Video games come with a variety of styles that offer players with different gameplay experiences. Now, with new technology, new genres and sub-genres will most likely emerge as game developers continue to innovate. In this guide, I present to you an ultimate reference of video game genres. I’ve listed the game genres and subgenres to help gamers understand the type of gameplay they enjoy and the challenges that come with it. Please bear in mind that most of the games are a mix of two or more genres. The geek in me is sufficiently strong so it’s safe for me to tell you that I’ll be updating this list from time to time with new reference. As always, I welcome any feedbacks or suggestions to further improve this for everyone’s sake.
CONTENT
- Action
- Adventure
- Battle Royale
- Casual
- Fighting
- First-person Shooter (FPS)
- Massively Multiplayer Online Role-playing (MMORPG)
- Multiplayer Online Battle Arena (MOBA)
- Platformer
- Puzzle
- Role-Playing Games (RPG)
- Simulation
Action
Action games challenges players to get involved in fast-paced combat which require hand-eye coordination, precise timing, and reflexes where players anticipate enemy attack patterns. It involves elements of twitch gameplay, which test the players’ response time. The common theme in action games have a lot to do with heroism, power, strength, justice, revenge, redemption and overcoming adversity.
First-person shooters (FPS) such as Call of Duty or Counter-Strike and fighting games such as Mortal Kombat and Street Fighter require players to react quickly to shoot or attack their opponents.
Adventure
Adventure games focus on the storytelling and exploration aspects of the gameplay. It also involves getting players to solve puzzles and manage their resources by interacting with the people or the environment in the game. A pure adventure games tend to be non-confrontational and players can usually play at their own pace. Hence, adventure games are usually appealing to people who don’t normally play video games.
A pure adventure game is extremely rare these days. It has become mostly a sub-genre that is a part of a larger genre, typically Action or RPG.
Battle Royale
Battle royal games will have a large number of players, individually or in a team, compete against one another until one winning player or team emerge as winner by being the last one survives.
It blends action, survival and exploration in a quick manner. Players start off the game with minimal equipment. They have to scavenge for weapons and armors, eliminate opponents, finding safe zones, etc. Battle royale games typically have a time limit where the play zone will continue to shrinkg, forcing players to eliminate each other to be the last one standing.
Notable battle royale games are typically free-to-play such as PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds (PUBG), Fortnite Battle Royale, Garena Free Fire, Apex Legends, and Call of Duty: Warzone.
Casual
Casual games are simple games that are available mostly on mobile. Idle games and puzzle games mostly are considered casual games. It’s appealing to people who don’t usually play video games. They can easily pick it up as it’s easy to play. Most popular casual games involve element of matching items or tiles such as Candy Crush or finding hidden objects such as Hidden City or Criminal Case.
Fighting
Fighting games have players combat each other in a close-range, typically one-on-one or against a small group of enemies. The combat style here is mostly hand-to-hand combat based on various martial arts style. Fighting games are popular in arcade and console. Popular fighting games are Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat, and Tekken.
First-person Shooter (FPS)
First-person Shooter or FPS in short is a game where players play from the first visual perspective of the shooter. Players use firearms typically to eliminate enemies. While Doom and Wolfenstein popularized the FPS genre, they’re not the first games in the genre. Maze War which was created in the 1970s was the very first FPS game.
Massively Multiplayer Online Role-playing (MMORPG)
Massively multiplayer online role-playing games, or MMORPGs is an online multiplayer video game that allow thousands or more players to occupy the game environment, typically in an open-world setting, simultaneously. Players get to create and customize their characters, team up with friends or other players online, explore the maps, raid dungeons, and participate in PvE or PvP battles.
MMORPG is by far the most popular game genre for decades since the launch of World of Warcraft. Most serious gamers would have played in this genre one way or another. Other popular titles include Guild Wars 2, Black Desert Online, Final Fantasy XIV, Once Human and more.
As long as the game developers are still updating the game and launching DLCs for their titles, MMORPGs can be played for years or even over a decade. Most of the titles mentioned earlier have been around for a long time.
Multiplayer Online Battle Arena (MOBA)
Multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) is like a mash-up between MMORPG and real-time strategy games. Players get to control one character with a set of abilities to be part of a team where they battle their opponents from another team to conquer their base. Players cannot customize their characters (commonly known as “heroes” or “champions”) like they do in MMORPG but they can purchase available skins or cosmetics when made available by the game developers.
MOBA games are also the favoured genre played in esports. Popular titles in this genre are none others than League of Legends, Warcraft III, Dota 2 and Mobile Legends: Bang Bang.
Platformer
Platform games feature 2D side-scrolling environments where players run, jump and climb from one platforms to another. The gameplay of platformers involve players overcoming obstacles such as objects where they will jump or climb over to avoid. Sometimes they may also come across enemies where they need to fight or shoot. A slightly more complex one will have players solving puzzles to progress in the game.
In the early days of video game development, most of the games are platformers with Donkey Kong (1981) being one of the earliest popular one before Super Mario Bros (1985) came into the picture.
Puzzle
Puzzle games requires players to engage in logical and conceptual challenges through puzzle solving. While a lot of other genre of games may have some puzzles to solve or including it as mini-games, pure puzzle games typically adapt real-world puzzles such as Word Search, Trivia, Sudoku and many others. These games test players in terms of problem solving, sequence solving, pattern recognition, memory, logical deduction, and word completion.
Puzzle games are mostly played on mobile phones and can be considered casual games and most of the time, known as educational games. The level of puzzle gets higher and become more challenging as players progress in the game.
Role-Playing Games (RPG)
This is my favourite genre of all time! The origin of role-playing video games came from Dungeons & Dragons, known as the godfather of all RPGs. Players immerse themselves into the gameplay by assuming the role of the character. Throughout the game progression, players defeat enemies, overcome challenges, and collect resources as they level up. Players gain experience points, unlock abilities or obtain stronger weapons or magic spells.
In the early days, RPGs are mostly turn-based but most RPGs these days are played in real time and set in an open world map where players are allowed to roam free and explore various game locations. Some popular titles in RPGs are of course the Final Fantasy series, Legend of Zelda, Baldur’s Gate, The Witcher, and many more.
Simulations
Simulations, as its name implies, replicate real-world activities into the gameplay. More than just entertainment, some simulations are meant for training and education. There are a few sub-genres in simulations:
- Construction and management simulation: Players build, expand and manage cities or communities. They either play the role of a mayor or project manager. Their objectives include economic growth, citizen well-being, etc. You may have heard of SimCity, which is one of the most well-known game in this genre.
- Life simulation: Players live a “second life” in the virtual world. This subgenre allows players to build a life and relationships in the game ecosystem. A popular example is The Sims. There are, however, life simulations that allow players to experience life and survival in a different forms such as animals or other beings. Simulations like this can also be integrated as part of educational games. There are also more specific life simulations that focus on certain tasks such as fishing.
- Vehicle simulation: It’s widely used in the airline industry to train new pilots to operate an aircraft. Vehicle simulation for training purpose is set to be as realistic as possible. For entertainment purpose, Microsoft Flight Simulator is a game that allow players to experience controlling the aircraft, simulating the act of flying. Other vehicle simulations mostly include racing games.