Talk:List of video game genres/Archive 3

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Is the big list really necessary?

This is a truly massive article. I am beginning to wonder if the entire list of small sections with lists of examples and links to main articles is really necessary. Perhaps we can cut it down into a few paragraphs about a generalization in which narrower gameplay genres fall under. Instead of having sections for TRPGs and ARPGs, we could only have one section about RPGs in general. We can consider that to get rid of that cleanup tag hovering over the article for two years now.  Marlith (Talk)  17:09, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

I've been paying attention to this article for a while, and making small changes to help it along. But I'm starting to think that it needs a fundamental rethinking. Right now, the article is basically re-telling of the information in all the different video game genre articles. It's basically a rehash or summary of what you see in shoot 'em up, 4X, real-time strategy, first-person shooter, etc... not only is this redundant, but it makes it harder to maintain as this summary article and the more detailed articles can diverge. Maybe it's time to just distill this down to a discussion of what it means to be a video game genre (e.g.: what's in the lead). That's how film genre is organized. Meanwhile, we have Template:Video game genre that offers a navigational aid to the more detailed articles. I'm thinking out loud. What do you think? Randomran (talk) 17:25, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

What I'd suggest is moving each umbrella genre like action game to a level 3 header and bullet-pointing the genres underneath, with an aim to cover each with one or two sentences. No examples, just a very basic explanation and a link pointing readers to the relevant article. Shooter games, though they're action games, could probably do with separating into their own section. 'Video game genres by purpose' and all those see also links could do with having a list of their own, this article is about gameplay-derived genres and they are out of place. Doing that would enable enough room to be given to exploring the concept of genres in the first area. I think the images are OTT, 3 or 4 should cover it. Someoneanother 15:59, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

For example compare this:

• Action-adventure (level 3)

Action-adventure games combine elements of their two component genres, typically featuring long-term obstacles that must be overcome using a tool or item as leverage (which is collected earlier), as well as many smaller obstacles almost constantly in the way, that require elements of action games to overcome. Action-adventure games tend to focus on exploration and usually involve item gathering, simple puzzle solving, and combat.

• Stealth games emphasize subterfuge and precision attacks over the direct attacks of shooter games. Most have first- or third-person shooter elements, but there are some exceptions.
• Survival horror games focus on fear and attempt to scare the player via traditional horror fiction elements such as atmospherics, death, the undead, blood and gore. One crucial gameplay element in many of these games is the low quantity of ammunition, or number of breakable mêlée weapons.

to how it currently looks:

• Action-adventure (level 2)

Action-adventure games combine elements of their two component genres, typically featuring long-term obstacles that must be overcome using a tool or item as leverage (which is collected earlier), as well as many smaller obstacles almost constantly in the way, that require elements of action games to overcome. Action-adventure games tend to focus on exploration and usually involve item gathering, simple puzzle solving, and combat.

The first action-adventure game was the Atari 2600 game Adventure (1979). It was directly inspired by the original text adventure, Colossal Cave Adventure. In the process of adapting a text game to a console with only a joystick for control, designer Warren Robinett created a new genre. Because of their prevalence on video game consoles and the absence of typical adventure games, action-adventure games are often confusingly called "adventure games" by console gamers.

• Examples of action-adventure games include: The Legend of Zelda series and the Tomb Raider series.

• Stealth (level 3)

Stealth games are a somewhat recent genre, sometimes referred to as "sneakers" or "creepers" to contrast with the action-oriented "shooter" sub-genre. These games tend to emphasize subterfuge and precision strikes over the more overt mayhem of shooters. Most have first- or third-person shooter elements, but there are some exceptions like Tenchu: Stealth Assassins.

• Examples of stealth games include: the Metal Gear series, the Thief series, and Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell.

• Survival horror (level 3)

Survival horror games focus on fear and attempt to scare the player via traditional horror fiction elements such as atmospherics, death, the undead, blood and gore. One crucial gameplay element in many of these games is the low quantity of ammunition, or number of breakable mêlée weapons.

• Examples of survival horror games include: the Resident Evil series, Sweet Home, Alone in the Dark, and the Silent Hill Series.

This does several things: a) it cuts down on the page size, b) it removes duplicated clutter from the genres' articles, c) it sticks to the point - what are the genres rather than where they came from and are going, d) it exposes each genre to actually being cited and e) it makes expansion possible. Someoneanother 16:26, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

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• Image:Ultima7-ss-exult-completelyviolentcombat.png
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This is an automated notice by FairuseBot. For assistance on the image use policy, see Wikipedia:Media copyright questions. --05:00, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

I am removing the "Escape the room" sub-genre

Escape the Room type games are not large enough, in both the number of games like it and the length to complete said games, to justify them as a sub-genre. Plenty of point and click adventure games will have escape the room like puzzles. "Escape the Room" is not a unique puzzle that is separate from other adventure games. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Eyenuh300 (talk • contribs) 23:04, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

You might want to go to Escape the room and propose a merge to Graphic adventure game. I'd support you, but we ought to be consistent across all the articles. If there's no support for a merge, I would add it back to the template and genre article. Randomran (talk) 01:53, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

Escape the room puzzle(s) could be found in The Hobbit text adventure with very few/limited graphics and similar such text based adventures on 8bit systems such as Amstrad CPC, so it is not necessarily a property of graphics adventures alone 91.0.97.118 (talk)

Examples

Is there some kind of guideline for games to put as examples for the genres? It seems a bit biased to list only a couple of examples, and neglect other games; not to mention that the games listed are of varying quality and popularity.--_{ZXCVBNM [TALK]} 02:11, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

The truth is we probably should remove almost all the examples. It *is* biased. Randomran (talk) 07:30, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Collaboration

So what's happening with the collaboration? Are we going to let it die off again? I think someone just needs to take the initative and take it live. We can discuss it endlessly, but the best thing we can do is just get it started and discuss changes afterwards. Dune II would be a good article to get us started (high priority). JACOPLANE • 2009-01-18 17:46

Well the bot is ready, we just need to implement the code. I would do that myself, but the page it is needed on is fully protected. In fact, if we can do today, it's all ready for Monday (tomorrow).--.:Alex:. 18:33, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

I added the code. And now we play the waiting game. Gary King (talk) 00:40, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

It looks like the game is now afoot! The bot has just updated the template, and has chosen Video game genres as the first article for us to work on. And also, everyone should be watching Template:Collab-gaming for future articles. Gary King (talk) 01:03, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Wow, that's an absolutely huge article. It's like...all of video games, in a nutshell. It looks like what it mainly needs are references, and possibly some cleanup.--_{ZXCVBNM [TALK]} 02:03, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

That is a beast of an article. But I think it needs more than general cleanup and referencing. Right now it looks more like "List of video game genres" rather than an article. An overview section describing the term and how it relates to video games would be good. Some more history content would help too. (Guyinblack25 ^talk 03:44, 19 January 2009 (UTC))

Minor side note, could an admin would update the Template:WikiProject Video games to change the wording of |CGOTW=yes from "This article is a candidate for Gaming Collaboration of the week." to "This article is the current Gaming Collaboration of the week."? The wording on |old-CGOTW=yes seems to be fine. --PresN 05:46, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

How do you suggest de-listifying the genres, though? It seems that there are so many subgenres that trying to squish them together would be too confusing. Not to mention that many of the genres have their own main page that describes them in detail.--_{ZXCVBNM [TALK]} 07:18, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

I'm glad to see this article is the first collaboration. For what it's worth, there's one idea for a radical rewrite on the table: to talk less about specific genres (many of which are just Wikipedia:Content forks that point to the first couple of paragraphs from each genre article), and spend more time talking about what's in the lead. Specifically, how genres are split, why, and how. Turn the specific genres into a much shorter list. I mean, that's why we have the template at the bottom. Randomran (talk) 16:47, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Also, as exciting as it is to work on such an important article... we may have actually drafted the hardest article of all. Writing a genre article is hard. Writing an article about all genres in video games? Could prove to be very very difficult. Randomran (talk) 16:49, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

I could be wrong, but I think the article might have been a list at one point (i.e List of video game genres).bridies (talk) 17:02, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

If it's hard, then it's better to collaborate on because otherwise people would leave it alone.--_{ZXCVBNM [TALK]} 17:31, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

I agree with Randomran that this is probably one of the more difficult video game article on Wikipedia to write or even improve. I hate to be the pessimist, but I doubt any significant improvements can be done on this article in a week, or even a month depending on the research material out there. :-(

As an alternative though- Since it's already in a list format, it might actually be a better idea to split the bulk of the article off to "List of video game genres", add proper sourcing, rewrite the smaller sections in a more professional and even tone, and go for FL. Any thoughts?

Also, should we be having this discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Video games/Collaboration of the week? (Guyinblack25 ^talk 17:36, 19 January 2009 (UTC))

Yes, but for the sake of clarity, it's being continued here instead. In my opinion, since the article itself states that video games sometimes cannot be defined by a single genre, the article should focus on the characteristics of the different genres rather than listing games that conform to the genre. For that reason I've removed all the examples of games.--_{ZXCVBNM [TALK]} 17:44, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

FWIW, the quickest and easiest way to get sources might be to look in the actual main genre articles themselves. Most of them have at least one or two references pointing out that there is a genre/subgenre, and what it basically is. It won't get us a *lot* of content, but it will get us one or two sentences about each genre. Arguably that's more than enough -- we may just need a list of the genres, with no description. Randomran (talk) 17:54, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

I would love to have the discussion on the collaboration page instead of here. For one thing, it will encourage people to watch that page. Secondly, people don't have to watch this page and get a bunch of discussions that might be irrelevant to them on their watchlist. Gary King (talk) 18:37, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. Let us take this to Talk:Video game genres, then. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^(talk) 18:40, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Video games/Collaboration of the week should also be on everyone's watchlist to keep informed about future collaborations. Gary King (talk) 18:45, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Serious games?

The article on "serious games" in Wikipedia seems a bit strange. For one, it appears to be an umbrella category for games such as art games and educational games. Also, "serious" is a relative term - a hardcore gamer could find Gears of War "serious" even though it is an action game. I think that it should be either changed to reflect any differences with other genres, or deleted.--_{ZXCVBNM [TALK]} 02:29, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

There are a few sources that use the term "serious game", but that still doesn't change the relative definition of "serious". How about "socially relevant game"?--_{ZXCVBNM [TALK]} 02:31, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

"Serious game" has become a term of art, not unlike "platform game" or "nerf". It means more than "a game that isn't funny", or "a game with a lot of intensity" (e.g.: Gears of War, Halo). See [1], [2], [3]... there are more scholarly journals that really focus on serious games, so I'd take the reports from USA Today with a grain of salt here. But the terminology sticks. Randomran (talk) 16:24, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

"Serious" means "non-entertainment". If that's too vague for you, consider that "serious" games are often funded by by various organizations, such that the prime motivation for creating the game isn't necessarily profit motive (or is OVERRIDINGLY so in the case of advergames). I.e. there's more to playing the games than just "having fun". SharkD (talk) 04:00, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

Only focus on the major genres?

Considering that each genre has their own article (Action game, etc.), I think we should only focus on top-level genres, and remove all the subgenres, leaving those for the separate articles to discuss. That should probably be our first step. Thoughts? Gary King (talk) 19:01, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

I think that's a legitimate strategy, and we could mention the subgenres in an overall paragraph about the major genres. In the alternative, we could:

• Talk about genrefication, and how video game scholars group genre by gameplay (see the film genre article for a reference). We'd basically be expanding the lead, and ditching the rest of the article.
• Turn this into an exhaustive but shorter list about game genres. Basically, summarize what we have now but tighten it up.
• A combination of both expanding the lead and tightening up the list.

But I also support going through the handfull of major genres, as suggested by Gary King. Randomran (talk) 20:23, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Agreed, details about the sub genres can be discussed in the major genre articles. I think some general info about sub-genres and cross-genres should be discussed in an overview section. Something else to look into are intend audiences of genres. Don't know what can be found about this though. (Guyinblack25 ^talk 23:58, 19 January 2009 (UTC))

I don't think the film genre page is a good example at all. It seems to be larger in terms of the definiton, but it's written in an unencyclopedic tone, unreferenced, and the list part goes on strange tangents such as giving examples of all horror films while devoting one sentence to action films. I think this article should be as unbiased as possible and depict genre creation from a historical standpoint. For example, in the history of the Action genre, Pong came before the tactical shooter, and they should be discussed in that order (with historical references).--_{ZXCVBNM [TALK]} 05:09, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

I think the organization of the film genres article is OK. However, it relies too much on bulletted lists instead of prose, and there are topics that aren't as important in an article about video games. In fact, a lot of the material even in *that* article would be better served in an "genres of fiction" article than one specifically about films. That said, i would probably prefer a different (and less lengthy) format. SharkD (talk) 18:47, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

It was suggested in the section above that the current material be abbreviated and moved to List of video game genres. That might be a good starting point. SharkD (talk) 06:04, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure listifying it is the way to go... but I think there's a consensus that there's no need to have 2-3 paragraphs on every subgenre here. We should talk about the best way to condense. I don't think we want a straight list (that's what Template:Video game genre is for). But maybe 10 sections on the major genres, with brief mentions of the subgenres? Randomran (talk) 06:11, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

I don't think it needs a list. Gary King (talk) 16:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Well, what I meant is that we could have two articles: an prose article about the topic in general, and a separate list that mentions all the individual little sub-genres in brief detail that shoudln't otherwise be mentioned in the prose article. SharkD (talk) 18:50, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

It seems most everyone agrees the sub-genres headings should go for now. And condensing the sub-genre content into brief descriptions under their main genre sounds like a good step to follow that. Any objections?
Slightly related- there's a number of academic papers which briefly discuss genres here and there. They could help with creating a working definition in the article. (Guyinblack25 ^talk 18:17, 20 January 2009 (UTC))

Yeah, I think there's a consensus to reduce the number of subgenres, and only focus on major genres (with brief mentions of subgenres). I also think a larger section about genre theory might help. Nothing huge, maybe a couple of paragraphs. But it helps frame the scope of the article, and why it's organized into gameplay, and not (for example) setting or theme. Randomran (talk) 00:53, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

The article looks a lot better than it did before. There's just two main issues that jump out at me when I look at it now: 1) There are LOTS of images—maybe too many of them. 2) The images are too small and you can barely make them out. SharkD (talk) 04:07, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

You can always click on the pictures to make them bigger. Personally, I think an article about genres should have multimedia. If the pics were any bigger they'd take up too much room.--_{ZXCVBNM [TALK]} 04:19, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

Christian ideology?

I'm not a Christian, but won't some Christians find the term "ideology" offensive, given that the word links directly to "Christianity" (and thus the faith as a whole, not some defined subset with political or cultural goals as the term "ideology" might imply). Would "religion", "faith", or "theology" not be better words? And should the genre even refer to Christianity in particular? Shouldn't a hypothetical Islamic, or Buddhistic (or even sceptical) game be in a common category with Christian ones, such as "Faith-based games", or "Religion games" or perhaps "belief-specific games"? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.55.68.35 (talk) 04:08, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

I changed it to "religion". I don't know of any other faith-specific games other than Christian ones, and "Christian (video) games" are the terms used. I actually don't feel they should be here, as they're not really a genre. If we look at the sources used in the main Christian game article (e.g. [4] and [5]) they give conventional genre definitions such as "real time strategy" and "action". "Christian" really just pertains to themes (one of the sources explicitly says "biblically-themed") in the same way as "WII shooter" or "Sci-fi RTS". Perhaps this should be a separate discussion but there you go. bridies (talk) 14:41, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

Sport Games?

I just noticed that this article seems to miss a quite important genre. So what about Sport games? AzaghalNK (talk) 09:27, 8 April 2009 (UTC)

It's already covered in the "Other notable genres" section. Randomran (talk) 15:32, 8 April 2009 (UTC)

Casual gaming genres

It's on my to-do list to make this into a full-fledged section. This is a quick-list taken from the Zylom-page. Help is always appreciated. GameLegend (talk) 21:32, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

I would think that "casual game" isn't a genre, just like "hardcore game" isn't one either. They contain games that fall into certain categories, such as the puzzle game, board/card game, and simple adventure game genres. What defines them isn't a genre, but that they rarely contain things like heart-pounding action, difficult battles, combos, and long plots, etc. That's not to say that there couldn't be an article on them, but including them in this list is questionable since the definition is vague.

EDIT: I noticed that there's already a section about them, the issue would be repetition of genres.--_{ZXCVBNM (TALK)} 22:11, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

Match 3-games, hidden object-games, Mahjong-games etc. are specifically casual game-industry genres you don't see in the core games industry, that's why I put them in a seperate category. When they've been written out, we might be able to drop that category, but for now it's easier overview-wise. GameLegend (talk) 12:53, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

I would support such a move. SharkD (talk) 16:19, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

Sports games

Shouldn't sports games get their own section? They're extremely popular and quite varied - each sport could be thought of as being a separate sub-genre really. They're responsible for the continued existence of two huge video game brands, i.e. EA Sports and 2K Games. sdornan (talk) 17:47, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Categorization of genres

I found a nice page at Mobygames describing various videogame genres. I guess it's used when submitting games to their website. What I like about that list though, is that they are categorizing the genres in major types: basic genres, perspectives, themes (sports and non-sport), and "other attributes". While some Wikipedians may not agree with the exact taxonomy they use, it can be a great inspiration for a reboot of the Wikipedia article. What is also nice about that list is that it can also be used as a source! I also like the fact that their descriptions are succint and to the point! 76.68.168.137 (talk) 08:38, 21 November 2010 (UTC)

Here's the link: http://www.mobygames.com/glossary/genres —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.68.168.137 (talk) 08:40, 21 November 2010 (UTC)

Super Mario Bros. the best-selling video game of all time?

Recently, Wii Sports has surpassed Super Mario Bros. as the best selling game of all time, so all I did was fix a small inaccuracy. See [6] for proof. Alex 23:58, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

VGChartz isn't considered a reliable source, for the purpose of Wikipedia. Randomran (talk) 00:47, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

VGChartz eh? *laughs*--_{ZXCVBNM [TALK]} 02:09, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, I wasn't aware that Wikipedia was a reliable source either. *smirk* In any case, this page lists Wii Sports as having sold 40.5 million copies, and that cites a reliable source, so I don't see the big deal. Alex 21:41, 8 February 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Alex723723 (talk • contribs)

Actually, Wikipedia is NOT a reliable source. That's the whole point of references. But if Nintendo says it's true, then...the non-gamers have won! We're all doomed! Just kidding...it's not like I care. Really.--_{ZXCVBNM (TALK)} 21:24, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

Can Wii Sports be considered to be sold? In other territories (such as Japan) Wii Sports must be bought, but in most countries near America, Wii Sports is a pack-in. Does a pack in count as a sell for the game? Are the pack-in numbers being added? P.S. Alex723723 - A study has been done to show that Wikipedia has nearly the same number of errors as the Encyclopedia Britannica.[7] Unfortunately, Nature, the company that did the study, requires a paid subscription. 71.164.44.179 (talk) 05:15, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

Super Mario Bros was also a pack in, so that doesn't really prove anything.--_{ZXCVBNM (TALK)} 06:17, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

^PWNAGE (pronounced as "ownage"). Favouratism can't be covered with makeup on Wikipedia. Accept that as horrible as a video game Wii Sports is in the classical sense, it still counts and has outsold all other best selling video games 71.164.44.179-sempai. Zoele (talk) 05:34, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

In the classical sense Wii Sports is a great game. It's multiplayer arcade sports. Those were huge in the Arcade-Atari-NES days (and now, evidently). It's a terrible game in the much later "hardcore" sense.

Did Sony steal final fantasy from Nintendo?

Sony and Nintendo both got together and made final fantasy. Before the actual release date of final fantasy, Sony released it and basically took all the credit. Because Nintendo was under contract, they couldnt say anything about final fantasy also being there creation. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 204.78.76.24 (talk) 16:27, 2 September 2011 (UTC)

What does that have to do with video game genres, which is what this talk page is for? See WP:NOTFORUM. —  HELLKNOWZ  ▎TALK

Role Playing (small thing)

It says "involve up to hundreds of players interacting with each other on the same persistent world in real-time." Shouldn't that be thousands or maybe even millions? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 90.213.28.229 (talk) 20:13, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

2011 requested move

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: No clear consensus to move Its apparent that there's disagreement about what this article is about, its sourcing and its current content state. Fix those things first before evaluating the need to change the title. For the time being, the current title is not inconsistent with WP:PLURALS#Exceptions Mike Cline (talk) 12:38, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

---

Video game genres → Video game genre relisted -Mike Cline (talk) 15:48, 20 November 2011 (UTC) – This is pretty straightforward—I think this should be singular. I assume the reasoning behind the original plural name is because this was just a bare list of video game genres, but it has now expanded to be a much more fleshed out article. So, standard naming convention should now apply again. relisting see below Andrewa (talk) 15:55, 20 November 2011 (UTC)Gary King (talk · scripts) 04:37, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose this is about genres in videogames, not a genre called videogame (like videogame based films) 70.24.248.23 (talk) 06:41, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

  Have a look at Film genre, which is a decent comparison. You are basing your argument on the naming convention followed by a handful of video game genre articles, when I'm asking that this should be following WP:NC. Gary King (talk · scripts) 07:07, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

  It's not, since there's not a genre called "film" but there is called "videogame" 70.24.248.23 (talk) 04:48, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

  So "Snow color" means color called "snow"? No one will confuse this for a genre called "video game". —  HELLKNOWZ  ▎TALK 09:09, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

  Really?

  Although video game music has yet to enter the classical concert repertoire, it does seem to be spawning its own particular musical genre. [8]

  But I was pleased to discover at least one genre of music that fits in surprisingly well with all the limitations of the system: classic videogame music. [9]

  By 1992 video game music had become a multimillion-dollar business in Japan, where record stores de vote entire sections to this genre of music [10]

  -- Video game is a genre of music -- 70.24.248.23 (talk) 04:51, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

• Support. Unsure, leaning support. Although WP:PLURAL springs to mind; there is WP:PLURAL#Exceptions "Articles on groups or classes of specific things". This is a group, but then again the topic is "video game genre". —  HELLKNOWZ  ▎TALK 09:09, 9 November 2011 (UTC)
  • Update to support following further comments and arguments made. —  HELLKNOWZ  ▎TALK 14:00, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose. This is not an article about the concept of "a video game genre" -- such an article might list available examples, but would spend most of its space discussing how a developer chooses a genre, how reviewers classify video games into genres, the larger purpose behind such classifications, how consumers responses are shaped by genre classification, etc. (See Film genre for an example of such an article.) Rather, this article is actually about the collection of concepts known as "video game genres" collectively. The article has multiple topics (the individual genres), so per WP:PLURAL, it properly takes a plural title. (It is directly analogous to Romance languages, which is one of many such examples given in WP:PLURAL.) Powers ^T 13:54, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

  I don't ever understand how that is a valid argument, but maybe it's hidden in the guidelines somewhere. I don't think it's fair to name an article based on what it already contains—for instance, stubs would have, and often do, have a lot of renames because they don't have discussions on their names first—I'd think it should be based on what one would expect to find here. And I agree with what you say, that this article should expand to include those items that you mentioned; there certainly isn't an article that would suit them more than this one.

  Also I don't see how Romance languages is directly analoguos to this one, since it states on WP:PLURAL "Articles on particular language families, as opposed to individual languages, are pluralised". It could be used as an example, but not a direct one. What we're all referring to from WP:PLURAL is, I assume, "Articles on groups or classes of specific things." Right now, people see this article as a group of specific things rather than a broader discussion on video game genres, and as you said, it simply needs more content to do just that. And as I mentioned, I don't think we can judge the article's name solely based on just what it contains at the moment; leaving it with a plural name never really gives the article the opportunity to change into the article it could become, and instead keeps it as a list of genres indefinitely since the article's name strongly implies that it should be just that.

  Another question is, if the desire really is to keep this article as a list, then it perhaps would be better off at List of video game genres so that Video game genre can take over the responsibilities of actually explaining what the term means, in the industry, to games and gamers, and so on. Gary King (talk · scripts) 19:00, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

  It's possible that such an article can't be written; if there aren't enough sources that discuss the concept of video game genres in general, we can't write an article on it. And even if we did, the grammatical number of the article's title could go either way; I am of the opinion that the film genre article could just as easily be film genres because it covers a class of specific things. Powers ^T 22:30, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

  Possibly, but here are some useful sources to help us get started: Playing video games: motives, responses, and consequences and "Genre and game studies: Toward a critical approach to video game genres". Gary King (talk · scripts) 21:38, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

• Support as per nom. Should be singular. - X201 (talk) 14:01, 9 November 2011 (UTC)
  • Why? Powers ^T 14:26, 9 November 2011 (UTC)
• Weak oppose, mostly per Powers. This article is still largely an overview of the various genre articles. I think either title would be acceptable and am somewhat ambivalent but I think Powers has a good case as to why this title better fits the present content. bridies (talk) 15:12, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

The above quote from Plural-Exceptions sounds pretty appropriate to this article, also. bridies (talk) 15:15, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose After more reflection I'm more firmly in agreement with the Exceptions argument. Also, based on the discussion here I don't think a consensus to move can be reached at this time. bridies (talk) 01:05, 21 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support. The parallel topics are film genre, music genre and literary genre. The article (and particularly its lead) needs work but that doesn't justify keeping it at this non-standard name. None of the exceptions listed at Wikipedia:PLURAL#Exceptions fit this case, and in particular, the parallel to languages is far weaker than that to other genre classification systems. Yes, there's a music genre called video game, but this article is on the primary meaning of video game genre. Andrewa (talk) 13:05, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
  • I just don't see it. It looks to me like the article is on a collection of individual genres -- it's clearly divided up into a number of sections, one per genre, and those sections contain the vast majority of the article's content. The article isn't about the concept of a genre; it's about selected genres, plural. Powers ^T 22:04, 18 November 2011 (UTC)
    • Interesting claim... So, do you think that there are two different topics, this one, video game genres, plural, and another, video game genre, singular? Either way it doesn't seem to make a lot of sense to oppose the move, see below. Agree that the article needs work, on multiple issues; That's a different matter IMO, and keeping this article at a non-policy-compliant name makes the prospect of fixing it worse not better. Andrewa (talk) 19:00, 19 November 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose at this time per Powers and Wikipedia:PLURAL#Exceptions. Don't move, and don't create a second article. Instead create a section like Concept of genre and fill it up with awesome content. It's not a traditional structure – I'd call it reverse summary-style – but it should work fine as an incubator. If such content proves significant, then rename the article and restructure it, promoting that content to the lead, and continuing with descriptions of the genres themselves. If the "concept" content can't be written or never is written, this title better describes the contents. It's not a list, but a prose descriptions of a class of genres. (Many interesting points, especially below.) --Pnm (talk) 03:57, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

Discussion

From above: The article isn't about the concept of a genre; it's about selected genres, plural.

So, is there then a separate topic video game genre, singular? And if so, is the topic video game genres (plural) encyclopedic, and is this the topic of the current article?

My answers are no, no and no. There may be a separate topic list of video game genres (where this article once lived, briefly), but this article is more general than that. The lead is about the concept, and the sections on individual genres are more detailed than appropriate for a list. It's doubtful that there's enough material to justify a second article whatever its name.

Or, if there is no separate topic, then where does that leave the argument for the plural title? In tatters. The scope of this article at least includes the concept, and the Wikipedia guideline and practice is to name such articles in the singular.

There's no question that this article needs work, the question is what's the best way to proceed with this? Naming to article to match the current unsatisfactory contents is a step in the wrong direction IMO. Andrewa (talk) 19:14, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Indeed. I essentially stated this, above, saying that we can't say that the article belongs at this current name just because the content is subpar, poorly organized, etc. The name should essentially reflect what readers expect to see here, which is an article about the concept. (This expect to see "rule" works particularly well for stubs, for instance). Gary King (talk · scripts) 02:38, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

It's not at all clear to me that an article on genre as it applies to video games is at all workable, due to a paucity of sources. Even if such an article is possible, however, this isn't that article. It's baffling to me that the above contributors wish to change both the name and the scope of this article. Why not just create video game genre? Powers ^T 04:25, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

I confess I'm a little baffled too. The proposed move doesn't make the article any more or less workable, or affect any paucity of sources. It doesn't affect the richness or paucity of sources either way; The immediate effect on the content is zilch. It's just a minor rephrase of the title, from an unjustified plural to the Wikipedia standard singular. What's not at all clear about that?

Why isn't this that article? Exactly which pieces of the current content would need to be removed (rather than just rephrased to match the title) from the plural-titled article in order to fit the scope of the singular? I can't see any. So can you be specific?

No change of scope is involved, the lead for example would change from Video game genres are used to categorize video games based on their gameplay interaction rather than visual or narrative differences.[1] A video game genre is defined by a set of gameplay challenges. They are classified... [11] to A video game genre is used to categorize video games based on their gameplay interaction rather than visual or narrative differences.[1] A video game genre is defined by a set of gameplay challenges. Video games are classified... or similar. These changes are all simply grammatical, leaving the meaning and the article scope unaffected.

Why not just create a new article? Perhaps a better question is why create a new article? Why bother? The material in this article all belongs in an article with a singular name, as described in the naming guidelines.

So I guess the answer to why not just create a new article is because we have better things to do with our time than to then perform the inevitable merge that the unwarranted fork created by this kinda bizarre suggestion would in turn require. Yes, baffled is a good word. Andrewa (talk) 13:12, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you're not getting. The bulk of this article comprises a series of disconnected sections that talk about each of several genres in depth. The article is thus about Action-Adventure video games, Adventure games, Role-playing video games, Simulation games, Strategy games, and "other notable genres". The article is about those genres, plural, and that's how it should be named under the exceptions listed at WP:PLURAL: "Articles on groups or classes of specific things." Powers ^T 15:10, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

One could similarly argue that splash cymbal should be at splash cymbals as it also lists several types, or that sausage should be at sausages. In both cases, and many, many others, the detailed subsections constitute the bulk of this article.

But this isn't what WP:PLURAL is about at all. None of the six examples given there are similar to this one. The only one of them you have specifically mentioned above, that of languages, has I think been sufficiently dismissed above, need we go further with it?

Alternatively, if this move does not go ahead, a more general example should be added to WP:PLURAL. Perhaps you could suggest a wording for this? Andrewa (talk) 00:24, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for finally explaining using a useful example; I now understand your objection to making this article an exception to WP:PLURAL. However, I don't entirely agree. I don't think the list at WP:PLURAL was intended to be exhaustive, merely to provide several examples of the types of articles that might be named in the plural. I continue to think that this article as it stands today is best described with the plural; but then, I also think that the other "____ genre" overview articles could reasonably be either plural or singular, as they are articles on both a class of related topics as well as on single topics (depending on how one approaches them). Powers ^T 02:16, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps then we are getting somewhere.

I'm glad you find my example useful. But surely the onus of proof is on those who wish to show that this should be an exception to the general rule? I've now provided two examples of articles that appear to meet your criteria for use of the plural, but which I think it would be generally agreed should remain in the singular. You haven't replied to either, nor even indicated which of them you find useful and why. The only example you have provided of a case you find similar is the one of romance languages; Need we discuss that one further? Is there a better one? Andrewa (talk) 16:04, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

It's an exception to the rule because it is an article "on groups or classes of specific things", which is the criteria for being an exception to the rule. I don't see how any of this pontificating can get around a clearly applicable, direct quote from the guideline. None of the articles you linked are applicable, they contain swathes of content not about the various types of sausage or symbols or whatever. Even if we indulge your assertion that "the bulk" of those articles are about the various types (spurious IMO), we're still left with the fact that this article is entirely about the various genres. The first sentence is "Video game genres are used to categorize video games..." and it goes on from there. Arguing burden of proof is pretty rich for a position based on what the article could-would-should contain, not what it does contain. bridies (talk) 00:52, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

But what does that quote mean? Why doesn't it apply equally to the other examples I've given? Bearing in mind that it does apparently apply to romance languages, which are only groups or classes in a very general sense. Andrewa (talk) 05:51, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

It means what it says. The articles you linked deal only partially with their subjects as categories; they are not exclusively about a collection of abstract concepts or categories as this article is. As I said. Tenuously pointing to articles which may also be of poor quality can't trump a guideline which explicitly supports the current name. bridies (talk) 06:05, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

Also, other articles listed at WP:PLURAL, such as the those on political divisions or maths, are far less based on categorisation (in terms of their format or content) than any of the examples you provided, let alone this one. I am further dubious that pointing to other articles, especially those which have not been peer-assessed (FA, maybe GA), is even of much use. Is this article about "groups or classes of specific things"? Yes it is. bridies (talk) 01:09, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

As are many other articles. As an example, rock splash is a class of cymbal, far more than French (a romance language) is a group or class of anything. Andrewa (talk) 05:51, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

See above. bridies (talk) 06:05, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

And having reread your opening post of this discussion, I also reject that as entirely spurious. The lead is not about the "concept". As I said, it opens by stating that "video games are categorised..." Then it discusses how they are "classified" not according to setting. Then it talks about the disputed "definitions". The rest of what you wrote regarding the "concept", "scope", this or that being "unjustified" or "doubtful" appears to be entirely baseless. I believe any content on the "concept" (a decidedly vague, ah, concept) is unlikely every to approach the amount of discussion on the various types, their characteristics, history etc. and that this is based in the balance of secondary research (really, this article mainly just lacks citations) and reflected in the other work we have on video game genres. bridies (talk) 01:44, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

Did you also reread the post [12] that I was quoting (note the italics) when I used the term concept? Does it suffer the same problems, and if not, why are oppose votes allowed to use the term if support votes are not? Andrewa (talk) 05:51, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you're talking about. Who first used the term "concept" or its merits is not relevant. If you're in fact referring to the hypothetical genre article Powers mentioned (not quite what you linked) and what I think you're getting at: here is where we cite burden of proof. Is this article currently about a single concept? No. It's about multiple concepts and there is limited if any evidence that it likely to contain substantial coverage of anything else. bridies (talk) 06:05, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

Disagree with most of this, except you're right, look two posts earlier [13], that's the one I meant of course, and the text of this is actually displayed at the page I did give. Sorry if it was confusing. But the quibble about who used what term first is just wasting time. The point is rather, he also used the term, so are you similarly discounting his argument too? And if not, why not? Clear now? Andrewa (talk) 03:26, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

I still don't see why you think this is any issue or argument. I'm not disputing the outright validity of the term nor its attendant hypothesis. Powers used it as an example of what the article is not and thus why it shouldn't be named as such. You used it to describe what the article should be and why it should be named as such. Yet, there is limited evidence that such content can be written, let alone that it can come to rival the weight of coverage on the different definitions, characteristics, etc. Again, you are aware of the concept of burden of proof. On the other hand, if we did remove that part of Powers' argument, we'd be left with the fact that this article is about multiple concepts and should be named as such. bridies (talk) 06:09, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

Similarly to W engine? Andrewa (talk) 02:05, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

Sigh. Another "sausages and symbols" analogy? Not an article about multiple, abstract concepts, categories etc. Neither in concept nor content. bridies (talk) 02:43, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm afraid I feel the same way. I'm offering arguments and all you're offering is text. Andrewa (talk) 04:00, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

Agree. Andrewa (talk) 05:05, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

Conclusion

Unless someone else supports the move, I'll offer no objection to closing next time around. In glorious hindsight maybe it wasn't even helpful to reopen it, but thanks for humouring me there. Andrewa (talk) 04:29, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

Premature closure IMO

The above discussion was closed mid-discussion IMO. There had been edits by three different contributors, one of them [14] being a change to support following further comments and arguments made, in little more than the previous hour. There is only one unqualified oppose vote, plus one weak oppose.

The logic of this oppose vote is still unclear to me, but my attempted reply to the last post was interrupted by an edit conflict with the closure. It appears to be based on Wikipedia:Naming conventions (plurals)#Exceptions, which lists six examples, none of which seem to bear sufficient similarity to this case to be relevant. The closest parallel I can see is the last of the six, Zeno's Paradoxes, but it's still a poor one.

Alternatively, if this article is to be plural, it should be cited in the guideline as a seventh example. But the rationale for this still escapes me. Andrewa (talk) 15:40, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

Andrewa, no problem, I will revert and reopen --Mike Cline (talk) 15:42, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, relisted! Andrewa (talk) 15:56, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure how many times and in how many different ways I can explain it. I can't see any justification for considering this article to be on the topic of a video game genre as a concept, as the bulk of the article is about specific examples. Compare this article to the film genre article, which contains no extended discussion of specific genres but rather covers topics relevant to all film genres. Powers ^T 20:18, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

I know you can't see it. Perhaps if you stop repeating that and respond to the arguments, we'll get somewhere.

True, film genre has a different structure, and the structure of the article is superficially similar to the article at Zeno's paradoxes, one of the examples at Wikipedia:PLURAL#Exceptions (but not one you've specifically named as of yet as far as I can see). But look deeper... There's no underlying concept that can be called Zeno's paradox; That would be ambiguous, and the singular title deceptive. Not so in this case, any more than sausage or splash cymbal is ambiguous. The various video game genres are each an instance of a video game genre, while the various paradoxes are not instances of a Zeno's Paradox, that's an artificial construction. We'd say one of Zeno's paradoxes not a Zeno's paradox. But we happily say a splash cymbal, a sausage, or a video game genre.

Yes, I know you claim there is no underlying concept, unlike say film genre where you say there is. This is important. But you haven't IMO substantiated this claim.

For a discussion of the bulk of the article... see the move request section above. Perhaps best to discuss all this there, in fact. Andrewa (talk) 01:43, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

They're not votes. bridies (talk) 01:06, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

One is. Um, so? Andrewa (talk) 01:38, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm just saying that "X amount of people voted this or that" doesn't help you overcome the opposing arguments. bridies (talk) 02:24, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

Agreed. They should be discussed. Which is what I'm trying to do. Andrewa (talk) 02:55, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Visual Novel needs to be removed

A Visual Novel is not a game. It is a work of interactive fiction. This is well-documented within other wikipedia articles. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interactive_fiction. It is a common fallacy to describe any digital medium as a 'game'. From 'http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game': Key components of games are goals, rules, challenge, and interaction. Visual Novels do not have goals, rules, or challenges, they only have interaction, and this interaction is on the most basic of levels. Calling them games is both disingenuous to the genre they are actually in, and to the misinformation it distributes to readers of this article. Furthermore, none of the sources cited for the context of a Visual Novel as a 'game' or accurate or reliable, generally relying on layman speculation with few expert sources. There is absolutely no reason why a Visual Novel constitutes a game. And it doesn't. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.181.58.64 (talk) 21:05, 30 May 2012 (UTC)

Fallacy or not, see Wikipedia:Verifiability -- "Verifiability, and not truth, is one of the fundamental requirements for inclusion in Wikipedia". There are reliable, secondary sources that describe "visual novel" as a video game genre, and there are a lot of examples when individual visual novels are referred to as games. Yes, they are hardly "real games", but such analysis is original research and cannot be used to determine inclusion or exclusion of content. —  HELLKNOWZ  ▎TALK 08:14, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

If the interactivity is reliant on chance or can cause a different outcome for the story, then it is a game, regardless of the fact that it has minimal control.

Reclassification of Visual Novels has wider implications than this one article, so if you want to propose that, WT:VG would be the best place to do it, because it really is a bigger issue than this one article. - X201 (talk) 08:45, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

big problem .... 2D v 3D

Say guys - this is a well written page and well done, you are all to be congratulated

One thing. A very basic division is 2D games versus 3D games.

I actually came to the page looking for a specific list of "2D video game genres" - there are so many classics. whether like space invaders, like asteroids, like mario - etc.

it's possible, that you hard workers here should either:

Group them in to pre3D and after3D sections

In each section, just note whether indeed it is a 2D or 3D game (this is a basic bit of info that is missing)

Alsop quite simply ..... someone clever could very simply add a new section "Genres by 2D" and "Genres by 3D" where you would simply note all the categories from this page, grouped in either group

you can imagine these days there is a big interest in "retro" or "pixel" games - essentially the many distinct 2D genres .. it would be very excellent to clarify this list. Particularly with young people coming up who only know about GTA  :)

Cheers — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.148.18.49 (talk) 06:30, 27 October 2012 (UTC)

Many genres can be both 2D and 3D, both in perspective and implementation, not to mention 2.5D, isometric and all the weird variations. See video game graphics article, which was basically made to clear this up somewhat. —  HELLKNOWZ  ▎TALK 08:19, 27 October 2012 (UTC)

When discussing the system's flaws...

I think it would be important to mention that some games appear to defy classification. For example, I don't think Katamari fits into any of the specific genres, and only vaguely into the top-level action category, and I can't place Wii Fit anywhere (party game maybe, as it is mostly a collection of minigames, except that seems plain wrong). Another, related problem is that sometimes games of the same genre are so different that it seems absurd to lump them together. For example, Pikmin is apparently (accroding to its wiki page) a real-time strategy game but is nothing like the Command and Conquer-style wargames more typically associated with the genre. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.26.13.2 (talk) 02:04, 21 November 2012 (UTC)

Looking for genre title

I can’t find a genre to describe the kind of games where you (as single player) speed along a course or tube and have to dodge objects, usually by quickly steering left or right, or by jumping over them, while the speed gradually increases. Here is an example where you can also collect yellowish objects, whatever they are, and here is one with multiple lives, ducking, and tricky physics. I can’t quite fit those into any of the listed genres. Thanks! —Telofy (talk) 12:24, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

Have to be obvious here, but what do the reliable source say the genre is? And if they don't say it, then you can't really use it anyway. —  HELLKNOWZ  ▎TALK 13:24, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

Visual novels do not belong in 'Video game genres'

Visual Novels are not actually games and therefore do not belong within the purview of so-called "Video Game Genres". They should be appended to this list: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interactive_fiction and that list alone. Liftmoduleinterface (talk) 19:20, 2 January 2014 (UTC)

Yes, they are a genre as supported by many reliable sources. Already was brought up at WP:VG back in September where your change did not gain consensus. —  HELLKNOWZ  ▎TALK 20:26, 2 January 2014 (UTC)

This may be a bit late but has there been any change since then because looking at the past discussion (which the proposer was involved in) I would find it hard to find anyone coming to the conclusion that there would be anything to even remotely indicate a consensus to remove visual novel as a genre?--174.93.163.194 (talk) 23:02, 7 February 2014 (UTC)

Features of role-playing games as categories

I found it weird that an article on genre categories goes on to elaborate on the features of role-playing games. They are even used as category-titles, leading to the impression that these particular features are actually genres of their own.

The titles I refer to are:

• 4.2 Role-playing Choices
• 4.3 Use of fantasy in RPGs

I suggest these are removed. Features of role-playing games should be discussed in the role-playing games article, not in a genre categorization. Wikikrax (talk) 11:44, 25 September 2014 (UTC)

Requested move

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: Page moved. There doesn't seem to be any significant opposition to this, the reasons are valid, and it's been around a long time. (non-admin closure)  — Amakuru (talk) 09:46, 16 January 2015 (UTC)

---

Video game genres → List of video game genres – The article in its current state is literally a list of genres. The title is even plural, whereas WP:PLURAL is against this and film genre and music genre aren't. More importantly, this article is not encyclopedic. Film genre is a relatively short article, but it discusses the categorization and definition of genres. The article attempts to explain what a genre is in film and how they are used. It does not list the genres themselves.

I suggest this article be moved entirely while a new article called Video game genre is made. The lead section of this article could be used well for the new article, as a start. I'd love to help with the change and with improving the new Video game genre-article, but I'd like to know if people support this, seeing as it is currently a top-priority article and apparently B-class. --Relisted. Dekimasuよ! 19:36, 10 December 2014 (UTC) ~Maplestrip (chat) 11:01, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

I agree. I think following the structure of the article film genre is the right way to go: it explains what a film genre is while also linking to a categorization. Wikikrax (talk) 11:12, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

I only just noticed that I missed the previous move request entirely when making this one, but seeing as this is the exact opposite suggestion (rather than changing the topic and scope of this article, create a new article with the topic and scope expected by this article), I don't think this matters much.

An issue I've noticed coming up in that conversation is that there might not be enough sources to create a "video game genre"-article. I personally doubt that is true, but I'll start on a draft later today. The move still stands, though, as this page is still a list and not an encyclopedic article. ~Maplestrip (chat) 11:17, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

I found out that "there aren't enough sources talking about VG genre" is completely silly. I am finding so many sources talking about how to classify video games that I don't know where to start. I'm still working on it, and it's just a rough sketch right now, but feel free to take a look at it and improve on it: user:Maplestrip/Video game genre ~Maplestrip (chat) 12:56, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

I think my draft has just about reached c-class now. Please tell me whether it's ready to be moved to the mainspace. This process is going more smoothly than expected because of how easy it is to find references. ~Maplestrip (chat) 13:59, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

• Support as nom. ~Maplestrip (chat) 12:56, 3 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Nominators don't add support !votes, FYI.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  11:52, 15 January 2015 (UTC)
• I think an article could be written on genre in video games. But this is kind of/sort of a list. Support Red Slash 01:03, 5 December 2014 (UTC)
• Support: It's a B-class article, so that might make some people leery about switching it over to a List-class, but really, that's what this is. There's always Good/Featured Lists, I believe. Supernerd11 _{Firemind ^_^ Pokedex} 22:30, 8 January 2015 (UTC)
• Support: This is clearly a list article, and it's standard operating procedure to name them as such. The fact that many of the entries are multi-sentence doesn't make it magically not a list, it's just an informative one. Merge from List of genres#Video game genres (may be reducible in length to just main categorizations, using {{main}} to link to the main list article) and perhaps from the recent fork Video game genre, as needed, though there is no reason we can't have an article Video game genre as well as a List of video game genres if there is enough proper content development. I'm not seeing that yet; Video game genre seems to me to be a stub, that just happens to have more citations that is average for a stub.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  11:52, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

I've extended it some more today, and found quite a few useful sources to work with later. There are a lot of good sources by Googling "Digital game genres" :3 I would hardly call it a stub, though, as we have featured articles that are shorter than this, haha. ~Mable (chat) 13:29, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

Discussion

comment the content of the article seems to go far beyond a mere list. Gregkaye ✍♪ 11:58, 4 December 2014 (UTC)

That's an issue, isn't it? The list defines each genre as it would be defined in the lead section of its own article. In that sense, the list reminds me a bit of this list, though this list seems harder to navigate for some reason... ~Maplestrip (chat) 12:18, 4 December 2014 (UTC)

Seeing the difference in scope, I just moved my draft to the mainspace, resulting in this article: Video game genre. The move request still stands, of course, though I'm not sure if I should just boldly move it now. Apparently, the move isn't as controversial as I expected. ~Maplestrip (chat) 13:44, 5 December 2014 (UTC)

Interestingly enough, there's already a list of VG genres in this article. I must also say that including a description of the several existing genres within the "Video game genre" article (rather than splitting it into a separate one) seems quite reasonable to me, and is probably the information that most users are expecting when they look this article up. Savig (talk) 09:58, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

A specific article called "List of video game genres" should be able to ensure that we don't make different lists of video game genres at different places. I've noticed outline of video games also includes a list of genres. Currently, the Video game genre article does link to this list, so if that's what someone is looking for, then it is just one click away. Do you support or oppose the move, though? ~Maplestrip (chat) 10:04, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

Outline of video games § Video game genres is more what I expect to see for the title List of video game genres, so perhaps the "list of" title should redirect to the "outline" article. This article gets into way too much detail for a simple list. Arguably your new Video game genre article is a content fork of this article. I would suggest merging that into the lead and introductory sections of this article, then when you have finished your merge, a move of Video game genres → Video game genre, which was rejected in 2011, could be re-proposed. Your new content could support such a move. Merging your new article could also help with the concern about having content about video game genres at different places. – Wbm1058 (talk) 16:06, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

Agreed. Savig (talk) 20:33, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

This is already a very long article. If more content was added to it, it would be due for a split anyway. Also, the lay-out wouldn't make much sense, as each section in this article focuses on a specific genre, whereas each section in the video game genre article focuses on an aspect of the concept of the video game genre. How would you combine the two? ~Maplestrip (chat) 08:02, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

Well I don't see a problem if the first two or three sections in this article are not devoted to specific genres but to more general aspects of the concept of genre. Anyway, one other possible option is making one single "Introduction" section for that (including History, Definition and Classification as subsections, as they are not very long), and leave the other sections (specific genres) as is. Savig (talk) 10:43, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

I don't believe that would work out, as the article would still be too big. With 74KB, according to WP:SIZERULE, the page is already much larger than prefered. I'd rather not increase the scope of this article and add 10KB to it (Video game genre is currently 8KB, but it's young), but keep the content splitted, though obviously in a more comfortable way than it is now ("genre" and "genres" being different articles). ~Mable (chat) 12:57, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

We should be following the concepts of Wikipedia:Summary style. If this article is too long, then that may mean that its summaries are too long, and should be condensed to only the most important highlights, or more content should be moved from here to the sub-articles, such as Action game, Action-adventure game, Adventure game, Role-playing video game, Simulation video game and Strategy video game. – Wbm1058 (talk) 17:06, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

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The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

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Cinematic Adventure

I would add the category "Cinematic Adventure" for games that emphasize the visual art and the story, under the Adventure macro-genre. Good examples are the following:

• Life is Strange
• Alan Wake
• Murdered Soul Suspect (maybe) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.1.213.96 (talk) 11:22, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

SourceForts genre of Capture the Flag

The game is a CTF FPS, I see no section on this list saying that CTF is a genre while many games are of that genre.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capture_the_flag#Software_and_games

!!Nick12506 (talk) 19:42, 18 May 2019 (UTC)

Do you have reliable sources that discuss it as a genre? —  HELLKNOWZ   ▎TALK 19:57, 18 May 2019 (UTC)

He's been told that CTF is considered a game mode rather than a genre at SourceForts. I agree with this assessment. -- ferret (talk) 20:46, 18 May 2019 (UTC)

So, Ferret is referring to himself and this other guy eik. If you take the CTF out of SourceForts, it wouldn't be a game. The main purpose is to capture the flag, check out the list of games provided in the wikipedia article and its sources to confirm that people consider CTF to be a genre..

Ferret is being sketchy right now I gotta say, with him not referencing himself with this discussion and instead tries to say that I've been told. The wiki page has many examples of games that are only CTF games. They have no function other then CTF. They have different methods of doing such, but in the end. These games all share the gameplay characteristic of capturing the flag. The first paragraph of this wiki article states that it would need to be "an specific category of games related by similar gameplay characteristics." With many games, some of which can be found in the wiki article I posted before, only being CTF games, how can it not be a genre? The game SourceForts was the one I was discussing because they removed a edit that stood on that games wikipedia page for over a decade.

He and this random person decided to tell me that the game isn't a CTF genred game, how can any of the games listed in the article provide, or my game not share the similar gameplay characteristic that is CTF?

Ferret, when you agree with yourself. You say I agree with my assessment. You need to reference yourself when you're going to take up a discussion when you yourself can check that the last edit was done by you on this matter.

Nick12506 (talk) 21:40, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

I looked at the discussion and history and you have not provided any reliable sources to support the claim that CTF is a genre. It's a game mode. We don't put game modes in the infobox and we don't include game modes in the genre list. The WP:BURDEN to show that it is a genre with reliable sources is on you if you want to add such content, regardless how long the article was stating unsourced information previously. —  HELLKNOWZ   ▎TALK 21:53, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

So all those games on that wikipedia page are not shown to share the same gameplay characteristic that if CTF? You must love making wikipedia less informational if you're only excuse in not adding this genre is that you can't find any sources to confirm or deny something. Nick12506 (talk) 01:10, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

Read WP:V. —  HELLKNOWZ   ▎TALK 06:52, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

Good source to use

Whew... this article is a mess! Anyhow, I came across this article on Gamasutra that might be of utility; "The Designer's Notebook: Sorting Out the Genre Muddle". Cheers, --Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^(talk) 22:14, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

07:32, 3 December 2020 (UTC)07:32, 3 December 2020 (UTC)07:32, 3 December 2020 (UTC)~== Do Puzzle Games deserve their own section? == At the moment, Puzzle Games isn't defined as a major genre, and is part of the "other notable genres" section. Should it be given its own section, especially considering the constant rise of puzzle-based freeware games now? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.45.196.28 (talk) 15:15, 16 January 2010 (UTC)

There are no "spin-offs" of a puzzle game, since puzzles are puzzles. They tend to be incorporated into other genres rather than the other way around. You wouldn't call Henry Hatsworth a puzzle-action game, you'd call it an action game with puzzle elements. Maybe Professor Layton is a puzzle/visual novel game, but there's no offshoot of the puzzle genre there, I think.--_{ZXCVBNM (TALK)} 16:21, 16 January 2010 (UTC)

I agree. Putting puzzle games like tetris under the sub-heading of 'logic games' under the umbrella term of "other" is ridiculous and makes this list look like a joke or written by someone with no clue about video games.Danben77 (talk) 07:32, 3 December 2020 (UTC)

Missing genre

What about beat em up text adventure and rts games Mr.Jacob Frye (talk) 08:30, 30 March 2021 (UTC)

What about them? —  HELLKNOWZ   ▎TALK 09:44, 30 March 2021 (UTC)

JRPG is not a genre.

I really want to remove the section about "JRPG" on here, but I figured I should ask the community first.

For one, it's not developed well, and only has a couple sentences about broad stereotypes that can easily be proven to be not present in many specific examples. But even if we expand upon it, it'll just turn into a list of cliches and tropes, that can also be demonstrably proven false for many examples.

More importantly though, claiming it to be a genre contradicts every other source defining video game genres, including this very same page, which all state that a genre is a "classification of a video game based on how it is played rather than visual or narrative elements."

As it stands, no sources are even in consensus of what "JRPG" even means in the first place. The most common answers are: 1) Any game with anime-style aesthetics and characters expressing Japanese cultural values. And 2) Literally any RPG developed in Japan. And the information for 1) can already be found in the "Culture Differences" section of the "Role-playing video game" article, while the information for 2) can already be found in the "History of Eastern role-playing video games" article. However, this page here is for video game genres.

And while a smaller number of people have tried to define "JRPG" as "Dragon Quest-clone", there is already an older and well-defined genre for this. It is simply a basic turn-based RPG. Not to mention suddenly calling all these games JRPGs means all the classic Ultima games and all other western computer games that copied it are now also JRPGs, and I can't imagine there will be a single source who will agree with that.

This very same page is also an excellent counter-example for this claim. Every other sub-genre of RPG that is listed contains games that are indisputably referred to as "JRPGs" by all sources. Examples: Action-RPG - Ys, MMORPG - Final Fantasy 14, Roguelike - Mystery Dungeon, Tactical RPG - Fire Emblem, Sandbox RPG - Romancing SaGa, Dungeon Crawler - Etrian Odyssey.

So if "JRPG" is a sub-genre, then how on earth can it contain every other sub-genre also?

And again, whatever the classification of "JRPG" means to various people, that can be discussed in detail elsewhere. But this is the page about genres, and since there are no actual unique gameplay mechanics that can distinguish it as an actual genre, we should not list it here.

Does anyone have any dissenting opinions as to why it should stay?

2600:1700:46B0:EB30:54F3:AD75:9CF8:C313 (talk) 06:06, 21 June 2022 (UTC)

Factory builders?

What about games like Factorio and Shapez.io? They fall into their own genre, the factory builder, which was pioneered by Factorio 110.145.223.234 (talk) 03:26, 20 July 2022 (UTC)