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What counts as a Block Stacking Game? Sticky

A topic by Cankyre created Jun 24, 2023 Views: 121 Replies: 3
Viewing posts 1 to 3
Host (1 edit)

Hey there, We had a discussion on our Discord Server about whether some games are Block Stacking Games or not. So now let’s, quite arbitrarily, define what we want to include as a BSG. Here are some game examples:

Games that are BSGs

  • Tetris
  • Tricky Tower
  • Puyo Puyo
  • Lumines
  • Some parts of Art Of Balance, though not Everything

Games that are NOT BSGs

  • Stack (thingy by Ketchapp)
  • Minecraft
  • Wilmot’s Warehouse
  • Jigsaw Puzzles

Now let’s take all the things in common between those games and define some ground rules:

  • The game must have blocks, we’ll call a block an object, whose colliding box is an assembly of regular convex polytopes (e.g. Square, Cube, Hypercube, Hexagon etc.)
  • The blocks must be stackable with one another: There is a mechanic which allows the player to assemble the blocks together in some way (don’t hesitate to comment a more specific definition)
  • The objective of the game must be to optimize a definite variable (general term) (e.g. Score, Speed, Number of moves etc.)
  • The game does not have a fixed, set, number of solutions: it is NOT a puzzle game.

Note: during the jam, we will stay flexible, as the point of this is to promote creativity. In other words, if you are a bit off-topic it’ll be fine, don’t worry :)

Host

Just reading this I realize Wilmot’s Warehouse has all the criterias, maybe it should count? What do you think?

I llike the game examples, to me they are really inspiring in terms of defining what BSG is.

Unfortunately unaware of Wilmot's Warehouse. What about Rodent's Revenge - I feel like those shouldn't be BSG.

Games like Go, Gomoku, Connect-4, Sokoban, are not BSGs, according to me :D .


Match-3

I think BSG is closely related to Match-3. I'd assume there is quite a significant overlap in the player-base that enjoys both genres.

- Bejeweled, Candy Crush, Zuma, Luxor are just match-3 and not BSG

Puzzle Bobble / Bust-a-Move style games ...?

Puyo, Dr. Mario, Vertrix combines the mechanics of BSG and match-3

- Panel Attack, Pokemon Puzzle Challenge - I always thought they are BSG but are they just match-3?

- Mr. Driller, some games where you click connected tiles with minimum size to remove them (titles?) - shares the gravity mechanic in some Tetris games so it feels a little bit BSG-ish.

Tetris

My initial perspective is that BSG is a very, very specific game type related to Tetris. Sure BSG doesn't have the word Tetris literally in it but it came from the Tetris community (I presume) and has a specific player-base. Just like in rogue-like games you don't have to be a rogue, the definition doesn't come literally from the words but also from social / historical reasons.

From that perspective, maybe games like Puyo PuyoDr. Mario are even only borderline BSG. The Tetris vs Puyo game brought the two together.

Host (1 edit)

Second this. Puyo Puyo and Dr. Mario ARE BSGs imo, but not the other match-3-like, because there is not really a stacking mechanic.