🔗 Share this article

Whenever a prominent honors show nears, one notices a demand for the addition of new categories to recognize overlooked contributions and fill the spirits of enthusiasts with niche passions.

Another commentator has already made advocating for terror-themed awards. That would be fantastic. Equally deserving are board games, this being a dedicated supporter's campaign. However, I must insist if I try to elbow in front because like all single-minded supporters, I have a cast-iron argument for why my demand remains most pressing and significant. Here's the proposal: We need an award type for logic-based games.

The Genre Classification Challenge

Classifying creative works isn't exact; it remains highly personal, and inevitably start arguments and end in fuzzy definitions. It's understandable that film award organizations avoid this approach. Yet it remains an unavoidable compromise in the world of gaming, that demonstrate such variety it's challenging to consider them a single creative category.

For comprehensive acknowledgment of gaming accomplishments to receive acknowledgment, and to ensure all game types to compete fairly, specific award classifications remain vital.

Present Award Structure

The major gaming awards currently feature award types recognizing Action-oriented games, Action/Adventure, Role-Playing, Fighting, Simulation and strategy titles, and Sports/Racing games. Collectively, these six categories actually cover numerous genres, allowing placement for most games within them.

This doesn't apply to brain-teasing titles. No appropriate category exists to accommodate them. Examine these examples from this year’s best games, showing diverse approaches: structural challenges in a particular game, intense tile-matching in a different title, thought-provoking social scenarios from additional release. What category would fit them within current classifications? Simply put, no category fits.

The Representation Problem

There are dozens of brilliant puzzle games published annually that have no home in entertainment awards, except when they manage to fit for categories like Handheld titles, VR/AR Game, and the highly challenging small studio competitions.

• An iconic brain-teaser got overlooked in any category during that awards season
• A different innovative game received no nominations during that ceremony
• A beloved organization game received no acknowledgment in 2021
• Only a few brain-teasers managed to sneak into niche award types

Value of Brain-Teasers

These are often compact experiences, however the design in brain-teasers holds tremendous importance. Well-known matching games count as the most-played games in the world and have been for over a decade.

The famous puzzle experience rivals well-known building titles claiming status as highest-selling title ever; it additionally competes for top gaming experience. Logic titles represent cornerstones within interactive entertainment, and they are in conversation across multiple categories.

Proposal and Rationale

Logic titles wouldn't face that issue. It would be easy to populate five nominees interesting, varied, worthy titles annually without trouble — perhaps, with difficulty, since numerous excellent many worthy titles.

To emphasize again, these represent titles without proper classification at major gaming awards. Puzzle game makers are working at the challenging frontier of video game design, creating some of most fundamental forms of the video game form. Just like cinema stunt performers, they warrant appreciation. We shouldn't delay 35 years.