Whenever a significant prize-giving event approaches, one notices a demand for the addition fresh award types to recognize overlooked contributions and delight the spirits of fans with niche passions.
My colleague previously argued for a horror game category. That would be fantastic. The same goes for strategy board titles, which is someone's personal cause. Yet I need to apologize in advance when I prioritize because like all blinkered fanatics, there's a strong justification for why my demand stands as crucial and significant. Here's the proposal: There should be a category for puzzle games.
Categorizing Game Types
Organizing artistic expressions isn't exact; it remains highly personal, and typically generate discussions resulting in unclear classifications. It's understandable that movie academies avoid this approach. But it is a necessary evil in the world of video games, which are so diverse they hardly constitute as a single art form.
For the full spectrum of gaming accomplishments to receive acknowledgment, while allowing diverse titles to compete fairly, specific award classifications remain vital.
Current Gaming Award Categories
The major gaming awards presently include genre categories for Action, Adventure-action titles, Role-Playing, Combat games, Simulation and strategy titles, plus athletic and racing experiences. Together, these six categories successfully include a lot of ground, and you can find room for most games within them.
Not so for brain-teasing titles. No appropriate category exists to accommodate them. Consider three of recent excellent titles, showing diverse approaches: building puzzles of one title, intense tile-matching of another game, engaging interpersonal challenges in another game. Where could they possibly go between these six categories? Unfortunately, nowhere.
Recognition Challenges
There are dozens outstanding logic titles launched regularly that have no home at major award shows, if they accidentally match award groups including Handheld titles, VR/AR Game, or the intensely contested Indie races.
- A renowned logic title received no recognition in any category that year
- Another creative title was excluded that year
- Popular arranging title received no acknowledgment that year
- Just some brain-teasers barely qualified for independent or mobile categories
Significance of Puzzle Games
Frequently they represent modest productions, but the art in brain-teasers carries substantial weight. Famous handheld logic titles count as most engaged experiences worldwide and have been for over a decade.
The famous puzzle experience rivals popular creative games competing to become most purchased experience; it also contends for top gaming experience. Puzzle games are foundational for gaming as medium, and engaging with diverse game types.
Proposal and Rationale
Brain-teasers wouldn't encounter such difficulty. You could fill multiple candidates engaging, different, qualified experiences every year with ease — or rather, with difficulty, since numerous excellent numerous deserving experiences.
And to reiterate, these represent titles lacking appropriate categories in important events. Puzzle game makers function at the challenging frontier of video game design, developing some of the purest expressions of gaming itself. Similar to movie stunt professionals, they deserve recognition. We shouldn't delay 35 years.
