So I wrote this short little thing on Games as Art (Late to the Party)

[Magus]

I'm probably about a month late on this, but I was thinking about this in the shower this morning (do not ask me why, I can't even figure out why). If this would do better in a different forum from the games forum, mods, please move it where you think appropriate. Anyway, a story I heard on NPR a while ago came to my mind, combined with something about Which Way™books, so here goes:

----------------------

Roger Ebert has argued against video games as art, citing the interactive choices of the player altering the experience as rendering it “not art”. Despite the fact that everyone working on the project is an artist (be they a graphic designer, script writer, director, scenario director, etc.), the final culminated piece is “not art” because the player’s own choices affect the experience and “alter” it in unique ways.

Roger Ebert may have a problem with his definition of art, based on this recent exhibit at the Guggenheim:

Link (http://www.columbiaspectator.com/2010/02/04/guggenheim-show-exhibits-art-human-interaction)


…After loading up on vicarious thrill, the “participant,” as Sehgal labels each visitor, works his or her way up the first ramp, only to be greeted by a skipping, meditative, or intimidatingly precocious child, who introduces himself, the artist, and a rather grown-up question.

The little “tour guide,” Aidan is a quiet, but nonetheless daunting eight-year-old. Suddenly, he asks a question: “What is progress?” Replaying the query in my head, I hear an eerily adult voice emerging from his miniature mouth. I was struck by the thought-provoking question at a relatively unexpected time and place.

Halfway through my somewhat uninspired answer about “moving forward,” I thought to myself, “I am having a conversation about progress with an eight-year-old.” The shock factor was there, and yet it felt oddly stimulating and comfortable.

Soon, after Aidan and I had walked and talked up and around the breathtakingly empty space for some time, we came to a stop and met up with a teenager named Bob.

Aidan and Bob were nearly identical, so I immediately speculated that the children would “grow up” throughout the process, lending an added layer to the concept of progress. The exhibition prompted me to engage in such hyperactive, analytical thinking from the very beginning of, at the risk of sounding cliché, my journey.

Two Columbia students involved in the teenage group and enrolled in Higonnet’s class say that many visitors are initially uncertain. Rachel Solomon, CC ‘12, described some participants as “disoriented” or “confused,” while Danielle Dillon, BC ‘12, characterized them as “nervous.”

I undeniably fell in that category, as I was grasping for ideas to reconcile what was happening with what I expected of art. I soon learned, however, to expel all preconceived notions and just enjoy the invigoration that comes with talking to various intelligent, open, and unique people...

Emphasis added.

A visitor enters the museum, gives an impromptu answer to a child’s question, this child “actor” must then improvise a response based on that visitor’s unique answer, and then they move on through three more such experiences before leaving. If a person were to return and give a different answer, the experience would be different. Even if they gave the exact same answer a week down the road, the experience would be different. This exhibit is considered art despite the visitor’s interaction with it altering the experience significantly every time.

What is being done here is precisely what many modern video games do: create a work of art which the player then interacts with, altering the experience based on their own choices.

Another fundamental argument of Ebert’s is that video games are not art because they rules. This is true: even the most “open world” games such as GTA IV have rules based on physics, geography, and so on. You can’t walk through walls, if you run you car head on into a concrete pylon at 60 miles per hour you will be ejected through the windshield, and so forth. GTA has many of the “rules” of real life forced upon the player, whereas other games may have rules that are fantastical (ability to fly, etc.), but they are all pre-decided by the creators and your possible interactions with them are often pre-surmised by the creators. Games are more linear and stringent than we think: even though a particular experience may have been randomly generated by a computer algorithm interacting with your choices, it stands to reason that you won’t be able to do anything that is out of line with the basic “rules” the game creator has come up with, nor will you be able to advance in the plot the creator has designed for you to go through except through the channels they have decided (if it is possible to do this, the game is considered “broken”, i.e., you’ve done something the creators didn’t intend for, an element they overlooked that allows you to do this. It’s not something you’re supposed to be able to do). So even within what are supposedly your “choices”, the creators have often thought them out ahead of time and accounted for them in crafting their game. As gamers, we have less choices than we think.

Art, according to Ebert, does not have “rules” and an end objective to “beat” the game, besides the interactivity (which we must now ignore because of the Guggenheim exhibit). However, this brings to mind what are alternatively called Choose Your Own Adventure™, Which Way™, etc. books, which have multiple endings based on your choices. There is no particular way to “beat” a Which Way™ book. You make predefined choices and follow predefined plot lines to their conclusion, an ending, which may be “good” with your character achieving some good feat, or “bad”, with your character dying. There are clear “rules” to these books: when you reach an ending, you’re supposed to start over from the beginning and make different choices.

However, most of us “broke” these “rules” by leaving our finger in the page where we ran into the choice, just in case our decision led to us falling down in a pit and dying or being eaten by giant ants or whatever the case may be (these books ran through pretty much every genre of adventure fiction ever devised). We would then backtrack and attempt to get to a “good” ending, which had our character having a happy ending. In fact, some of these books told you to go back to an earlier page, as opposed to making you start over (a difference in the “rules” of each book). Would Ebert define these books as “art”? I believe he would have to. And what are video games but massively complex Which Way™ books with a hundred choices for each situation?

Games are similar to this. We can “backtrack” and make new choices which lead to achieving the objective of a “mission”. However with most games this objective is now to get to the end of the story (often a fairly linear path, as well). In GTA IV you may “beat” each mission (which are analogous to “complications” in the arc of a book or movie), but the end “goal” to “beat” the game is to get to the ending, to see the entire plot. And this ending is predefined by the creators, you have no say in it. So if it is a sad or bittersweet ending that comes at the end of the plot of numerous games (Max Payne 2, Metal Gear Solid 3, Shadow of the Colossus), we as the players have no say in making it a “good” ending. You can play through it as many times as you want and it will still not be a “good” ending, if we define this as a happy ending, you will simply get the ending. Even the complications are often far more choreographed than we think. The earlier example of the Max Payne series comes to mind, with heavily choreographed gun battles which are not quite as “random” or “interactive” as we the player think they are. And all games have set pieces, which are often described as “cinematic” because you are kept to a heavily linear path through them.

There is no real “beating” of modern games, there is only seeing the plot through to the end, much like a good movie or book. That there are challenges that we interact with to get to this ending is not a detriment to games being art, it simply makes them a different form of art, possibly even more enjoyable, depending on a person’s own tastes. That this is also interactive does not keep it from being art, as illustrated in the Guggenheim exhibit. We can argue over the quality of this art, but it does not preclude it from being art. Quite simply, games are art.

-------------------

My apologies to anyone who has already brought up Which Way™ books or even the Guggenheim exhibit in past arguments, I just now remembered hearing about that exhibit on NPR one day and this morning went "blast, that would be an incredibly good argument against Ebert's annoying 'video games are not art' statements."

[Amake]

Way to expel your preconceived notions there, Roger. Well, he seems to be trying anyway.

So what is progress? That's an interesting question I think. The word for it in Swedish means "steps forward" while etymologically I'd say it means "fore-way". Pretty much the same idea. It implies a beneficial direction. It's the nature of all living things, I suppose, to want to move on, to grow forward, upward, outward and onward through time. It can become a problem when you get too good at it though, wiz. human civilization. Just some thoughts.

[Lumenskir]

Interesting, but first a few deflations I came up with while reading.
Despite the fact that everyone working on the project is an artist (be they a graphic designer, script writer, director, scenario director, etc.)
Quite simply, games are art.
Everyone working on a movie is also an artist, but this does not mean that Epic Movie (which has writers, cinematographers, directors, etc.) is art. I'll address this just below, but while Ebert is wrong in saying that videogames cannot be art ever, taking as gospel the opposite of this thought (all videogames are art) is just as wrong, unless you stretch the definition of art to encompass any vaguely artistic endeavor, in which case everything is art and then the word doesn't mean anything.
Would Ebert define these books as “art”? I believe he would have to.
Ebert is a world-renowned movie critic, so I think it's safe to assume that he loves movies. However, when asked, even he admitted that only a few films are worthy, to him, of being called art. With that being said, I think you presenting an example of a subgenre of something he admitted is art would not cause him to overlook the shitty writing almost all Choose-Your-Own-Adventure books and call all of them art.

I think what's being lost in the kerfluffle over Ebert's words is that he's wrong about one big macro thing, but taking the complete opposite view isn't right. He contends that videogames as a medium can never be art, but I think what he's truly saying is that they can never be considered an artform, the way movies and books and music and television (and etc) can, which is undeniably wrong, but not unexpected of someone in his position. I admire and respect Ebert's views on movies, but I wouldn't say he's a great prognosticator, because no one really is. It's much too easy to look at the current present and extrapolate the future based on what you can immediately see, and when all you see is junk it's easy to assume it'll remain that way forever, especially because you can't think of a way to solve/correct it.* What's important to remember in this position is that it's not your job to fix it; It's up to future artists to figure out a way to fully utilize the medium's potential.

*A great example of this is to go back 20 or 30 years to see what people were saying about the future of television. Even David Mamet, who I consider one of the greatest writers (screen or otherwise) alive, couldn't conceive of television being anything other than a waste of time, because when you're surrounded by Three's Company-s it's hard to imagine that something like The Wire will one day come along and justify the format.

[Magus]

Three's Company is art, it's just not "high art" or "great art" or maybe even "good art". Epic Movie was also (and this pains me)...art. There was clearly some semblance of an attempt at acting within its hellish environs, or perhaps even a story. It is absolutely the trashiest of art. Hell, most things ARE art, whether it be someone's design for a car or a building or whatever, if it has any aesthetic purpose behind it (this wouldn't include anything, some things are built entirely for function, after all). If Ebert doesn't think video games are good art, he should just say so. Most of them are entirely for entertainment purposes, just like most movies which he doesn't consider art (or good art, if he doesn't want to sound wrong.)

Oh, and Queen, Ebert didn't write that article, I just bolded that part because it seemed like something Ebert should do or try to keep in mind as he relegates entire swaths of artistic endeavors to the trash bin. Someone was experiencing something new which was considered art and instead of falling back on their preconceived notions of art they were trying to keep an open mind. Everyone should do that, otherwise our urinals will never be water fountains. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcel_Duchamp#Readymades)

[Lumenskir]

Three's Company is art, it's just not "high art" or "great art" or maybe even "good art". Epic Movie was also (and this pains me)...art. There was clearly some semblance of an attempt at acting within its hellish environs, or perhaps even a story. It is absolutely the trashiest of art. Hell, most things ARE art, whether it be someone's design for a car or a building or whatever, if it has any aesthetic purpose behind it (this wouldn't include anything, some things are built entirely for function, after all).
See, I just can't personally subscribe to this viewpoint. Movies and television and so on are artforms (mediums capable of creating art), but to say that anything that isn't a tool (or whatever "things built entirely for function" entails) is then art is just way too broad. If you have varying levels of high-->low art, why not slash a line at some point close to the 'high' mark and shunt everything below it to 'not art but entertainment'.
If Ebert doesn't think video games are good art, he should just say so. Most of them are entirely for entertainment purposes, just like most movies which he doesn't consider art (or good art, if he doesn't want to sound wrong.)
But's that not his problem; He doesn't think the entire medium is even up for consideration as an artform (as in, not capable of ever making something artistic), not just that it isn't good. Showing that someone else reconsidered art doesn't really compel Ebert to reshape his worldview, especially since the bigger problem is the fact that 99% of games, and all of the most successful ones, don't really present the medium as anything other than a mishmash of interactive elements strung together with stolen movie and novel tricks, rather than anything that employs the unique elements of videogames intrinsically to explore a theme. It's understandable that he'd assume the trend would continue, just like Mamet thought TV would never escape being disposable commercial time sucks. They're both wrong, but given the evidence, understandable.

[Magus]

why not slash a line at some point close to the 'high' mark and shunt everything below it to 'not art but entertainment'.

It makes you sound like a know-it-all, I guess. Yeah, I get it, he's a critic, it's his job to be a know-it-all and define what is good, but I don't think it's his job to define what is art. But anyway, if his position is that only good art is art then I misunderstood his basic position somewhat. But yeah, that he believes the entire medium is incapable of sustaining art seems extreme, and it seems like the kind of position you take when you don't have an open mind about what constitutes art.

As for "things that exist only for function", I don't know, tools is a good start, like a bulldozer, or anything which is not specifically designed to be aesthetically pleasant in some way. Like one guy could make a toaster and it wouldn't be art, another guy could make a toaster that looked exactly the same but he intended it to fit in with a specific decor pleasingly and be nice on the eyes and it would then be art. You can say that is too vague for categorizing things as art but I'm not sure why we need to put art in a little box. If it can range from architecture to fashion it seems pretty broad anyway, so the question is why can't Ebert include video games in his definition? Because he wants to define art as something specific when it's incredibly broad.

[Amake]

Ah, I should have known it was too much like a genuine revelation to come from Ebert. Well, as I've said before in related topics, audience participation starts when you open your mouth to share an idea, it's impossible to have a work of art that isn't experienced differently depending on who experiences it. (Or when or where or why or with whom.) Games are not different because they put a controller in your hand, they're different because Ebert says so.

Also the rules argument is crap. I'm pretty sure there's a rule against me eating the Mona Lisa, however vital that may be to my objective of experiencing the painting.*

Meanwhile I have to point out Epic Movie got a few chuckles from me. Meet the Spartans is the real bottom of the barrel of unfunny, cheap-assed, meaningless, not-even-so-bad-it's-awful-it-just-sits-there-about-as-blank-as-a-last-stage-Alzheimer-patient movies not even trying to recreate memorable scenes from other movies but settling for recreating unremarkable moments from piss-poor low budget comatose uninteresting what-the-hell-is-wrong-with-the-world-that-even-one-of-these-shows-gets-watched reality TV.

Now, I thought I'd conclude by being forced to admit that it's nonetheless art, but on reflection it might fail even the most liberal definitions. No creativity has been put into it, no will to make something new that wasn't in the world before - it doesn't have any original or even parodied characters or plot points. It's not the result of an act not immediately related to surviving or improving one's situation - it's a blatant cash grab. It doesn't make anyone proud to be human, quite the reverse. It's not an attempt to look at anything from a new perspective, or giving anyone a new perspective. The production values are so low it's questionable if even the physical effort or craft involved in making it account for anything. It's made for the a very obvious function of making the audience pay for a ticket and grunt in recognition. If they made more movies like this, maybe Ebert would question movies as a valid art form?

[Kim]

If you have varying levels of high-->low art, why not slash a line at some point close to the 'high' mark and shunt everything below it to 'not art but entertainment'.

Because what is high art is subjective. No matter how certain you are that something is low art, someone could come along with their own interpretation of it that, at least to them, makes it high art. What gives you the authority to tell them that they're wrong? You can argue whether or not it is, but ultimately it's in the eye of the beholder. I think Ebert trying to define what is or is not art is putting himself on too high a pedestal.

[Jagos]

Roger Ebert (http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/2010/04/video_games_can_never_be_art.html) is pretty smart (http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070721/COMMENTARY/70721001).

He is saying that games (http://www.torontosun.com/entertainment/videogames/2010/04/20/13652396.html) can't be art because " they are bound by rules, points, objectives and achievements. When rules and objectives are eliminated, "it ceases to be a game and becomes a representation of a story, a novel, a play, dance a film. Those are things you cannot win; you can only experience them."

I think a lot of people got a knee jerk reaction to his words. Granted, games may not be an artform right now, but it doesn't mean they can't expand into that view.

Almost every game out there gets attributed to a few specific genres. Even off the top of my head if I do think of a few special games (Guitar Hero, Chrono Trigger or even Flower (http://www.cnet.com.au/flower-339290757.htm)) they represent a goal or objective to complete, not necessarily a story advancing the state of gaming.

Not like that's the huge thing. We still play games to enjoy them. Why do we need them defined as high art when that's not their purpose in the first place?

[Kim]

He is saying that games can't be art because " they are bound by rules, points, objectives and achievements. When rules and objectives are eliminated, "it ceases to be a game and becomes a representation of a story, a novel, a play, dance a film.This is nonsense. I could point out several of instances where the rules are what made a game art. By this backwards logic, a film is just a representation of a story. If that's the case, and that's why games can't be art, then I declare that no film is art.

I think a lot of people got a knee jerk reaction to his words.Seeing as there's really no way to interpret his behavior other than "Roger Ebert is being a massive troll," I can't say I blame them.

games may not be an artform right nowThey are.

We still play games to enjoy them.The same can be said of any artistic medium.

Why do we need them defined as high art when that's not their purpose in the first place?

I've played several games that I feel were designed to be art in the first place.

Why care if a painting is high art? A poem? A movie? A song?

Art needs to be appreciated.

Being seen as art encourages discussion from that angle.

Etc.

[Lumenskir]

If they made more movies like this, maybe Ebert would question movies as a valid art form?
They've made plenty of movies like it, and some almost as bad. They don't somehow diminish the truly great films just because they were made in the same medium.
Because what is high art is subjective. No matter how certain you are that something is low art, someone could come along with their own interpretation of it that, at least to them, makes it high art.
While I do believe that the gradient between high and low art is subjective, I think it's pretty easy to concede that there's a vast gulf between works that attempt to use a medium to explore a theme (or whatever else it takes for you to consider something high art) and works that exist to get money/solely entertain. Ke$ha and Antlers are both on my iPod, and I can get entertained by both, but to say that Animal (an album about getting drunk at clubs) is an artistic record is an insult to the care and work that went into making Hospice (an album that so masterfully uses music and lyrics to explore the death of a loved one that I usually end up crying by the final song).
Granted, games may not be an artform right now, but it doesn't mean they can't expand into that view.
They are an artform, it's just that almost none of the games on offer aspire to anything more than entertainment, so Ebert assumes this trend will continue forever after.
We still play games to enjoy them. Why do we need them defined as high art when that's not their purpose in the first place?
People aren't (or shouldn't be) getting up in arms because they need the games around right now defined as high art (which none of them are), they just don't want the entire potential future of the medium tossed aside so casually. If you ghettoize the entire field it just gives future designers free reign to underperform or just not aim high, because fuck it, games are intrinsically unable to be art amirite?

And your 'purpose in the first place' statement doesn't really make any sense. Television's original purpose was to keep people's eyes glued to the screen long enough so they could see the soap ads, and you can find similarly mercenary or low goals in any medium's origins.

[Magus]

Roger Ebert (http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/2010/04/video_games_can_never_be_art.html) is pretty smart (http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070721/COMMENTARY/70721001).

He is saying that games (http://www.torontosun.com/entertainment/videogames/2010/04/20/13652396.html) can't be art because " they are bound by rules, points, objectives and achievements. When rules and objectives are eliminated, "it ceases to be a game and becomes a representation of a story, a novel, a play, dance a film. Those are things you cannot win; you can only experience them."

I think a lot of people got a knee jerk reaction to his words. Granted, games may not be an artform right now, but it doesn't mean they can't expand into that view.

Almost every game out there gets attributed to a few specific genres. Even off the top of my head if I do think of a few special games (Guitar Hero, Chrono Trigger or even Flower (http://www.cnet.com.au/flower-339290757.htm)) they represent a goal or objective to complete, not necessarily a story advancing the state of gaming.

Not like that's the huge thing. We still play games to enjoy them. Why do we need them defined as high art when that's not their purpose in the first place?

I already attempted to point out that the goal of most games nowadays is no longer to "beat" or "win" them with a high score but to see the plot come to fruition, whatever the ultimate end to that plot may be. It could be your entire team getting executed or whatever.

You could argue that the "goal" of Chrono Trigger was to prevent the planet from being destroyed, but really that is not what we as players are particularly tasked with, we play through a bunch of turn-based battles and so on. I can envision CT's plot playing out regardless of whether or not I push some buttons and make some choices (although CT shows the strength of the interactive medium by having their be multiple plots and endings), but Pac-Man exists solely in the realm of my choices as far as how many pellets Pac-Man gets to eat before he is eaten by ghosts.

They don't need to be defined as "high art". I'm fine with someone who says they are "low" or "bad" art. To say they are not art at all doesn't seem to make sense. You have to remember this is something Ebert started. He said video games are not art. He has to defend that position and has pretty much failed to at this point.

As for the basic idea of defining some things as art and some things as not art based on their quality, here is why this can't and shouldn't work:

http://img15.imageshack.us/img15/185/monalisaq.jpg

A person would have to define the Mona Lisa as art, if only based on the overwhelming force of human opinion, but it appears to be of "high quality", so I guess it is art.

http://img138.imageshack.us/img138/7616/5cpublish5cworksimages5.jpg

Is it art?

http://img149.imageshack.us/img149/7183/cavepainting.jpg

Is it art?

http://img690.imageshack.us/img690/3129/kids3large.gif

Is it art?

Ebert should stick to saying things are good or bad art, not if they are art or not.

[Kim]

The bottom is the most artistic because, of the pictures presented, it gives me the most freedom of interpretation.

It is a statement about Man's loneliness in an uncaring world.

[Magus]

No, no it is a post-apocalyptic scene, the surfer represents Jesus coming to sweep the faithful off to heaven, represented by the sun.

[Kim]

No, the sun represents joy, and how it may appear close at times, but is in truth unreachable.

The surfer represents the happiness found only by those too ignorant to realize this basic truth. That's why the surfer is drawn "closer" to the sun.

[Magus]

I'm more interested in how the artist has created the sense of dynamic movement with a diagonal composition but which is still grounded in the here-and-now with a horizontal base:

http://img692.imageshack.us/img692/6245/kidart.jpg

[Kim]

I'm really impressed with his creative use of a limited palette.

[Magus]

I'm not so sure, the use of orange in the absence of peach in the composition of Caucasians is not particularly revolutionary...however if the figure represented is not intended to be Caucasian my judgment of his genius may change greatly.

[Kim]

I think he's supposed to be sunburnt. Perhaps a reflection on how harsh the world can be?

[Lumenskir]

Just gonna bypass the hilarious discussion going on-

I already attempted to point out that the goal of most games nowadays is no longer to "beat" or "win" them with a high score but to see the plot come to fruition, whatever the ultimate end to that plot may be. It could be your entire team getting executed or whatever.
I'm just gonna say that playing a game to see the 'plot' come to fruition is probably the worst reason to buy or play a game. If you want to experience a good story, why not watch a movie or read a book, almost all of which have better and more concise plots and stories than videogames, and none of which require you to perform tasks in order to experience the stories?
You have to remember this is something Ebert started. He said video games are not art. He has to defend that position and has pretty much failed to at this point.
He has failed in the sense that his perception of art doesn't match up to yours/the definition of somebody you found on the internet? Because, shit, in that definition, you fail because your perception of art doesn't match up to mine, and you're being ridiculous in your defense of your perception (because your defense isn't "I automatically submit to your definition).
As for the basic idea of defining some things as art and some things as not art based on their quality
I don't think I or Ebert has said anything about quality. If anything, it's more about intention and meaning. Can you find a game out there (besides maybe Shadow of the Collosus and Another World) that actually has a deeper theme it's using the medium of videogames to explore? Or, more likely, can you find almost any game that was made solely to give the purchaser a few new puzzles or game mechanics to play with for the length of the game (most lengths being extended with 'stories' that only serve to buffer empty spaces between gameplay sections) without any deeper meaning?

Again, this is not solely a videogame phenomenon. ER and CSI don't have deeper themes, but they've given millions of people pleasure and entertainment. People aren't clamoring to call them art just because they were made and aren't hammers. It's ok to admit that not everything is art, that not everything is something special or deep. It's not ok to say that an artform will forever remain the realm of the artless.

[Kim]

I'm just gonna say that playing a game to see the 'plot' come to fruition is probably the worst reason to buy or play a game. If you want to experience a good story, why not watch a movie or read a book, almost all of which have better and more concise plots and stories than videogames, and none of which require you to perform tasks in order to experience the stories?Augh...

Just.... aaaaaaauuuuuuuuggggggggggghhhhhhhhhh...

1. The involvement of the player allows for a story experience that would be impossible to get in any other artistic medium.

2. Games can make you feel things that other artistic mediums can not.

3. Because video games allow the player to experience longer, more complex stories than would be available in other forms of entertainment, without it being restricted to mere prose. It ultimately works because games are not designed to be experience in one sitting, and the combination of gameplay and story can, when well paced, deliver both an enjoyable story experience and an enjoyable gameplay experience, without either being sacrificed for the other.

4. Because a story where the person experiencing it has some impact on how events unfold, especially when well executed, will mean more to that person.

5. Because you get a different variety of stories than you would in other forms of entertainment.

6. Because any number of things that it didn't occur to me to add into this post.

EDIT: AAAAAAAAUUUUUUUUUGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHH

[Lumenskir]

I'm gonna say that I agree with everything you say NonCon, but the point still stands that a vast majority (all but one or two or maybe a handful I haven't personally played) don't realize those points. Instead, the stories are doled out piecemeal in between level grinding (or just levels) instead of intrinsically becoming the actual story itself. So when you say that you're playing a modern game for the 'story', you're really just playing for the cutscenes that show a bunch of characters talking/doing stuff you the player can't do, until you resume control and do puzzles and gameplay to reach the next piece of story being doled out in a subpar movie or block of poorly written text.

I personally think that videogames are suffering from the scourge of storytelling. Designers are so worried about the players having any amount of confusion over what they're motivation is that they make 'stories' and scenarios that leave absolutely no doubt for the player. You'll always know that you have to do (because games are rule and outcome based, and we as players need to know what outcome we should be aiming for) to the point that any subtle signpost tends to get blown up into a giant set of railroads. Forget 'show, don't tell' when you're dealing with people who believe their audience only wants 'tell tell tell'.

That's why things like SotC and Another World are such wonders, things approaching high art. There's only enough tell to point you towards the right path. The majority of the story in SotC is you the player finding the monsters, killing them, and witnessing the horrific aftermath, with minimal authorial voice informing you that you should be ashamed or terrified of what you're doing. It actually has a theme it's exploring through its medium, and it's only realized by the player actually playing the game, rather than the designer telling you through an NPC (*cough* Bioshock *cough*). Another World is similar, but vastly beyond, since it has much fewer places where the character loses control.

[Kim]

SMT Strange Journey put me into difficult moral dilemmas and ultimately made me feel guilty about the alignment I sided with, in spite of the fact that I was siding with what I thought was good.

Prince of Persia 2008, a game I personally hated, managed to make me feel a sense of loss about a character with gameplay rather than a cutscene.

Contact managed to turn my normal treatment of video game characters against me in its last moments.

Both Persona 4, Mass Effect 2, and Dragon Age: Origins left how well most of the characters in the game were fleshed out up to me, and encouraged me to get to know them all through the gameplay.

The Mother trilogy used its reliance on fairly standard jRPG mechanics to turn them on their head and make the endings of all three games more fulfilling and emotionally powerful by doing so.

Bioshock gave you complete control over your actions for almost the entirety of the story, and that made the scene where you had no control over your actions more powerful.

Etc.

These are all things I have never seen outside of video games. I've never seen an equivalent outside of video games. I could come up with plenty more examples. To say that video games can never be art is ridiculous. To say they aren't art right now is ignoring so many brilliant things only possible in an interactive medium.

[Magus]

Meh, we're arguing about nothing, really. Lumenskir only considers really good attempts at art to be art, whereas I say they're all art but some are bad and some are good, whatever. Same difference, if you use the term "high art" or "art" and they seem interchangeable between different people. We all agree games are an artform and can be art, even if we disagree on which have reached it, or if any.

At least we agree on Shadow of the Colossus, and I've heard great things about Another World, too, that's the cel-shaded one for the SNES right? Out of this World, it's called in the U.S., related to the game Flashback. Mother 3 is art, too, and I'll throw in Max Payne 2, let's call it day.

By the way, yes, we are totally hilarious! This is obvious.

[Jagos]

Maybe we're looking at it wrong...

What games, are the best in the form of art?

For convenience, I'll list a few:

Metal Gear Solid - Pacing, story...

Earthbound series - Though it never quite looked the best, it told a great story in all 3 games.

Chrono Trigger - Stated above, great art, story...

Ico - For sheer art in to the nth degree...

Flower - stated above, and shot down:

"Flower". A run-down city apartment has a single flower on the sill, which leads the player into a natural landscape. The game is "about trying to find a balance between elements of urban and the natural." Nothing she shows from this game seemed of more than decorative interest on the level of a greeting card. Is the game scored? She doesn't say. Do you win if you're the first to find the balance between the urban and the natural? Can you control the flower? Does the game know what the ideal balance is?

Braid - This was actually shot down by Ebert:

This is a game "that explores our own relationship with our past...you encounter enemies and collect puzzle pieces, but there's one key difference...you can't die." You can go back in time and correct your mistakes. In chess, this is known as taking back a move, and negates the whole discipline of the game. Nor am I persuaded that I can learn about my own past by taking back my mistakes in a video game. She also admires a story told between the games levels, which exhibits prose on the level of a wordy fortune cookie.


What I'm trying to figure out is what would make the games high art? Would it be the graphics or the gameplay?

[Kim]

Fragile Dreams is art. It's pretty, and uses a post-apocalyptic world to tell a tale about finding someone, and also some stuff about communication. Very good on an emotional level, and the little short stories in there are fantastic.


What I'm trying to figure out is what would make the games high art? Would it be the graphics or the gameplay?

I think things can be art for different reasons. I wouldn't say there's one general reason something is art.