Genres and subgenres
The full taxonomy. Filter by family, era or whatever you need.
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Action
Games where you overcome physical challenges in real time: you react quickly, aim and coordinate what you see with what your hands do, often with little time to think.
Adventure
You progress by exploring places, talking to characters and solving puzzles with the items you pick up, and your reflexes do not matter. The challenge is understanding how the story's world works.
Incremental game
A game where you repeat a simple action, such as clicking, to gather a resource that you then invest in upgrades that produce it on their own, ever faster. Progress continues even when you are not playing, and the challenge is deciding what to invest in and when to reset in exchange for permanent bonuses.
Puzzle
You solve problems under fixed rules, such as arranging pieces, clearing a path or putting objects in place. The challenge lies mostly in working out the solution rather than in reflexes.
Role-playing
You take on the role of one or more characters defined by numbers (health, attack, skills) that grow as you explore the world and win battles. The challenge lies in deciding how they progress and how to make the most of what they can do in each situation.
Serious game
Games made with a main purpose other than entertainment: teaching, training, informing, persuading or supporting health. They use a game's rules and challenge as the means to that end.
Shooter
You attack from a distance with weapons that fire: the challenge is aiming quickly and accurately at enemies or targets while avoiding being hit.
Simulation
Games that model a real or fictional system (a city, an aircraft, a farm, a life) for you to run and watch respond to your decisions. The challenge is less about beating an opponent than understanding that system and keeping it going or making it grow.
Sports
You play a sport or compete in races: controlling an athlete, a team or a vehicle, or running a club from the manager's office. The challenge combines the sport's rules and tactics with your reflexes or your management.
Strategy
Games you win by thinking and planning rather than by reflexes. You manage resources, territory or units, anticipate what your rivals will do and decide how to use what you have, in turns or in real time.
Traditional games
Digital versions of games that exist off-screen and are played at a table, in an arcade or in a casino: board games, cards, gambling, pinball or quiz shows. The rules come from the original game; the computer acts as opponent, referee or table.
Visual novel
You read a story that moves forward line by line in a text box, over character art and backgrounds, and every so often you choose what to do or say. Your decisions take the story down different branches to one of several endings.