As any significant honors show nears, one notices a clamor for the addition fresh award types to recognize overlooked contributions and fill the passions of followers dedicated to specific genres.
Another commentator has already made supporting a scary games classification. It would be amazing. So would board games, representing someone's personal cause. Yet I need to apologize in advance for pushing forward because like all blinkered fanatics, I possess a compelling case backing this proposal stands as crucial above others. Here's the proposal: We need an award type for logic-based games.
Organizing Gaming Categories
Categorizing art by genre defies precise measurement; it’s very subjective, and it will always spark debates and end in fuzzy definitions. There’s a reason cinema institutions don’t do it. Yet it remains a necessary evil for the industry of video games, which are so diverse they hardly constitute as a single art form.
To recognize the complete range of interactive entertainment excellence to be recognized, and for games of all stripes to have a chance for representation, classification by type becomes crucial.
Existing Game Classification System
Prominent interactive entertainment events offer these genre categories for Action-oriented games, Adventure-action titles, RPG experiences, Fighting, Sim/Strategy, plus athletic and racing experiences. Collectively, these six categories actually cover a lot of ground, allowing placement for numerous titles.
Not so for brain-teasing titles. No suitable classification appears to put them. Think about these outstanding current releases, showing diverse approaches: the architectural riddles of one title, intense tile-matching of another game, thought-provoking social scenarios in another game. What category would fit them within current classifications? Simply put, no category fits.
Recognition Challenges
Numerous examples exist of brilliant puzzle games launched regularly lacking appropriate categories during gaming ceremonies, except when they manage to fit award groups including Handheld titles, VR/AR Game, or the intensely contested small studio competitions.
- One classic puzzle game got overlooked for anything in 2014
- A different innovative game received no nominations in 2019
- A beloved organization game got ignored in 2021
- Just some brain-teasers scraped into small studio or handheld classifications
Importance of Logic Titles
These are often modest productions, but the art of the puzzle game carries substantial weight. Well-known matching games rank among most engaged experiences worldwide continuing this trend for an extended period.
The famous puzzle experience challenges famous sandbox experiences for the title of best-selling game of all time; it also contends for top gaming experience. Puzzle games are foundational for gaming as medium, and they are in conversation across multiple categories.
The Solution and Justification
Brain-teasers wouldn't encounter this problem. One could readily select five nominees engaging, different, qualified experiences each ceremony simply — actually, with challenge, given the need to exclude many worthy titles.
To emphasize again, these represent titles lacking appropriate categories during prominent ceremonies. Puzzle game makers operate at the challenging frontier interactive creation, developing some of the purest expressions within interactive entertainment. Comparable to cinema stunt performers, they deserve recognition. Don't make them wait 35 years.
