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Whenever a significant prize-giving event draws close, one notices an outcry for introducing of new categories to honor unsung work and fill the spirits of followers dedicated to specific genres.

A fellow writer has already made supporting a scary games classification. That would be fantastic. Equally deserving are tabletop games, representing a dedicated supporter's campaign. But they will have to forgive me for pushing forward because like all single-minded supporters, I have a cast-iron argument supporting my request remains most pressing and important of all. Here's the proposal: There should be a category for puzzle games.

Organizing Gaming Categories

Classifying creative works isn't exact; it’s very subjective, and it will always generate discussions concluding with vague boundaries. It's understandable that cinema institutions avoid this approach. Yet it remains a necessary evil within the realm of gaming, which are so diverse it's challenging to consider them a single creative category.

For comprehensive acknowledgment of interactive entertainment excellence to be recognized, and to ensure all game types to have a chance for representation, classification by type becomes crucial.

Current Gaming Award Categories

Leading game ceremonies currently feature genre categories for Action, Adventure-action titles, Role-Playing, Fighting, Sim/Strategy, and Sports/Racing games. Between them, these six categories effectively encompass many game types, allowing placement for most games within them.

This doesn't apply to brain-teasing titles. There’s simply nowhere to put them. Think about these this year’s best games, each quite distinct: the architectural riddles of one title, fast-paced pattern recognition of another game, engaging interpersonal challenges of a third title. What category would fit them between these six categories? Unfortunately, nowhere.

The Representation Problem

Many instances occur of brilliant puzzle games released every year lacking appropriate categories at major award shows, except when they manage to fit classification types such as Mobile Game, Virtual reality experiences, or the extremely competitive independent game categories.

• An iconic brain-teaser wasn’t nominated for anything in 2014
• Another creative title missed out in 2019
• Well-received sorting experience received no acknowledgment that year
• Just some brain-teasers barely qualified for niche award types

Value of Brain-Teasers

Frequently they represent modest productions, however the design of the puzzle game holds tremendous importance. Famous handheld logic titles rank among the most-played games in the world and have been for over a decade.

The iconic tile-matching title challenges well-known building titles claiming status as most purchased experience; it also contends as greatest title ever. Brain-teasers form essential building blocks within interactive entertainment, and they are in conversation with almost every other genre.

Proposal and Rationale

Brain-teasers wouldn't encounter such difficulty. It would be easy to populate multiple candidates with fascinating, diverse, deserving games annually without trouble — or rather, with difficulty, because you’d have to leave many worthy titles.

And to reiterate, these represent titles lacking appropriate categories during prominent ceremonies. Puzzle game makers function at the demanding boundary of video game design, producing among most fundamental forms of gaming itself. Just like film action specialists, they deserve recognition. We shouldn't delay 35 years.