As any prominent awards ceremony approaches, you'll find a clamor for the addition additional classifications to honor unsung work and satisfy the spirits of fans with niche passions.
A fellow writer made the case for a horror game category. That would be fantastic. So would strategy board titles, this being a passionate advocate's mission. But they will have to forgive me if I try to elbow in front just as with other single-minded supporters, I possess a compelling case supporting my request stands as crucial and important of all. This is the request: We need a classification for brain-teasing titles.
The Genre Classification Challenge
Organizing artistic expressions defies precise measurement; opinions vary greatly, and it will always start arguments resulting in unclear classifications. It's understandable that film award organizations don’t do it. However, it represents an unavoidable compromise within the realm of gaming, that demonstrate such variety they hardly constitute a single creative category.
For comprehensive acknowledgment of gaming accomplishments to be recognized, while allowing diverse titles to compete fairly, specific award classifications remain vital.
Existing Game Classification System
The major gaming awards offer these classifications covering Action, Action/Adventure, Role-Playing, Combat games, Sim/Strategy, and Sports/Racing games. Between them, these six categories successfully include many game types, and you can find room for most games within them.
Different situation exists for logic-based experiences. There’s simply nowhere to accommodate them. Examine these examples from recent excellent titles, each quite distinct: building puzzles from a specific release, the pulse-pounding block-matching from another release, engaging interpersonal challenges of a third title. Where could they possibly go between these six categories? Unfortunately, nowhere.
Acknowledgment Issues
Many instances occur excellent brain-teasers published annually without proper recognition in entertainment awards, unless they happen to qualify award groups including Mobile Game, VR/AR Game, and the highly challenging independent game categories.
- One classic puzzle game wasn’t nominated in any category that year
- A different innovative game received no nominations during that ceremony
- A beloved organization game got ignored recently
- Only a few logic titles scraped into niche award types
Importance of Logic Titles
Frequently they represent small games, but the art of the puzzle game carries substantial weight. Iconic mobile puzzle games count as most engaged experiences worldwide maintaining this status for an extended period.
The famous puzzle experience competes with 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 for gaming as medium, and they are in conversation with diverse game types.
Proposal and Rationale
Puzzle games wouldn’t have this problem. You could fill five nominees with fascinating, diverse, deserving games every year with ease — perhaps, with difficulty, because you’d have to leave numerous deserving experiences.
To emphasize again, these are games lacking appropriate categories during prominent ceremonies. Logic title developers function at the hard edge of video game design, developing some of the purest expressions of gaming itself. Similar to movie stunt professionals, they warrant appreciation. We shouldn't delay decades.
