Each time a prominent honors show approaches, there’s always a demand for introducing fresh award types to recognize underappreciated efforts and delight the spirits of followers with niche passions.
My colleague made the case advocating for terror-themed awards. That would be fantastic. So would tabletop games, representing 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 is the most urgent and significant. Here's the proposal: It's essential to create an award type for logic-based games.
Organizing Gaming Categories
Classifying creative works is not a science; it’s very subjective, and it will always start arguments and end in fuzzy definitions. This explains why cinema institutions avoid this approach. Yet it remains an essential concession in the world of interactive entertainment, which are so diverse they hardly constitute a single creative category.
For the full spectrum of interactive entertainment excellence to receive acknowledgment, and for games of all stripes to receive proper recognition, specific award classifications remain vital.
Present Award Structure
Leading game ceremonies offer these classifications covering Action, Action/Adventure, Role-Playing, Combat games, Sim/Strategy, and Sports/Racing games. Collectively, these award types actually cover a lot of ground, making space possible for most games within them.
Not so for brain-teasing titles. There’s simply nowhere to put them. Think about these this year’s best games, all very different: building puzzles from a specific release, intense tile-matching in a different title, thought-provoking social scenarios from additional release. Which classification works among existing types? Simply put, no category fits.
Acknowledgment Issues
Many instances occur of brilliant puzzle games published annually that have no home during gaming ceremonies, if they accidentally match classification types such as Mobile Game, Virtual reality experiences, or the extremely competitive small studio competitions.
- An iconic brain-teaser received no recognition in any category that year
- Another imaginative release received no nominations during that ceremony
- A beloved organization game received no acknowledgment recently
- Only a few brain-teasers barely qualified for niche award types
Importance of Logic Titles
These are often small games, however the design of the puzzle game carries substantial weight. Well-known matching games stand as most popular titles worldwide maintaining this status for an extended period.
The legendary block-stacking game competes with famous sandbox experiences competing to become highest-selling title ever; it additionally competes as greatest title ever. Puzzle games are foundational to the art of video games, and they are in conversation across multiple categories.
Proposal and Rationale
Puzzle games wouldn’t have this problem. You could fill five nominees engaging, different, qualified experiences every year with ease — or rather, with difficulty, because you’d have to leave many worthy titles.
Restating the point, these represent titles lacking appropriate categories during prominent ceremonies. Brain-teaser creators function at the hard edge game development, producing among most fundamental forms of the video game form. Comparable to cinema stunt performers, they merit acknowledgment. Don't make them wait generations.
