The Vault · Genres
Genres
Game genres, subgenres, and design movements.
40 articles
4X Strategy
Explore, expand, exploit, exterminate
The strategy genre defined by four key activities: explore the map, expand your territory, exploit resources, and exterminate opponents—epitomised by Civilization.
Action RPG
Real-time character growth
Action RPGs combine role-playing progression systems with real-time combat, from Zelda II through Diablo to the modern looter-shooter.
Arcade Adventure
Britain's own genre, and one with no modern name
Exploration and puzzle-solving driven by arcade controls, not a text parser: Atic Atac, Knight Lore, Head Over Heels. A category the British press used constantly and which modern taxonomies have quietly dissolved.
Arcade Game
Not where it was played — how it played
On home machines, 'arcade game' named a style, not a venue: immediate, reflex-driven, score-chasing action with no reading and no waiting. The broadest genre word in the period press.
Art Games
Games as artistic expression
Art games prioritise aesthetic experience, emotional expression, and meaning over traditional gameplay mechanics, challenging definitions of what games can be. Also called experimental games; the two labels were used interchangeably.
Beat 'em Up
Walk right, punch everyone
Beat 'em ups send players through scrolling stages punching waves of enemies, from Double Dragon to Streets of Rage to modern revivals.
Console FPS
Shooters on the sofa
Console first-person shooters adapted PC precision gaming for controllers, creating distinct design philosophies around aim assist, level design, and multiplayer.
Console RPG
Living room adventures
Console RPGs adapted computer role-playing for living room play, prioritising accessibility and storytelling over simulation complexity, becoming Japan's dominant RPG form.
First-Person Shooter
Through the gun barrel
First-person shooters place players behind the barrel of a gun, creating intimate combat experiences that evolved from Wolfenstein 3D's corridors to modern competitive esports.
Flight Sim
Aircraft, spacecraft, and the pleasure of a long manual
Simulated flight, from combat aircraft to trading spacecraft. One of the few home-computer genres that traded reflexes for study, and a genre that made a virtue of complexity when everything else was shedding it.
God Games
Divine simulation
God games place players in positions of supreme power over simulated worlds and populations, from Populous to Black & White.
Graphic Adventure
The parser gets a picture, then loses the parser
Adventure games that show you the room. Beginning as illustrated text adventures and ending as fully point-and-click, the graphic adventure charts the slow replacement of typing with pointing.
Horror Games
Interactive dread
Horror games evolved from text adventures through survival horror to streaming phenomena, using interactivity's unique properties to create fear that passive media cannot match.
Immersive Sim
Player-driven possibility
The immersive sim genre prioritises player agency and emergent gameplay, letting systemic interactions create unique solutions rather than prescribing singular paths through designed challenges.
JRPG
Japanese role-playing games
JRPGs developed distinct conventions from Western RPGs: linear narratives, turn-based combat, predetermined protagonists, and emotional storytelling that defined a genre loved worldwide.
Management Game
Spreadsheets that fight back
Running something — a football club, a city, a theme park, a software house — through budgets and decisions, not direct control. Britain's own strand of it turned the football manager into a national institution.
Maze Game
One screen, four ghosts, and a great many imitators
Navigate a maze, collect its contents, avoid what hunts you. Pac-Man defined the form so completely that the British 8-bit market produced hundreds of variations, and the press needed a word for all of them.
Metroidvania
Explore, acquire, return
Metroidvania describes games combining exploration with ability-gated progression, named after Metroid and Castlevania: Symphony of the Night.
MMORPGs
From MUDs to millions
The evolution of massively multiplayer online role-playing games from text-based MUDs through graphical worlds like Ultima Online and EverQuest to the phenomenon of World of Warcraft.
MUDs
Text-based multiplayer worlds
Multi-User Dungeons pioneered online multiplayer gaming, creating persistent worlds, social dynamics, and design patterns MMORPGs would later adopt.
Music Games
Play the music
Music games evolved from rhythm matching to full-band simulation, creating a genre that made everyone feel like musicians before market saturation caused its dramatic collapse.
Platformer
The art of jumping
Platform games challenge players to navigate levels through jumping, climbing, and precise movement, defining gaming from Donkey Kong through modern indie revivals.
Portable Gaming
Gaming on the go
Portable gaming evolved from simple LCD games through Game Boy dominance to sophisticated handhelds, creating a distinct market with different design priorities.
Racing Game
Driving games, racing games, and the road that came toward you
Getting somewhere fast, against a clock or a field. The period press used 'driving game' and 'racing game' more or less interchangeably, covering everything from sprite-scaled coin-ops to serious circuit simulation.
Racing Simulation
Virtual motorsport
Racing simulations prioritise realistic physics and authentic motorsport experience over arcade accessibility, demanding precision and practice.
Rail Shooters
On-rails action
Rail shooters move players through environments automatically while they focus on shooting targets, from light gun arcade games to spectacle-driven modern entries.
Roguelike
Death and rebirth
The roguelike genre emerged from Rogue's procedural dungeons and permadeath, spawning purist tradition and modern roguelite evolution that influenced countless games.
RTS Genre
Real-time warfare
Real-time strategy emerged from Dune II's template, dominated the 1990s PC landscape, spawned esports, then declined as MOBAs captured competitive audiences.
Shoot 'em Up
The most-used genre word in the British computer press
The dominant action genre of the 8- and 16-bit era: fly, shoot, dodge, repeat. From Space Invaders through R-Type and Uridium to the bullet-hell descendants, and the term the period press reached for more than any other.
Simulation Games
Systems to master
Simulation games modelled complex systems—cities, theme parks, civilisations—giving players godlike control and emergent storytelling through interacting mechanics.
Single-Screen Platformer
One screen, infinite challenge
Single-screen platformers contain entire levels within one fixed view, from Donkey Kong to Bubble Bobble to modern puzzle-platformers.
Sports Games
Virtual athletics
Sports games evolved from abstract representations to licensed simulations, becoming gaming's most commercially reliable genre through annual releases and real-world authenticity.
Survival Games
Fight to live another day
Survival games challenge players to gather resources, craft tools, and endure hostile environments, from Minecraft to DayZ to Valheim.
Survival Horror
Terror through scarcity
Survival horror combined limited resources, vulnerable protagonists, and atmospheric dread to create gaming's most effective horror genre, codified by Resident Evil and evolved through Silent Hill.
Tactical RPG
Strategy meets story
Tactical RPGs combine grid-based strategy combat with RPG character progression, from Fire Emblem to Final Fantasy Tactics to XCOM.
Text Adventure
Worlds built from words
Text adventures created entire worlds through prose and parser, challenging players to solve puzzles by typing commands in the days before graphics.
Tycoon Games
Build your empire
Tycoon games put players in charge of building and managing business empires, from theme parks to railroads to hospitals.
Walking Simulator
Games without gameplay?
Walking simulators prioritise exploration and narrative over traditional gameplay mechanics, sparking debates about what constitutes a game while creating profound interactive experiences.
Wargame
Hex maps, supply lines, and an unhurried audience
Military conflict simulated at the level of units and terrain, not individual action. The computer wargame inherited its rules, its audience and its typography from the tabletop, and kept them long after the rest of gaming moved on.
Western RPG
Player-defined heroes
Western RPGs prioritise player agency and character customisation, letting players define who they are rather than following predetermined protagonists through authored stories.