Whenever a prominent awards ceremony nears, one notices an outcry for the addition fresh award types to recognize underappreciated efforts and satisfy the spirits of fans who have specialized interests.
A fellow writer made the case advocating for terror-themed awards. That would rule. The same goes for tabletop games, representing someone's personal cause. Yet I need to apologize in advance for pushing forward because like all blinkered fanatics, I have a cast-iron argument supporting my request remains most pressing above others. This is the request: There should be a classification for brain-teasing titles.
Categorizing Game Types
Categorizing art by genre is not a science; opinions vary greatly, and it will always spark debates resulting in unclear classifications. There’s a reason film award organizations avoid this approach. However, it represents an unavoidable compromise within the realm of interactive entertainment, that demonstrate such variety 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 receive proper recognition, specific award classifications remain vital.
Current Gaming Award Categories
Leading game ceremonies presently include classifications covering Action, Action/Adventure, RPG experiences, Combat games, Sim/Strategy, and Sports/Racing games. Collectively, these classifications successfully include many game types, making space possible for most games within them.
Not so for logic-based experiences. No appropriate category exists for their placement. Consider three of recent excellent titles, each quite distinct: the architectural riddles of one title, intense tile-matching from another release, engaging interpersonal challenges of a third title. What category would fit them among existing types? Unfortunately, nowhere.
Recognition Challenges
Numerous examples exist of brilliant puzzle games released every year lacking appropriate categories during gaming ceremonies, unless they happen to qualify classification types such as Mobile Game, VR/AR Game, or the extremely competitive Indie races.
- A renowned logic title got overlooked in any category that year
- Another imaginative release missed out during that ceremony
- Well-received sorting experience got ignored in 2021
- Just some brain-teasers scraped into niche award types
Importance of Logic Titles
Commonly they're compact experiences, however the design in brain-teasers is of massive significance. Well-known matching games count as the most-played games worldwide maintaining this status for over a decade.
The iconic tile-matching title competes with well-known building titles for the title of highest-selling title ever; it’s also in the running for best game of all time. Logic titles represent cornerstones within interactive entertainment, while interacting across multiple categories.
The Solution and Justification
Puzzle games wouldn’t have this problem. One could readily select five nominees with fascinating, diverse, deserving games each ceremony simply — or rather, with difficulty, because you’d have to leave numerous deserving experiences.
To emphasize again, these represent titles lacking appropriate categories at major gaming awards. Logic title developers are working at the hard edge interactive creation, developing some of most fundamental forms of the video game form. Similar to film action specialists, they deserve recognition. We shouldn't delay decades.
