Each time a major awards ceremony nears, you'll find a demand for introducing additional classifications to recognize underappreciated efforts and delight the spirits of enthusiasts with niche passions.
Another commentator made the case advocating for terror-themed awards. That would rule. The same goes for board games, which is someone's personal cause. Yet I need to apologize in advance for pushing forward since similar to blinkered fanatics, I possess a compelling case backing this proposal remains most pressing and significant. This is the request: There should be a category for puzzle games.
Categorizing Game Types
Classifying creative works isn't exact; it’s very subjective, and typically generate discussions concluding with vague boundaries. This explains why cinema institutions steer clear of genre categories. But it is a necessary evil in the world of video games, showing incredible range they hardly constitute as a single art form.
For comprehensive acknowledgment of gaming accomplishments to be recognized, while allowing diverse titles to receive proper recognition, specific award classifications remain vital.
Current Gaming Award Categories
Prominent interactive entertainment events presently include classifications covering Action-oriented games, Action/Adventure, Role-Playing, Combat games, Simulation and strategy titles, plus athletic and racing experiences. Between them, these classifications actually cover many game types, making space possible for most games within them.
Different situation exists for brain-teasing titles. There’s simply nowhere to accommodate them. Consider three of recent excellent titles, showing diverse approaches: building puzzles from a specific release, the pulse-pounding block-matching of another game, and the sweetly sociological logic puzzles in another game. Where could they possibly go between these six categories? Simply put, no category fits.
Recognition Challenges
There are dozens outstanding logic titles released every year without proper recognition during gaming ceremonies, except when they manage to fit for categories like Mobile Game, VR/AR Game, or the extremely competitive small studio competitions.
- An iconic brain-teaser got overlooked completely in 2014
- Another imaginative release was excluded in 2019
- Popular arranging title received no acknowledgment that year
- Limited numbers of puzzle games scraped into niche award types
Significance of Puzzle Games
These are often small games, yet the craft of the puzzle game holds tremendous importance. Iconic mobile puzzle games rank among most engaged experiences in the world and have been for over a decade.
The famous puzzle experience competes with well-known building titles for the title of most purchased experience; it also contends for best game of all time. Puzzle games are foundational to the art of video games, and engaging with almost every other genre.
Recommendation and Reasoning
Puzzle games wouldn’t have this problem. One could readily select multiple candidates with fascinating, diverse, deserving games annually without trouble — actually, with challenge, because you’d have to leave numerous deserving experiences.
And to reiterate, these include experiences that otherwise have no home in important events. Logic title developers are working at the challenging frontier game development, developing some of the purest expressions of the video game form. Just like film action specialists, they merit acknowledgment. We shouldn't delay 35 years.
