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Tetris Wouldn't Win at The Game Awards — A New Category May Address This Issue

Each time a major awards ceremony nears, one notices a clamor for the addition fresh award types to recognize unsung work and delight the passions of followers who have specialized interests.

My colleague has already made advocating for terror-themed awards. That would be fantastic. So would board games, which is someone's personal cause. However, I must insist when I prioritize just as with other dedicated enthusiasts, I possess a compelling case for why my demand is the most urgent above others. This is the request: It's essential to create a classification for brain-teasing titles.

The Genre Classification Challenge

Organizing artistic expressions defies precise measurement; opinions vary greatly, and it will always generate discussions resulting in unclear classifications. There’s a reason film award organizations don’t do it. But it is an essential concession in the world of interactive entertainment, showing incredible range it's challenging to consider them a single creative category.

For the full spectrum of interactive entertainment excellence to be recognized, and for games of all stripes to compete fairly, classification by type becomes crucial.

Current Gaming Award Categories

Prominent interactive entertainment events presently include genre categories for Action, Action/Adventure, RPG experiences, Fighting, Simulation and strategy titles, and Sports/Racing games. Together, these award types successfully include numerous genres, making space possible for numerous titles.

Not so for brain-teasing titles. No appropriate category exists to accommodate them. Consider three of outstanding current releases, all very different: building puzzles from a specific release, fast-paced pattern recognition from another release, thought-provoking social scenarios from additional release. Where could they possibly go within current classifications? Nowhere, that’s where.

The Representation Problem

Numerous examples exist of brilliant puzzle games released every year that have no home at major award shows, except when they manage to fit award groups including Mobile Game, Virtual reality experiences, and the highly challenging Indie races.

  • One classic puzzle game wasn’t nominated completely in 2014
  • A different innovative game was excluded during that ceremony
  • Popular arranging title was overlooked in 2021
  • Limited numbers of logic titles scraped into independent or mobile categories

Significance of Puzzle Games

Commonly they're compact experiences, however the design behind logic titles carries substantial weight. Well-known matching games count as the most-played games globally continuing this trend for many years.

The legendary block-stacking game rivals well-known building titles for the title of highest-selling title ever; it also contends as greatest title ever. Brain-teasers form essential building blocks to the art of video games, while interacting with almost every other genre.

Recommendation and Reasoning

Puzzle games wouldn’t have that issue. You could fill multiple candidates engaging, different, qualified experiences each ceremony simply — or rather, with difficulty, because you’d have to leave numerous deserving experiences.

To emphasize again, these are games that otherwise have no home in important events. Puzzle game makers function at the hard edge game development, developing some of essential manifestations of the video game form. Just like film action specialists, they deserve recognition. Don't make them wait decades.

The writer

Zachary Stanley

Competition enthusiast and blogger sharing verified prize draws and success stories since 2018.

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