The Iconic Puzzle Game Wouldn't Succeed at This Gaming Ceremony — A New Category Might Solve This

Each time a major prize-giving event nears, you'll find an outcry for the addition additional classifications to recognize underappreciated efforts and delight the passions of followers who have specialized interests.

My colleague made the case for a horror game category. That would be fantastic. Equally deserving are tabletop games, this being a dedicated supporter's campaign. However, I must insist for pushing forward because like all dedicated enthusiasts, there's a strong justification supporting my request stands as crucial and significant. This is the request: There should be a category for puzzle games.

The Genre Classification Challenge

Classifying creative works is not a science; it remains highly personal, and typically start arguments and end in fuzzy definitions. This explains why film award organizations avoid this approach. But it is a necessary evil for the industry of interactive entertainment, which are so diverse they hardly constitute as a single art form.

For the full spectrum of interactive entertainment excellence to be recognized, and for games of all stripes to have a chance for representation, genre categories are essential.

Present Award Structure

Prominent interactive entertainment events offer these award types recognizing Action-oriented games, Adventure-action titles, RPG experiences, Combat games, Simulation and strategy titles, plus athletic and racing experiences. Collectively, these award types effectively encompass many game types, making space possible accommodating various experiences.

Different situation exists for logic-based experiences. There’s simply nowhere to accommodate them. Consider three of outstanding current releases, all very different: structural challenges in a particular game, the pulse-pounding block-matching in a different title, thought-provoking social scenarios in another game. Where could they possibly go between these six categories? Unfortunately, nowhere.

The Representation Problem

Numerous examples exist of brilliant puzzle games released every year without proper recognition during gaming ceremonies, 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 that year
• Another imaginative release received no nominations in 2019
• Well-received sorting experience received no acknowledgment recently
• Just some logic titles managed to sneak into small studio or handheld classifications

Importance of Logic Titles

Frequently they represent modest productions, yet the craft of the puzzle game is of massive significance. Well-known matching games stand as most popular titles worldwide continuing this trend for an extended period.

The famous puzzle experience rivals popular creative games competing to become most purchased experience; it’s also in the running for top gaming experience. Brain-teasers form essential building blocks for gaming as medium, while interacting with diverse game types.

Proposal and Rationale

Brain-teasers wouldn't encounter such difficulty. It would be easy to populate five nominees engaging, different, qualified experiences every year with ease — perhaps, with difficulty, given the need to exclude many worthy titles.

Restating the point, these represent titles without proper classification at major gaming awards. Puzzle game makers are working at the hard edge game development, developing some of most fundamental forms within interactive entertainment. Comparable to movie stunt professionals, they warrant appreciation. We shouldn't delay decades.