list of video game genres

2011-12-11 05:14:24 pm

my umbrella goes directly to Bankai

+1 for describing games with 2 categories. a lot of sub categories in many places are just the combination of 2 others.

we could also describe stuff like Star Fox Command which is a flight/turn-based strategy hybrid instead of a rail shooter where the first 2 fall into.

kesvalk

Edit history:

kesvalk: 2011-12-11 05:22:20 pm

kesvalk: 2011-12-11 05:21:45 pm

2011-12-11 05:21:27 pm

Indie Lover

about the sandbox genre, i like to call it "games of doing nothing" because it's exactly that, you really don't have any clear objectives on them, you kinda make the objectives on your own...

games that fall in this genre are Minecraft, animal crossing, terraria and spore

of course you can put the "non-linear" description to broaden it and encompass games that let you do things the way you want, like the bethesda RPGs

arkarian

2011-12-11 05:44:02 pm

red chamber dream

lol, "games of doing nothing" is cute but doesn't really sound like a genre. :P i think sandbox covers all the games you just mentioned well enough.

Quote from Opium:

For example: can't there be just one 'shooter' category, with the game description giving the details on perspective, etc - instead of trying to fit the game into a more specific category (or even two) that may only describe it partially.

maybe. the reason i'm hesitant to combine first-peson shooter and third-person shooter for instance is that those are such well-known and commonly used genres, and the gameplay in each tends to be quite different, even though both are "shooter" games.
also, does putting call of duty in the same genre as metal slug really make any sense? i suppose metal slug could be a "shooter/platformer", but it's only a shooter because you fight with guns in the game. if it were all melee combat it wouldn't be that different of a game. so maybe metal slug and similar games are more "action/platformer" and "run and gun" should be nixed entirely?

the one category i don't want to get rid of is shoot 'em up, ie bullet hell and similar games like ikaruga and touhou. it's such a huge and unique genre that i think it deserves its own classification.

so what do yall think? should i combine first-person and third-person shooters into just "shooter"? should i get rid of "run and gun" in favor of action/platformer?

another debate: should it be called "platformer" or "platforming"?

also removed dating sim as per nate's weeaboo advice. "visual novel" and "visual novel/simulation" should cover just about everything.

lol, "games of doing nothing" is cute but doesn't really sound like a genre. :P  i think sandbox covers all the games you just mentioned well enough.

[quote="Opium"]For example: can't there be just one 'shooter' category, with the game description giving the details on perspective, etc - instead of trying to fit the game into a more specific category (or even two) that may only describe it partially.[/quote]
maybe. the reason i'm hesitant to combine first-peson shooter and third-person shooter for instance is that those are such well-known and commonly used genres, and the gameplay in each tends to be quite different, even though both are "shooter" games.
also, does putting call of duty in the same genre as metal slug really make any sense? i suppose metal slug could be a "shooter/platformer", but it's only a shooter because you fight with guns in the game. if it were all melee combat it wouldn't be that different of a game. so maybe metal slug and similar games are more "action/platformer" and "run and gun" should be nixed entirely?

the one category i don't want to get rid of is shoot 'em up, ie bullet hell and similar games like ikaruga and touhou. it's such a huge and unique genre that i think it deserves its own classification.

so what do yall think? should i combine first-person and third-person shooters into just "shooter"? should i get rid of "run and gun" in favor of action/platformer?

another debate: should it be called "platformer" or "platforming"?

also removed dating sim as per nate's weeaboo advice. "visual novel" and "visual novel/simulation" should cover just about everything.

ryu

2011-12-11 05:47:56 pm

>another debate: should it be called "platformer" or "platforming"?

shooter or shooting?

i guess, since nobody says shooter anymore you might go with platforming to have some sort of conventional rule for this.

arkarian

2011-12-11 05:48:57 pm

red chamber dream

first-person shooter? third-person shooter? rail shooter? i think "shooter" is much more common than "shooting" as a genre. but i hear both platforming and platformer all the time, as well as just platform.

Opium

Edit history:

Opium: 2011-12-11 05:50:05 pm

Opium: 2011-12-11 05:49:57 pm

Opium: 2011-12-11 05:49:56 pm

2011-12-11 05:49:22 pm

Hell, I'd even go with plain old 'platform' before 'platforming'. Making it into a verb just doesn't sound right to me.
Shooter vs. shooting however - I think either works but shooter is the commonly accepted term so why change it.

arkarian

2011-12-11 05:52:17 pm

red chamber dream

hmm you know, nearly all the genres on the list are nouns, so it seems like maybe they should all be. so even though shooter is more common, it makes more sense to go with shooting.

think about genres of movies or books: horror, comedy, drama, action, romance - they're all nouns. i'd like to be consistent like that.

Poision Envy

2011-12-11 05:59:41 pm

Club 27 Goals

yeah with the MMO/Single Player/Party thing maybe it could be its own category. If a game is single player, co-op, massively multiplayer, or party. Course there's some that fall under multiple, but just thought I'd throw my idea out there.

Opium

2011-12-11 06:01:03 pm

Quote from arkarian:

hmm you know, nearly all the genres on the list are nouns, so it seems like maybe they should all be. so even though shooter is more common, it makes more sense to go with shooting.

think about genres of movies or books: horror, comedy, drama, action, romance - they're all nouns. i'd like to be consistent like that.

Isn't it easier to call the game itself a 'shooter' (noun) than to describe it with an adjective, which requires a subject? eg: That game is a shooting game, vs that game is a shooter.

Poision Envy

2011-12-11 06:03:36 pm

Club 27 Goals

Shooter makes more sense to me (2c)

arkarian

Edit history:

arkarian: 2011-12-11 06:05:04 pm

2011-12-11 06:04:04 pm

red chamber dream

@poision: hmm i dunno, i actually still thought mmo should be its own genre, but maybe you're right - "mmo" doesn't really describe the genre, it's more how the game is played. but mmos are just so different from other games that it seems weird to not differentiate them somehow.

@opium, true, but then we'd have to change all the genres to somehow fit that convention. "that game is a shooting game." "that game is an action game." both sound good to me, isn't that how genres are generally applied?

Prime Hunter

Edit history:

Prime Hunter: 2011-12-11 06:06:06 pm

2011-12-11 06:05:42 pm

Trying to think of how books/movies are described. Aren't they typically described like "It's a ___ movie" or "It's a ___ novel" rather than the second example Opium just used? Although now that I say that I think of examples of where it work the other way, like "It's a comedy" or "It's a drama", so both work in context.

arkarian

2011-12-11 06:06:27 pm

red chamber dream

yeah, and you'd never say "it's a horror" (unless you were watching gigli or something); the same is true for "shooting" (unless you're talking about columbine). hmm.

arkarian

Edit history:

arkarian: 2011-12-11 06:09:21 pm

2011-12-11 06:08:05 pm

red chamber dream

shooter is also a noun i guess so it would still fit, i just don't want mix -er and -ing endings if possible. "shooter" always implies "game" (i'm playing a shooter) whereas none of the other listed genres do that except visual novel.

Opium

2011-12-11 06:09:32 pm

I didn't think about 'action', but I don't see how a noun can be used for that category since the very definition itself is literally action (verb).

Poision Envy

2011-12-11 06:12:09 pm

Club 27 Goals

hm, what about app style games? Plants vs Zombies, Angry Birds, etc?

Poision Envy

2011-12-11 06:15:01 pm

Club 27 Goals

also flash style games, such as on newgrounds or facebook and things, dunno if those count though.

arkarian

Edit history:

arkarian: 2011-12-11 06:25:47 pm

2011-12-11 06:25:36 pm

red chamber dream

action is a noun. an action game.

@poision those were mentioned earlier - flash, facebook, the app store, etc are all platforms and don't describe the actual genre of their games. plants vs. zombies is a tower defense game (fuck, should that be added as a genre? or is it just real-time strategy?), angry birds is an action/puzzle game, etc.

Poision Envy

2011-12-11 06:27:11 pm

Club 27 Goals

I'd consider PvZ just an RTS. (maybe a "babby's first RTS")

On a related note, our neighbors down the street filled their lawn with home-made PvZ stuff and its hilarious. Gonna go take a picture when I go for a walk here in a minute.

Prime Hunter

2011-12-11 06:32:30 pm

Yeah, I second the idea of tower defense games as RTS. You're essentially doing the same thing, but in a more confined area and purely on the defensive. But you still build up resources of some kind and purchase units while controlling a larger combined force and reacting to whatever the enemy sends at you.

arkarian

2011-12-11 06:33:22 pm

red chamber dream

in that respect starcraft could almost be called a real-time strategy/sandbox game o_O

but yeah you're right, tower defense is too specific

Prime Hunter

2011-12-11 06:38:41 pm

That's an odd thought... Starcraft the sandbox game...

I could almost see tower defense games as RTS/puzzle or something like that. For some reason when I think of those I remember how most of the TD games I've played are usually in smaller chunks with some sort of challenge or handicapp to deal with. RTS games do that too from time to time, but it's not the core game where as with TD if often feels like that to me.

arkarian

2011-12-11 06:46:34 pm

red chamber dream

in a way shooters are just action games too lolol

Poision Envy

2011-12-11 06:49:25 pm

Club 27 Goals

on that note, aren't almost all games role-playing as well? Uncharted could be a third-person shooter sandbox action puzzle role-playing game if you really get vague about it.

arkarian

2011-12-11 06:49:48 pm

red chamber dream

lol, yeah that's why this is so hard