Genres and tags for PlayDrop games
The required genre, optional subgenre, play mode, theme and mood tags a PlayDrop game can use, and how they place a game in browsing and search.
Tags place a game in PlayDrop's genre pages, filters, search and recommendations. Choose the few that describe it accurately; wrong tags show the game to players who leave quickly.
Rules
- Every game needs a genre: a
game-genre/…tag, ordesign.genreset to a genre or subgenre. - Tags are existing references written
group/tag, such asgame-subgenre/sudoku. Free-form tags are refused. - At most 20 unique tags per game.
- When you choose a subgenre, keep its broad genre too:
game-genre/puzzlewithgame-subgenre/sudoku.
{
"tags": ["game-genre/puzzle", "game-subgenre/sudoku", "game-feel/relaxed", "game-play-mode/daily-challenges"],
"design": { "genre": "game-subgenre/sudoku" }
}design.genre names the main category when a game fits several.
Genres (game-genre)
family action adventure arcade board card casino casual educational fps idle music platformer puzzle rpg racing
role-playing shooter simulation sports strategy tower-defense trivia wordSubgenres (game-subgenre)
brawler fighting obby endless-runner battle-royale open-world sandbox survival roguelike action-rpg escape-room
real-time-strategy turn-based-strategy deckbuilder tycoon city-builder life-sim farming clicker match-3 merge
bubble-shooter block-puzzle sorting jigsaw hidden-object 2048 sudoku solitaire mahjong chess checkers word-search
crossword driving drifting soccer basketball golf rhythm flying dress-up decorating cleaning-organizing incremental
collecting minesweeperHow you play (game-play-mode)
single-player 2-player multiplayer online-multiplayer local-multiplayer co-op couch-co-op 1v1 party-games
challenge-a-friend daily-challenges instant-games mobile-games controller-games social turn-based-multiplayerPlay mode tags describe the game for players; the play declarations (types, party, controller) in catalogue.json are what PlayDrop uses to start parties and controllers. Keep both consistent.
Themes (game-theme) and moods (game-mood)
fantasy sci-fi space horror zombies animals dinosaurs cars pirates superheroes memes cooking fashion robots numbers
pets
funny cute challenging story-driven asmrDesign aspects
Besides genre, the optional design object names one tag for each aspect of the game, written group/tag like other tags, for example "feel": "game-feel/relaxed". Each field accepts only its own group:
coreGameplay (core-gameplay): aim build collect defend dodge explore fly manage match merge platform race rhythm shoot solve sort survive
perspective (perspective): 2d-fixed-screen 2d-side-view 2d-top-down 2d-isometric 3d-first-person 3d-third-person 3d-top-down 3d-isometric
controls (game-controls): drag gamepad keyboard pointer swipe tap
visualStyle (visual-style): hand-drawn low-poly pixel-art realistic stylized
progression (game-progression): endless levels rounds score-chase story waves
feel (game-feel): chaotic cozy fast-paced playful relaxed snappy strategic tense weightyRead the live list
These lists change over time. A game can read the current tags with sdk.assets.tags.list() and sdk.assets.tags.get(groupSlug, tagSlug). An upload with an unknown tag is refused with a message naming it.