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The Iconic Puzzle Game Didn't Triumph at The Game Awards — Another Award Type Could Fix That

Whenever a prominent awards ceremony draws close, you'll find a demand to include of new categories to honor overlooked contributions and delight the passions of followers with niche passions.

My colleague previously argued advocating for terror-themed awards. That would rule. So would strategy board titles, which is a dedicated supporter's campaign. But they will have to forgive me for pushing forward just as with other blinkered fanatics, I have a cast-iron argument supporting my request is the most urgent and important of all. The demand is this: 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 inevitably generate discussions concluding with vague boundaries. This explains why cinema institutions don’t do it. Yet it remains a necessary evil within the realm of interactive entertainment, showing incredible range it's challenging to consider them a single creative category.

For the full spectrum of gaming accomplishments to gain proper attention, while allowing diverse titles to have a chance for representation, genre categories are essential.

Current Gaming Award Categories

Prominent interactive entertainment events offer these award types recognizing Action-oriented games, Action/Adventure, RPG experiences, Combat games, Simulation and strategy titles, plus athletic and racing experiences. Collectively, these award types successfully include many game types, and you can find room for most games within them.

Not so for puzzle games. No suitable classification appears to put them. Think about these this year’s best games, each quite distinct: the architectural riddles in a particular game, intense tile-matching in a different title, thought-provoking social scenarios from additional release. What category would fit them among existing types? Simply put, no category fits.

Acknowledgment Issues

There are dozens of brilliant puzzle games published annually that have no home at major award shows, except when they manage to fit for categories like Mobile Game, VR/AR Game, or the intensely contested independent game categories.

  • An iconic brain-teaser wasn’t nominated completely that year
  • A different innovative game missed out during that ceremony
  • A beloved organization game was overlooked that year
  • Only a few brain-teasers barely qualified for small studio or handheld classifications

Significance of Puzzle Games

Frequently they represent compact experiences, however the design of the puzzle game is of massive significance. Famous handheld logic titles rank among most popular titles globally continuing this trend for many years.

The iconic tile-matching title rivals famous sandbox experiences competing to become best-selling game of all time; it additionally competes as greatest title ever. Puzzle games are foundational within interactive entertainment, and engaging across multiple categories.

The Solution and Justification

Brain-teasers wouldn't encounter such difficulty. It would be easy to populate a field of five engaging, different, qualified experiences every year with ease — perhaps, with difficulty, given the need to exclude numerous deserving experiences.

To emphasize again, these are games that otherwise have no home in important events. Logic title developers operate at the demanding boundary of video game design, creating some of essential manifestations of the video game form. Comparable to cinema stunt performers, they merit acknowledgment. Let’s not keep them waiting 35 years.

The writer

Jasmine Silva DVM

A seasoned legal journalist with over a decade of experience covering court cases and legislative changes.

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