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| " …although, and this is really only going to serve to confuse the matter, but I have to be fair, a film of that chess game would be… |
Obviously you’re anticipating this, but from what I gather, you’re saying the experience of playing the game is not art, but that a potential recording of that game could be. Not unlike The King of Kong, correct?
Or The Hustler, or Bang the Drum Slowly, or Cockfighter…
Final Fight’s ending was one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen.
Cody + Jessica 4 EVA!
There may be an argument to be made that true art under these definition involves an artist presenting a viewpoint, narrative and ideology.
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| Originally Posted by Phil View Post Or The Hustler, or Bang the Drum Slowly, or Cockfighter… |
Wait, I’m not trying to say that. Anybody knows a sporting event can be made into a riveting film. Video games have only recently had a legitimate inroad into that arena, and that’s only after a 30+ year history.
Nice peice Devin, excellent job. Very comprehensive, and clearly laid out.
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| Are narrative games actually subsets of cinema with a gimmick layer of ‘game’ as opposed to games with a gimmick layer of cinema? The answer I have for that is yes, in the same way infomercials and music videos are. |
I guess this is a fair point, but you really seem to be splitting hairs in order to declare games not art. I don’t think it’s quite fair to argue that in some games interactivity is simply a"gimmick," added to cinema. That’s the kind of language I would reserve for something like, I don’t know, the periodic fad of 3D movies.
Like it or not, Tetris and Half-Life are fundamentally similar, and it’s because they’re interactive. The added dimension of interactivity is the defining characteristic of all games. In my view, it’s much more accurate to describe all narrative games as games with a cinema gimmick. So I think what you describe as a “subset of cinema” is actually pretty clearly distinct from cinema.
I would also submit that the interactivity that is the fundamental feature of games as a category can create an artistic dimension in games that simply can’t exist in any of your other forms of cinema. There are all sorts of ways to play with the player’s perception of control in order to support a theme - for example, the act of making a player make a moral choice forces them to think about it, and, if done well, feel the consequences in a way that a less interactive piece of art simply can’t. It doesn’t always get used that way - rarely, in fact - but as you said, the quality of the games in question have no bearing on their being art.
Yeah, can’t really argue with it. Very well thought out.
I still think you aren’t giving videogames enough credit as amazing storytelling devices, but I understand why videogames may not be art, at least not right now.
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| Originally Posted by Jacob Singer View Post Wait, I’m not trying to say that. Anybody knows a sporting event can be made into a riveting film. Video games have only recently had a legitimate inroad into that arena, and that’s only after a 30+ year history. |
But King of Kong at any rate takes its central gaming bits and molds them into a classic “sports competition” frame, which creates drama, and you’re much further on your way to “art” than you were before.
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| Originally Posted by Verbal Kint View Post … at least not right now. |
I’ve belaboured this point elsewhere, but I think it bears repeating: in the debate of “but is it art?!?!?”, the subject almost always wins out over the critic, historically speaking.
Nice article
I both agree and disagree I think. I agree that yes, a video game can be comprised of artistic components. Yet the sum of those parts is not art?
Like, the old pacman sitdown boxes were artistic, yet the actual playing of the game is not…
I dunno, I think that complex puzzles (and all games are puzzles in some form) are an artform. And by putting your mental facultys to work in solving that puzzle, it then becomes an interactive piece of art.
This is something i’m going to have to mull over for a while. Thanks devin.
Also, to all the nerds that are getting ready to post that games are art because Shadow of the Colossus made you cry: Stop. No. Bad.
Edit: hahahaha I didn’t even notice the enormous SOTC thread right next to this one that presumably inspired this column in the first place. You people are so predictable.
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| Originally Posted by LlamaRama View Post There are all sorts of ways to play with the player’s perception of control in order to support a theme - for example, the act of making a player make a moral choice forces them to think about it, and, if done well, feel the consequences in a way that a less interactive piece of art simply can’t.. |
That’s simply not true. Cinematic narratives aren’t strengthened by having a player guide the choices of the protagonist any more than novels are improved by adding a choose your own adventure element to them. You either end up with something completely devoid of authorial intent*, or following one of X amount of preprogrammed stories. And the argument that interactivity makes you feel it more is no different than saying IMAX or 3D is art because shit being huge or in your face makes you feel it more.
* And don’t say you making the choices makes you the author. That doesn’t make games art either. It would simply make the game the vehicle for telling an animated story in real time.
good article Devin, but I did get a good laugh when you said you where not going to define art, then in the next paragraph you being to define art.
solid argument on this subject matter.
I do believe that a video game can be considered art.
But that is my opinion.
Art? No, but design? Hmmm… (shoot me).
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| Originally Posted by Verbal Kint View Post videogames as amazing storytelling devices. |
Unless the industry changes drastically, beyond the whole “How fun can we make this?” mindset, I don’t think videogames will reach their full potential. There are some filmmakers who set out with the “How fun can we make this?” mentality, and the films they make are summer blockbusters. In the videogame world all there ever seems to be are “summer blockbusters” when is gaming going to get it’s Oscar season?
While I actually agree with a lot of what’s written, I don’t think putting Narrative Game X under the umbrella of cinema helps the situation.
I mean Devin can declare it, and cite Clue as an example, but for the sake of actually discussing things I think interactivity in cinema deserves a unique classification.
But I do think that this article is missing the point, and that’s the potential here. Games, audio, video, interactivity, narratives… I don’t think people should be bound by what there currently is.
You can use these tools tell stories, challenge the viewer/user, to entertain or express ideas in a number of ways. I think video games show potential for things in the future that may not be known as games at all.
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| Originally Posted by Jacob Singer I’ve belaboured this point elsewhere, but I think it bears repeating: in the debate of “but is it art?!?!?”, the subject almost always wins out over the critic, historically speaking. |
Since I did the long-winded response in the other thread, I’ll just say that this certainly seems to be true.
If you even have to ask (and answer) the question, does the question even matter any more?
The more I think about this whole argument the more I get partial to the definition of pornography. “I’ll know it when I see it.” I’ve been playing games since the Atari 2600 and I still haven’t seen it.
And you know what? I follow game development pretty closely and I’ll bet you anything that even the huge majority of game developers can’t emphatically tell you that games are indeed art. I don’t even see how their challenge/reward structure can lend itself to art. Art may be used as a reward, for example completing a puzzle to listen to a great piece of music or see a copy of The Night Watch, but I think that the very act of playing the game should qualify as art if we are to term the game itself as art.