Just like cinema stunt performers, they deserve recognition. We shouldn't delay generations.
