Whenever a significant awards ceremony approaches, one notices a clamor for introducing fresh award types to acknowledge underappreciated efforts and satisfy the passions of fans with niche passions.
My colleague has already made advocating for terror-themed awards. It would be amazing. So would tabletop games, this being a passionate advocate's mission. Yet I need to apologize in advance when I prioritize since similar to blinkered fanatics, I possess a compelling case supporting my request is the most urgent and important of all. This is the request: There should be a category for puzzle games.
The Genre Classification Challenge
Categorizing art by genre is not a science; it’s very subjective, and it will always spark debates resulting in unclear classifications. It's understandable that cinema institutions don’t do it. However, it represents an unavoidable compromise for the industry of gaming, which are so diverse it's challenging to consider them a single creative category.
For the full spectrum of gaming accomplishments to receive acknowledgment, while allowing diverse titles to receive proper recognition, specific award classifications remain vital.
Present Award Structure
Leading game ceremonies offer these genre categories for Action, Adventure-action titles, RPG experiences, Fighting, Sim/Strategy, and Sports/Racing games. Between them, these classifications actually cover a lot of ground, making space possible accommodating various experiences.
Not so for logic-based experiences. No suitable classification appears for their placement. Think about these recent excellent titles, each quite distinct: structural challenges from a specific release, fast-paced pattern recognition of another game, and the sweetly sociological logic puzzles in another game. Where could they possibly go between these six categories? Nowhere, that’s where.
The Representation Problem
There are dozens outstanding logic titles released every year lacking appropriate categories in entertainment awards, except when they manage to fit for categories like Handheld titles, Virtual reality experiences, and the highly challenging Indie races.
- A renowned logic title received no recognition completely that year
- Another imaginative release received no nominations that year
- A beloved organization game got ignored that year
- Just some logic titles scraped into independent or mobile categories
Importance of Logic Titles
Commonly they're small games, but the art behind logic titles carries substantial weight. Famous handheld logic titles count as the most-played games globally and have been for over a decade.
The famous puzzle experience challenges famous sandbox experiences claiming status as best-selling game of all time; it also contends as greatest title ever. Puzzle games are foundational to the art of video games, and they are in conversation with diverse game types.
Recommendation and Reasoning
Brain-teasers wouldn't encounter such difficulty. It would be easy to populate a field of five interesting, varied, worthy titles every year with ease — or rather, with difficulty, since numerous excellent so many good games out.
And to reiterate, these are games without proper classification at major gaming awards. Puzzle game makers are working at the hard edge game development, developing some of most fundamental forms within interactive entertainment. Comparable to movie stunt professionals, they deserve recognition. We shouldn't delay 35 years.
