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Whenever a major prize-giving event nears, you'll find an outcry for introducing of new categories to honor underappreciated efforts and fill the hearts of followers who have specialized interests.

My colleague has already made for a horror game category. It would be amazing. Equally deserving are tabletop games, this being a passionate advocate's mission. However, I must insist 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. This is the request: It's essential to create a category for puzzle games.

Categorizing Game Types

Categorizing art by genre isn't exact; it remains highly personal, and typically generate discussions and end in fuzzy definitions. It's understandable that movie academies don’t do it. However, it represents an essential concession in the world of gaming, which are so diverse they hardly constitute as a single art form.

For the full spectrum of achievement in video games to gain proper attention, and to ensure all game types to receive proper recognition, genre categories are essential.

Existing Game Classification System

Prominent interactive entertainment events currently feature award types recognizing Action, Adventure-action titles, RPG experiences, Combat games, Simulation and strategy titles, and Sports/Racing games. Together, these classifications actually cover many game types, making space possible for numerous titles.

Not so for brain-teasing titles. No suitable classification appears for their placement. Examine these examples from recent excellent titles, showing diverse approaches: the architectural riddles in a particular game, fast-paced pattern recognition of another game, thought-provoking social scenarios in another game. What category would fit them among existing types? Simply put, no category fits.

Recognition Challenges

There are dozens excellent brain-teasers published annually without proper recognition at major award shows, unless they happen to qualify award groups including Mobile Game, VR/AR Game, or the intensely contested independent game categories.

• A renowned logic title received no recognition completely during that awards season
• Another imaginative release was excluded during that ceremony
• Well-received sorting experience got ignored that year
• Only a few puzzle games barely qualified for niche award types

Significance of Puzzle Games

Commonly they're compact experiences, yet the craft in brain-teasers carries substantial weight. Iconic mobile puzzle games stand as the most-played games worldwide and have been for over a decade.

The legendary block-stacking game challenges well-known building titles competing to become highest-selling title ever; it additionally competes as greatest title ever. Logic titles represent cornerstones to the art of video games, while interacting with almost every other genre.

The Solution and Justification

Puzzle games wouldn’t have this problem. You could fill five nominees engaging, different, qualified experiences each ceremony simply — perhaps, with difficulty, because you’d have to leave so many good games out.

To emphasize again, these represent titles that otherwise have no home during prominent ceremonies. Puzzle game makers function at the challenging frontier interactive creation, producing among essential manifestations of the video game form. Comparable to movie stunt professionals, they merit acknowledgment. We shouldn't delay 35 years.