CE Wiki

Categories ​

CE organizes all games on the site into six distinct groups, which we call categories. These include Action, Arcade, Bullet Hell, First Person, Platformer, and Strategy.

Categories exist to help people more easily find games that they might enjoy playing more, as well as keeping relatively similar skillsets contained within a similar set of games.

Action Action ​

Action refers to games in which combat is the primary focus and where engagement with enemies defines the difficulty.

Commonly associated genres include: Soulslikes, Beat 'em Ups, Traditional Fighting Games, and Action Adventure games.

Site examples include Dark Souls, Hades, Cuphead

Arcade Arcade ​

Arcade refers to a collection of loosely related sub-categories which we refer to as "R6" which stands for:

Arcade was originally used as a kind of dumping ground for anything that couldn't easily be put into the other categories, but more quickly became identified with rhythm and games where reflex and scoring are what defines the difficulty.

Arcade in a CE context does not mean anything that was found on an arcade cabinet, or more traditionally associated with arcade games like Shoot 'em Ups.

Bullet Hell BH ​

Bullet Hell includes any game that can be defined as a Shoot 'em Up, as well as any game where the primary element of gameplay is dodging an unmanageably large amount of on screen hazards.

Twin Stick Shooters are also sometimes included in Bullet Hell depending on how much dodging is a theme of gameplay.

Site examples include: The Touhou series, Geometry Wars 3, Star of Providence, Marimoth

First-Person FP ​

First Person refers to any games that are played from the first person perspective and in which you have free directional control over your character.

First Person Shooters are the largest block of games in this category, and First Person Platformers compose the next largest chunk.

First Person also typically includes VR games unless the theme of the VR game is strongly associated with another category such as Beat Saber.

Site examples include: DOOM Eternal, Neon White, Devil Daggers

Platformer Platty ​

Platformer refers to any games where difficulty is primarily based on mastering movement through a hazardous environment or from learning how to control your character effectively.

Generally speaking, platformers in CE follow a set of rules for inclusion:

  • Platformer games typically challenge the player by asking them to become familiar, comfortable, and or consistent with the physics, movement and environment. Usually requiring precision, memorization, or familiarity with difficult or non-traditional controls.
  • Some element of gravity must be affecting the player character, including situations where the player moves by controlling gravity itself (such as VVVVVV or Gravity Den).
  • The character must interact with surfaces as a primary element of gameplay.
    • Odium to the Core, for example, is a game where surface interaction is either non-existent or minimal. In these cases, a game may otherwise embody all of the characteristics of platformers, but are excluded on this rule.
  • Regardless of how non-traditional movement may be (awkward control simulators), as long as the gameplay is derived from navigating a hazardous environment or obstacles, or from learning to control your character effectively, it is still a platformer. This also applies to games where you cannot traditionally jump (Getting Over It and Stilt Fella).
  • Gameplay elements from another category cannot strongly outweigh the platforming characteristics.
    • For example, Kreedz Climbing is characteristically a platformer, but the First Person perspective overrides its category by default.
    • Similarly, there will be many Action Platformers where gameplay is more focused on combat than platforming such as Cuphead and Hollow Knight. Those games would be considered Action.
  • You must be in control of your character, and that character must be vulnerable in some way to the environment. Examples where this is relevant are cases where you control a stage (Super Monkey Ball), or you control an object that engages with the primary element of gameplay such as a paddle (Super High Ball). These may be considered Arcade Platformers.

Some commonly associated genres include 2D platformers, 3D platformers, Foddians, awkward control simulators, Metroidvanias (depending on how little gameplay depends on combat), marble games.

Site examples include: Super Meat Boy, Crash Bandicoot, Pogostuck: Rage With Your Friends

Strategy Stratty ​

Strategy refers to games where difficulty comes from challenging the player's ability to think through and respond to complex situations.

A strategy game on CE must not be guidable in the sense that a "solved" set of actions will guarantee a win. Learning and understanding the core concepts and interactions of the game is a large component.

Strategy games will typically require some form of RNG in order to be considered site worthy.
Any games where RNG is not present means it is likely solveable and or a guide can be used to give all future clears a free path to completion.

However, RNG cannot be so overwhelming that victory comes down to a matter of luck. As a rough rule of thumb, if the game would be unwinnable less than a quarter of the time to a person with infinite working knowledge of the game, then the RNG is potentially too overwhelming to be considered viable for CE.

This category usually includes games where you have as much time as needed to make consequential decisions. Although there are instances where time pressure may exist in a strategy game, the time component itself can't be what makes the game difficult.

Commonly associated genres include Deckbuilders, Grand Strategy, Traditional Roguelikes, Turn-Based, Resource Management.

Site examples include: Slay the Spire, FTL: Faster Than Light, Peggle Deluxe

FAQ ​

How do you decide where each game is categorised? ​

The category a game will be allocated to is typically intuitive enough, but there are some games where that is not the case.

While it doesn't cover all possible bases, when a game's category is not immediately clear, the following flowchart can be used to assist in determining a game's category placement.

Category decision flowchart

Is there any reason for the category ordering? ​

They are ordered alphabetically. Nothing deeper behind it than that.

Why do we specifically have these 6 categories? ​

Ultimately, the six categories aim to group games with similar characteristics. There have been proponents to the separation of particular sub-categories (eg: rhythm within Arcade), but equally there is beauty in conciseness.

The genre listings against games aims to assist in identifying core gameplay characteristics that a user may be seeking, with more granularity than that of the category level.