Each time a major honors show nears, one notices a demand to include fresh award types to honor unsung work and satisfy the passions of enthusiasts with niche passions.
My colleague has already made for a horror game category. That would rule. So would tabletop games, this being a dedicated supporter's campaign. But they will have to forgive me when I prioritize since similar to blinkered fanatics, I have a cast-iron argument backing this proposal stands as crucial above others. The demand is this: We need a category for puzzle games.
Organizing Gaming Categories
Organizing artistic expressions is not a science; it remains highly personal, and inevitably generate discussions resulting in unclear classifications. It's understandable that cinema institutions steer clear of genre categories. Yet it remains a necessary evil in the world of interactive entertainment, which are so diverse they hardly constitute one unified medium.
For comprehensive acknowledgment of interactive entertainment excellence to gain proper attention, while allowing diverse titles to compete fairly, genre categories are essential.
Current Gaming Award Categories
Leading game ceremonies currently feature genre categories for Action-oriented games, Action/Adventure, RPG experiences, Fighting, Simulation and strategy titles, plus athletic and racing experiences. Between them, these award types effectively encompass a lot of ground, and you can find room for numerous titles.
Not so for brain-teasing titles. There’s simply nowhere to accommodate them. Think about these recent excellent titles, all very different: structural challenges of one title, the pulse-pounding block-matching from another release, thought-provoking social scenarios in another game. Where could they possibly go within current classifications? Simply put, no category fits.
Recognition Challenges
Numerous examples exist excellent brain-teasers released every year without proper recognition during gaming ceremonies, unless they happen to qualify award groups including Handheld titles, Virtual reality experiences, or the extremely competitive small studio competitions.
- One classic puzzle game got overlooked for anything that year
- Another creative title was excluded during that ceremony
- Well-received sorting experience got ignored that year
- Only a few logic titles scraped into independent or mobile categories
Value of Brain-Teasers
Frequently they represent compact experiences, however the design of the puzzle game holds tremendous importance. Iconic mobile puzzle games rank among the most-played games in the world continuing this trend for an extended period.
The iconic tile-matching title challenges famous sandbox experiences for the title of best-selling game of all time; it also contends as greatest title ever. Puzzle games are foundational for gaming as medium, and engaging with diverse game types.
Recommendation and Reasoning
Brain-teasers wouldn't encounter such difficulty. One could readily select multiple candidates interesting, varied, worthy titles every year with ease — or rather, with difficulty, because you’d have to leave numerous deserving experiences.
To emphasize again, these include experiences that otherwise have no home during prominent ceremonies. Puzzle game makers operate at the challenging frontier interactive creation, creating some of essential manifestations of gaming itself. Just like movie stunt professionals, they merit acknowledgment. We shouldn't delay 35 years.
