Whenever a major honors show approaches, you'll find an outcry for the addition of new categories to recognize unsung work and fill the spirits of followers who have specialized interests.
Another commentator has already made advocating for terror-themed awards. It would be amazing. Equally deserving are tabletop games, 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 dedicated enthusiasts, I have a cast-iron argument for why my demand remains most pressing and important of all. Here's the proposal: There should be a category for puzzle games.
Categorizing Game Types
Organizing artistic expressions isn't exact; opinions vary greatly, and inevitably start arguments concluding with vague boundaries. There’s a reason cinema institutions steer clear of genre categories. However, it represents an essential concession within the realm of gaming, that demonstrate such variety it's challenging to consider them one unified medium.
For comprehensive acknowledgment of interactive entertainment excellence to receive acknowledgment, and for games of all stripes to compete fairly, specific award classifications remain vital.
Current Gaming Award Categories
Leading game ceremonies offer these classifications covering Action-oriented games, Adventure-action titles, RPG experiences, Combat games, Simulation and strategy titles, plus athletic and racing experiences. Together, these six categories effectively encompass a lot of ground, and you can find room for most games within them.
This doesn't apply to brain-teasing titles. There’s simply nowhere to accommodate them. Consider three of recent excellent titles, showing diverse approaches: structural challenges in a particular game, fast-paced pattern recognition of another game, and the sweetly sociological logic puzzles in another game. Which classification works among existing types? Nowhere, that’s where.
The Representation Problem
There are dozens of brilliant puzzle games launched regularly lacking appropriate categories at major award shows, unless they happen to qualify classification types such as Mobile Game, VR/AR Game, or the intensely contested small studio competitions.
- A renowned logic title wasn’t nominated for anything in 2014
- A different innovative game missed out that year
- A beloved organization game received no acknowledgment recently
- Just some brain-teasers scraped into niche award types
Value of Brain-Teasers
These are often modest productions, however the design behind logic titles carries substantial weight. Well-known matching games rank among the most-played games globally continuing this trend for many years.
The famous puzzle experience challenges popular creative games for the title of best-selling game of all time; it additionally competes for top gaming experience. Logic titles represent cornerstones for gaming as medium, and they are in conversation with almost every other genre.
Recommendation and Reasoning
Brain-teasers wouldn't encounter that issue. One could readily select a field of five engaging, different, qualified experiences annually without trouble — or rather, with difficulty, since numerous excellent so many good games out.
And to reiterate, these are games that otherwise have no home in important events. Logic title developers operate at the hard edge of video game design, developing some of essential manifestations of gaming itself. Just like cinema stunt performers, they deserve recognition. Let’s not keep them waiting 35 years.
