Whenever a significant awards ceremony draws close, you'll find a demand for introducing additional classifications to recognize unsung work and fill the spirits of followers with niche passions.
My colleague made the case supporting a scary games classification. That would be fantastic. So would tabletop games, representing a dedicated supporter's campaign. Yet I need to apologize in advance when I prioritize just as with other dedicated enthusiasts, there's a strong justification backing this proposal remains most pressing and significant. Here's the proposal: It's essential to create an award type for logic-based games.
The Genre Classification Challenge
Organizing artistic expressions defies precise measurement; it remains highly personal, and typically start arguments resulting in unclear classifications. It's understandable that film award organizations don’t do it. But it is a necessary evil in the world of gaming, showing incredible range they barely qualify a single creative category.
For comprehensive acknowledgment of interactive entertainment excellence to be recognized, and for games of all stripes to compete fairly, genre categories are essential.
Current Gaming Award Categories
The major gaming awards offer these award types recognizing Action, Adventure-action titles, Role-Playing, Combat games, Sim/Strategy, and Sports/Racing games. Collectively, these six categories effectively encompass numerous genres, allowing placement for numerous titles.
This doesn't apply to logic-based experiences. No appropriate category exists to accommodate them. Consider three of outstanding current releases, all very different: the architectural riddles in a particular game, the pulse-pounding block-matching in a different title, engaging interpersonal challenges of a third title. What category would fit them among existing types? Unfortunately, nowhere.
The Representation Problem
There are dozens excellent brain-teasers launched regularly lacking appropriate categories during gaming ceremonies, if they accidentally match for categories like Handheld titles, VR/AR Game, or the intensely contested independent game categories.
- A renowned logic title received no recognition in any category that year
- A different innovative game was excluded during that ceremony
- Well-received sorting experience received no acknowledgment recently
- Only a few brain-teasers scraped into small studio or handheld classifications
Significance of Puzzle Games
Commonly they're small games, yet the craft in brain-teasers carries substantial weight. Well-known matching games rank among most engaged experiences globally continuing this trend for an extended period.
The legendary block-stacking game competes with popular creative games competing to become best-selling game of all time; it also contends for top gaming experience. Puzzle games are foundational to the art of video games, and they are in conversation with diverse game types.
Proposal and Rationale
Logic titles wouldn't face that issue. One could readily select a field of five engaging, different, qualified experiences each ceremony simply — or rather, with difficulty, given the need to exclude numerous deserving experiences.
To emphasize again, these represent titles lacking appropriate categories at major gaming awards. Logic title developers operate at the challenging frontier interactive creation, producing among most fundamental forms within interactive entertainment. Comparable to cinema stunt performers, they deserve recognition. Don't make them wait generations.
