As any significant honors show draws close, one notices an outcry for the addition additional classifications to acknowledge underappreciated efforts and fill the passions of fans with niche passions.
My colleague has already made for a horror game category. That would be fantastic. So would strategy board titles, which is a passionate advocate's mission. But they will have to forgive me when I prioritize because like all dedicated enthusiasts, I possess a compelling case for why my demand remains most pressing and important of all. Here's the proposal: There should be an award type for logic-based games.
The Genre Classification Challenge
Categorizing art by genre isn't exact; it remains highly personal, and typically generate discussions resulting in unclear classifications. There’s a reason film award organizations don’t do it. However, it represents a necessary evil for the industry of gaming, which are so diverse they hardly constitute one unified medium.
For the full spectrum of interactive entertainment excellence to be recognized, while allowing diverse titles to compete fairly, classification by type becomes crucial.
Current Gaming Award Categories
The major gaming awards presently include classifications covering Action, Adventure-action titles, Role-Playing, Fighting, Sim/Strategy, and Sports/Racing games. Together, these award types successfully include many game types, allowing placement for most games within them.
This doesn't apply to logic-based experiences. No appropriate category exists to accommodate them. Consider three of this year’s best games, all very different: building puzzles from a specific release, intense tile-matching from another release, engaging interpersonal challenges in another game. Where could they possibly go among existing types? Unfortunately, nowhere.
The Representation Problem
There are dozens outstanding logic titles published annually that have no home in entertainment awards, unless they happen to qualify award groups including Handheld titles, VR/AR Game, or the intensely contested independent game categories.
- One classic puzzle game wasn’t nominated in any category in 2014
- A different innovative game missed out during that ceremony
- A beloved organization game got ignored in 2021
- Limited numbers of logic titles scraped into niche award types
Significance of Puzzle Games
Frequently they represent small games, but the art behind logic titles is of massive significance. Well-known matching games rank among most engaged experiences in the world and have been for over a decade.
The legendary block-stacking game rivals popular creative games claiming status as most purchased experience; it additionally competes as greatest title ever. Logic titles represent cornerstones within interactive entertainment, while interacting with almost every other genre.
Proposal and Rationale
Logic titles wouldn't face this problem. It would be easy to populate multiple candidates with fascinating, diverse, deserving games annually without trouble — perhaps, with difficulty, because you’d have to leave many worthy titles.
And to reiterate, these represent titles without proper classification at major gaming awards. Brain-teaser creators operate at the demanding boundary interactive creation, developing some of most fundamental forms of gaming itself. Comparable to movie stunt professionals, they merit acknowledgment. Let’s not keep them waiting 35 years.
