291: Almost Art

[Knytemare]

I think that you should beware when defining art in such rigid boxes. Art is an illusive to define and personal thing. In some schools of artistic philosophy it exists only in the viewer.

Take for instance the carpenter who makes tables, on a schedule, one per month or he cannot feed his family. He lives on the same constricting 'timetable', even tighter, with a more direct cause-effect relationship between himself and his task, his art. The tables he makes are beautiful, one of a kind. They are art. All games are art whether we like it or not. They are as different as pieces of wood, and the grain of the carved lines. Is a table exciting? Does it instill broad emotional or political ideas in the viewer? No, and niether does the mona lisa. Most games are like those tables. Slightly different, and each a labor of love. The essence of their beauty lies in their uniqueness.

Remember though, that being art does not make something 'magical' or 'better'. Many works of art are trite, meaningless drivel.

-Knytemare

 

[Mouse One]

Remember though, that being art does not make something 'magical' or 'better'. Many works of art are trite, meaningless drivel.

-Knytemare

Exactly. Now, I'm in the "games are art" camp, myself. I think Samyn made a mistake in titling his piece "Almost Art", as many are reading that as "games suck". Considering that Tale of Tales has made some of the most emotionally engaging, thought provoking, and dare I say, artistic games on the market today, that take on the piece is a bit ironic.

But, as Knytemare points out, art can suck. For the record, I've taken a couple of semesters of 3D character design, and have studied under professionals. I'm not a pro (yet), but I'm here to tell you that all the artistic ideas about form, perspective, gesture, what have you go into those 3D models you see in games. Then marketing turns to the designers and says "Put bigger ta tas on the chicks". Is the final model still art? Sure, but let's not kid ourselves and say it carries the same impact that the concept artist and character designer wanted.

Stepping away from the dead horse of "Are games art?", what Samyn is really trying to point out is that there are some very real obstacles to artistic expression in the industry as it currently stands. And he's right-- a small studio of like minded people can more easily realize their vision. Look at some of the great games of the last few years. Many of the best (in terms of emotional impact on the player) come from indie studios (Braid, Amnesia, and yes, the Path). Why is that, when they labor under budgets that are literally less than 5% of the typical AAA title? Because they have more freedom to express themselves.

And Samyn's also right when he says that gameplay considerations and marketing issues can be a further obstacle. Marketing is a necessary evil, but when you letting the marketing boys make artistic decisions is akin to letting the hospital billing department do surgery. It's just not their department.

Gameplay is a more intriguing issue, as I firmly believe it can add to the experience-- again, look at Braid (and thanks again for the poster who mentioned it, just started playing it a few days back). And, just to prove that AAA studios can make great works, the ending of Bioshock impacts the way it does largely because of the gameplay restrictions. BUT, having said that, often gameplay is far too independent, and often interferes with the message. Worrying about the "score" can pull one out of the emotional immersion of the gaming experience, and worse yet, can replace one's motivation. Players should want to continue the game for the experience of playing, not to satisfy some conditioned response. Anyone every grind for an item or level? Did you enjoy it? If not, why did you do it? (Extra Credits had a great video on Operant Conditioning a bit ago).

As game consumers and creators, we do need to think about and address these issues, or the artistic side of videogames will languish. Knee jerk "Hey that guy over there is dissing our hobby!" responses don't get us anywhere. We need to challenge our comfortable preconceptions and try new and hopefully rewarding ideas.

And if I can use the word, isn't that what art is about?

 

[Jaime_Wolf]

Pretty baseless article actually.

First, there are plenty of games that do involve the things you're talking about. Second, your qualifications are hopelessly entrenched in thinking about art in film. The undercurrent present throughout is that video games can only be art by emulating other art forms. Without more realistic graphics, you imply, we couldn't even hope for art. Now that we have photorealism, we can finally become film, just so long as we don't let "gameplay" get in the way. But gameplay is what makes games games. And then beyond that you have some apparent rules for what art must be. Your beliefs that art can only be intentional, that it can only arise in a certain process, that only the "author" can create art, that art can't be focused on providing a fun experience, are profoundly ridiculous. You can find famous, extremely important works of art that violate all of those dictums with relative ease.

Art has already been created within video games. It's created all the time. Little bits of pieces of it can be found in sublime moments in even the largest blockbusters and we're getting unbelievable avant-garde art from every direction with the proliferation of smaller games. Braid is probably the posterboy in the latter case: a game with a mechanic that feels integral to the plot, with thematic variations on a mechanical theme, each exploring a different aspect of gameplay and of the story and character. And it doesn't rely on photorealism, it doesn't have to imitate films, it doesn't need to eschew the entertainment of the gamer.

The inability to find art in games is just that, your inability to find it, not its lack of existence. Claiming that games haven't reached the status of art is an unwitting way of perpetuating that very idea endlessly. If you say that they aren't art, but could be, as is particularly popular right now, you can feel smugly superior in your knowledge of what art "is" without alienating your audience, the people you get to feel superior in comparison to. People fall into this trap easily on both sides - people like to feel superior and people like to have experts they can appeal to in order to decide things like this.

The way games will become recognised as art is through all of us ending this stupid nonsense about insisting that they aren't yet.

 

[MichaelSamyn]

Thank you for your comments. I'm afraid I don't have the time to read all of them. I apologize for that.

There's one remark I wanted to make, though. My article is not intended as an argument for or against games being art or not. It starts from the premise that they are not and works its way up to how I think they can become art. It's a very hopeful, optimistic article.

It doesn't really have anything to do with the "objects" we call games. I'm sure many can be experienced as art. My criticism is of the way in which most games are made. Which is simply not an artistic process. My article is intended to encourage developers to approach game creation with a more artistic attitude. The original title of the article, by the way, was "Games, dare to be art!"

I realize that some of the things I say in the article, are predicated on my own personal vision of art for the future. And this vision is not exactly aligned with the achievements of the modernist movement in fine art from the previous century. In fact, I make games largely because I refuse to be involved with that movement. I'll try to explain my vision on art in a future article.

 

[nipsen]

Mm. Ok.. so next question.. how many of us will have to think the same thoughts, like this, before games can comfortably be talked about as something more than silly game-mechanics with expensive make-up..?

Or does that involve just giving Pachter wedgies, and pouring sand in Ebert's gasoline tank..? I mean - the problem is that even niche-games that are specifically sold to a market who appreciates the game exactly for what it is.... still aren't talked about as, say, "fantasies" rather than "funny colours on the screen", etc.

I mean, it's like commenting on Sports, and having a lengthy review every single game solely and exclusively about the rules, and ignoring the match completely.

 

[Djinni]

People often use the term "art" to mean anything done well but for this discussion we need to use language with a bit more precision.
There are 4 common domains in the field of visual literacy.



Each of these domains has exemplars and iconic masters - excellence and high quality can be found in all 4 domains - it is not a hierarchy. Like photography and film, video games will eventually have exemplars in all 4 domains even though they started as forms of (3) visual culture created by designers (2).

This.

Most people who argue that video games are art don't understand what art is. Art=\=good.

 

[More Fun To Compute]

The original title of the article, by the way, was "Games, dare to be art!"

That's cool and everything but if don't learn to respect arcade games, for example, as much as you respect art then you will never show enough nerve to make really great games, art or not.

 

[Ytmh]

I realize that some of the things I say in the article, are predicated on my own personal vision of art for the future. And this vision is not exactly aligned with the achievements of the modernist movement in fine art from the previous century. In fact, I make games largely because I refuse to be involved with that movement. I'll try to explain my vision on art in a future article.

This is absolutely hilarious as "the path" uses modernism nonstop, both musically, visually and conceptually.

You "refuse" to be involved with something you're actually doing yourself, or should I take it that you're JUST referring to Duchamp and people similar to that? Schoenberg, Ligeti, Picasso, Warhol, are all OK then? Or what?

I'm pretty sure you aren't aware how VARIED "fine art" ends up being, including interactive electronic art too and all sorts of things. The 20th century is precisely the moment where something being in a museum or not doesn't matter for it to be considered by anyone art or not, or even what kind of thing is or isn't art.

But w/e, it's not like art matters.

 

[ProGrasTiNation]

I think japanese games are way ahead of the game when it comes to art,,GT5s portrayal of cars,MetalGearSolids story,that rivals any movie,& the upcoming Cathrine,which looks to be very interesting indeed.
Not that it is limited to japanese games as seen in david cages(french dude)heavy Rain,which moral choices impact the story so much that you feel serious shit when you withness the outcome of your actions.
& ill leave this post by saying take a look at Dead Island trailer & tell me it doesnt move you like any good Movie would.
Peace out

 

[MelasZepheos_v1legacy]

I'm a page in and already I disagree on several key points. First off, to claim that films and artwork are not 'rigid systems' is ridiculous. We accept the systems of cinema, literature, artwork because they've been around longer so we forget that when they were first introduced people said exactly the same thing about them.

Also, Art Is About Something. Games Are Not. Really, so films aren't largely commercial enterprises where big name producers and developers churn out crap every summer in order to pacify the masses because I think James Cameron, Michael Bay and the entirety of Hollywood would like a word with you. Some developers turn out 'artsy' games just for the 'deep' crowd with no thought of recompense, just like some indie film developers turn out 'artsy' films just for the 'deep' crowd etc. Don't judge gaming by its big blockbusters because that would be like judging the entire history of film based on the Transformers movies.

'Today, game developers don't need to be concerned with the message that their game is sending to its audience.' See above regarding film makers, who I'm sure are always concerned about the messages of every film being released to the general public.

'explore certain themes or to convey messages that cannot be said in any other way.' And you know what, I can't think of a single developer who's trying this. I mean, it's not like anyone is using the entire interactive nature of videogames to make a statement which can't be made anywhere else. [/sarcasm]

'There simply is no place for art in such a tight schedule.' Yes there is, some of the greatest classics of literature were developed under extraordinarily short time constraints. Similarly for some films, and pieces of artwork.

Your article is confusing, mixed in its message and downright wrong in several places.

I turn to the words of Tycho Brahe...

'If a hundred artists create art for five years, how can the result not be art?'

 

[Erana]

"Through all of art history, there's been a strong tendency towards representation. Throughout the ages, artists seem to have tried to fool their audience into believing they were seeing something that wasn't really there. Even when art was more spiritual, there was a desire for the experience of another reality.

Technology has increasingly offered more tools towards the creation of this spectacle. Oil-based paints gave birth to almost tangible representations of food and fabric and skin."

I know this is beside the point, but the trend of art has not always been to strive towards photorealistic representation- if you look at the latter part of the Roman empire, this society known for their fairly realistic representations of the human form in sculpture moved from idealized realism to more abstracted imagery. The Four Tetrarchs [http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/67/Venice_%E2%80%93_The_Tetrarchs_03.jpg/400px-Venice_%E2%80%93_The_Tetrarchs_03.jpg] are an excellent example of this.
And oil was not the reason painting went from the more abstract to the photorealistic. It was a change in style from the look of Byzantine art to a more lifelike one because of Italy's growing cultural influence on Western culture. Its the Italians who latched onto the idea of seeking realism over a graphic style, and the rest of the West followed suit.
This general increase in the verisimilitude of work continued from there, primarily with tempra for years, and oil just happened to come along and make it easier for artists to create photorealism.
(OK, so that was pretty much just a rant to get to use "Verisimilitude" outside of an art history class. Damn, I love that word.
Still, no one seems to remember that early medieval art looks like it does because of style, rather than due to some sort of regression out of the fall of the ancient Roman Empire.)

Still, you omit the introduction of the camera. Being to recreate exactly what you saw without any technical skill at all put the art world, who had spent the past thousand years striving to do what a camera could do in an instant turned the art world on its head.
I would love for someone to address this in the context of gaming- what sort of thing could change the video game world so entirely, as photography did painting? What would its functions be? What would the new goals of developers in creating video games?
Would it be available to the layperson, and what would they do with this seemingly magical piece of technology?

 

[Delusibeta]

RPS has linked this on one of their Sunday Papers [http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2011/02/20/the-sunday-papers-158/] articles, and here's a comment about this article that's really good, in my opinion. If the author wanted to start out buy saying video games are not art but *can* be art, he's done a very bad job of showing that. Quote from RPS comment thread follows:

I can?t help but think Samyn raises discussion because he?s deliberately out to provoke people. He makes some fair points but he also overstates his case, fully I believe, aware of the ire this will cause.

The main culprit in this article (emphasis his) being:

?When a medium can represent a soldier and it can recreate a theater of war, it needs to have something to say about this subject matter.?

As Bullwinkle succinctly put it in the first comment ?No it doesn?t.? It certainly would be nice if it did. If it was striving to be art then yes it should be making some sort of statement. But as a piece of entertainment, it certainly doesn?t. It?s obvious from the rest of the article that Samyn feels that games should be being more than entertainment; but describing this as a ?need? is massively overstating his case. Entertainment and art can happily coexist side by side; you can have your Tom Clancy?s sharing the same shelf as your Sebastian Faulks? and both of them have their own merits. Well I have respect for Samyn?s desire for greater artistry in games, I can?t help but feel he?s out to cause a ruckus.

I also think there are a few contradictions to be found in the piece. For example Samyn suggests that ?commercial considerations? are not a valid reason for the non persual of artistic merit in games then later goes on to say,

?It takes an enormous amount of effort to produce the spectacle we know from blockbuster videogames. This effort requires heaps of time and money and above all an extremely tight production plan.

The admirable tightness of videogame production planning may very well be the core reason why games haven?t evolved into an art form yet. There simply is no place for art in such a tight schedule.?

Now stop me if I?m wildly missing the point, but that sounds like a commercial consideraton right there. It doesn?t seem like a ?mask to hide behind? at all. Even assuming a more artistic product would open up the mass market there?s no way a mid to large size studio could survive for long enough financially to realise whatever artistic vision they may have. Such an endeavour seems doomed to failure. Unless you had somebody charismatic who could somehow manage to continually acquire investment despite end product being ages away (think 3D Realms and Duke Nukem Forever), which seems unlikely at best.

Moving on, I also have issues with the following point:

?By definition, the essence of a work of art can only be communicated through the work itself. Otherwise, there is no point to making the work in the first place. This essence cannot be communicated to fellow team members, per definition. [...] The only way to create art with a large team is for everyone to trust the author to follow his vision and to give him full authority over the production, because the author is the only one who has the real knowledge of what is actually being made.?

I don?t buy that communicating the essence of a work of art is entirely impossible. I may be looking at this in a naive and simplistic manner but it seems to me that when an artist must work as part of a team to complete their endeavour then they have a responsibilty to be able to communicate what their art is about. If they don?t manage to achieve this, then failure to convey what the artist wanted is entirely the artist?s fault and they need to work on their communication skills. Yes, I agree, you wont get the full sense of the piece untill it is complete but I don?t buy that you can?t convey some of what you are trying to do with descriptions, be they words or images. Look at something like architecture. It?s a massive collaborative effort, which would be a shambles without solid lines of communication between the architect and those in charge of construction.

I think Samyn?s right in that there has to be a willingness in members of the team and those involved int he more technical aspects to trust in the artist?s creative vision even if they don?t really understand it. I think this does need to happen more in the game?s industry. But I think there?s also onus on the artist to at least try and explain to someone whose putting in the hard graft what all of their work is trying to achieve. And of course the person putting in the hard graft needs to get paid, and as covered above this could be a problem.

So yeah, I think Samyn is going about things the right way if he wants to create art. He?s got a small team of like minded people with creative and technical skills and they are trying to create something unique and worthwhile. More power to them, I?m glad they are willing to try and I wish them every success. But I can?t help but feel that he expects too much of the rest of the game?s industry in pursuing similar goals and I also can?t help but find his insinuation that art and entertainment can?t happily coexist if the medium is to move forward as an overstatement of his case at best and absolutely baffling pig headed stubborness at worst.

 

[esserius]

Yet in terms of cultural relevance, social importance and aesthetic impact, masturbators still play second fiddle to cinema, literature or music, because underneath their superficial artistic appearance, masturbators are bland, unforgiving, meaningless, cold-blooded, rigid. These systems offer a context for goal-oriented, rules-based experiences that already have a place in society: next to other masturbators. Since nothing new is happening here, society is not affected.

Masturbators clearly have potential; they just have not accepted their role as an art form yet. Masturbation is king to most masturbators. To play them is to compete in a sort of digital sport. Graphics and sound have been added as polish and pretty packaging. Masturbators are simply not created as works of art.

Masturbation Is About Something. Art Is Not.

 

[Use_Imagination_here]

Umm, just one question, why? Why would doing anything you just said accomplish anything?

Surely If the developers set out with the intention of making a game built around a mechanic with as good a story and setting and characters as possible would accomplish the exact same thing.

and guess what, we're doing that right now.

WE'RE JUST NOT DOING IT GOOD ENOUGH.

 

[Psycho Goose]

It doesn't really have anything to do with the "objects" we call games. I'm sure many can be experienced as art. My criticism is of the way in which most games are made. Which is simply not an artistic process. My article is intended to encourage developers to approach game creation with a more artistic attitude. The original title of the article, by the way, was "Games, dare to be art!"

I just re-read your article with this in mind, and I have decided that I tend to agree with your thoughts on what games can be, but think you're over-generalizing when it comes to what they are. The thing is, there certainly are some games that deserve the criticisms you gave here (hell, most of them do; Sturgeon's Law is in effect here as much as it is everywhere else), but there are a few that don't, and--as far as I could tell--you ignored them entirely. It could be that you don't think any of them are art, in which case I would be interested to see your thoughts on BioShock, Shadow of the Colossus, Silent Hill 2, Planescape: Torment, etc.--all games that have had the "art" label thrown on them a lot in these debates.

The biggest problem with any "is it art?" debate is that we lack a widely-accepted definition of "art." Your saying that they have to be "about something" seems to be pretty good, but then surely there are plenty of games that are "about things"? And while your Hollywood comparison is quite fitting (I say this as somebody who is increasingly fed up with Hollywood), there are a fair number of films that either manage to sneak some intelligence through the Hollywood system, or don't come from Hollywood at all.

Your thoughts on what games can be make sense, but the definition of art that you give seems to admit a few already-made games, while your article (as far as I could tell) says that no game yet made is art.

 

[chikusho]

If art is not a team sport, movies can't be art either.
There are hundreds of people working in every big budget movie no matter what the subject matter, not to mention that the initial screen-play writers work might have been rewritten a dozen times before it's handed off to a director.

 

[Specter Von Baren]

In all honesty, I find this article insulting and I kindly tell the maker of it to $%&* off because they don't know a damn thing about what they're talking about.

Okay, I'm going to philibuster this crap right now as I'm sick of people talking about depth in games as if they understand anything when instead they're just sweeping a wide brush before even looking. Expect a long post after I look through my collection for every game I have that has emotional elements to it.

 

[Specter Von Baren]

Prepare for spoilers for many games people.

The Zero Escape series: A game series dealing with concepts such as Morphic Fields and multiple universe theories. Also has some very emotional moments over its characters (I challenge you to play Virtue's Last Reward and not feel some kind of emotion over Luna).

OkamiDen: Talks about fate and being who you should be in spite of what you were created to be, has a moment where a character that is a clone of another and that was experiencing a crisis over this fact ends up dying peacefully with friends around him, content with believing himself to be his own person.

Radiant Historia: Deals with issues such as political strife and whether the sacrifice of one person is worth the saving of an entire world.

Megaman Zero series: Deals with a dystopian world where humans are mostly holed up in a single city due to most of the rest of the world being a wasteland while they let robots do most of the work for them. Deals with prejudice against robots due to a lack of resources and so it involves ideas that can be compared to discrimination in the real world.

Silent Hill 2: Deals with the psychological problems of one man ranging from sexual frustration and his guilt over murdering his wife.

Phoenix Write Justice For All: Deals with a defense attorney dealing with the moral question of defending someone he knows to be guilty and what is the right thing for him to do, especially when the tension is high due to an assassin threatening the life of friend of his if he doesn't defend this person.

Ar Tonelico series: Has a message that if a man wishes to trully "win" the heart of the woman he loves then the way to do it is to understand their personality and accept them for who they are.

Megaman Starforce series: Deals with the strength of personal bonds and how having a connection with people makes you stronger and lifts you out of the dark times in your life.

Persona 4: Deals with the repressed side of our psyche and accepting yourself for who you are.

Odin Sphere: A game with many themes, there's the story of a daughter trying to become her own person and not merely be subject to the desires of her father, there's the story of a princess having to take over her kingdom when he mother dies and actually become the leader her people need, and others like that. All of this is told through a narrative that draws elements of Victorian era plays.

Bioshock: Deals with the ideologies of Ayn Rand and actually uses the mechanics to give a surprising twist.

Fragile Dreams: Takes place after the world has ended and most of what is left are people dying and memories of those that are dead.

Metal Gear Solid 3: Deals with patriotism and what lengths a person can go to follow their ideals. How does history remember the people that fight and die for their countries?

Shadow of the Colossus: Deals with the lengths one man will go for the person he loves in spite of what it may cost him and other people.

Okage: Specifically uses a world that seems to be a caricature of the old "hero fights the evil king" cliche and pokes fun at those ideas and even has the characters themselves be questioned over what their roles actually mean.

Nier: A miserable, miserable story of sadness.

Catherine: Deals with the issues of men cheating on women and has a message of that being bad.

I honestly could bring up more but these are the ones that have what some term "socially relevant" issues or things that can at least make most people feel something I think.

This is not to say that there aren't games that fall into what the writer of this article said, but I dismissing all of the hard work that's already been done is a slap in the face.