BBC Debate: Games Aren't Art ... Yet

[SyphonX]

So many games today can leave a mark on you, whether some will admit it or not. Other people don't even realize it. Almost every game I play these days has a serious effect on me. It makes me question cultural norms, observe patterns in society I never recognized. Games are so robust, and so overly-stimulating that it's hard to consciously accept you are being inspired. You're not simply staring at a static painting drawing inspiration from your own thoughts, you're being overloaded with elaborate 'alternative realities' that are so real, yet completely driven by a specific narrative.

We can make fun of GTA 4 all we want, but the entire game is brilliant. It's a parody, a farce on modern American culture. It's taken to absurd levels, but the world is still believable, and while you draw comparisons to the real America you'll have the inevitable, "This is all too much, but some of this is frighteningly real." Everything from the radio stations, the intertwined stories, the pedestrian commentary, the role of GTA's "government", everything. The game, and others like it (take your pick) leaves a mark on you. It does, profoundly so. The entire world talked about how controversial it was. How often does this happen with entertainment, hm?

We live in this absurd world where not too long ago, people like HP Lovecraft struggled to make ends meet, and largely considered himself a failure. Lovecraft was so poor, he couldn't afford a tombstone for his own grave. Yet his works are undisputed at changing the literary and horror world as we know it. Only after death do the critics remove the boot from his neck. So many games today are inspired from Lovecraft's legacy (ultimately Poe, who also had such struggles), and still the elitist "culture overlords" will not remove their boots.

Now every author is a bestseller, and the 'prolific writers' of our time make enough money to run a nation. The gaming industry is just as popular, just as extreme.

My point is, its only in retrospect that works are recognized as art. Usually in the span of many decades. Our time in the information age is unprecedented. We've never had this world where production of entertainment has been this large, where households can get virtually anything they want if they have the means. Critical acclaim of art is just another niche. It's a niche where people need their special place to appreciate something, it's just difficult when everything is popular. There are few items that require critical recognition, because everything is recognized. Why recognize something when it already makes thousands, or millions? If everything is popular, then nothing is art.

 

[Guardian of Nekops]

You know, I'd be hard pressed to think of a painting or a statue that really made me think about the world and my place in it. I've seen the David, I mean the real David, in the stone. It was... history. Interesting, not life-changing.

Traditional art, though often very well crafted of course, has become largely irrelevant to the lives of most people. It misses its mark... people look at it out of obligation and grasp for every bit of inspiration it gives them.

On the other hand, there are games that have reshaped the way I think about myself. There are games that I have played which leave me staring at nothing for hours afterwards, just trying to reconcile what I have just experienced.

Hell, games have given me nightmares... and not just "Oh no, something scary is chasing me!" nightmares. I'm talking about dreams where I realize I was not who I thought I was, and what I had been fighting for the whole time was actually something terrible.

 

[procrasty]

i think what eshan is refering to when he says "art" is essencially "fine art" and a big part of what defines that is presentation. games are, overwhelmingly, presented as games, they'll start being art when creators make serious attempts to present them as that.

it's not that they've failed at it so far, they're just not being used in that way yet. as creating them becomes both cheaper and easier, this will increase, and games will be another way in which people can make things for fun, for money, for exploration, for learning, and for art, just like every other meduim.

 

[The_Fezz]

All gaming is art, just not necessarily high art, the same can be leveled at film, literature and music also.

It's a varying art form.

 

[Dreadman75]

According to the definition of art on Wikipedia: Art is the product or process of deliberately arranging items (often with symbolic significance) in a way that influences and affects one or more of the senses, emotions, and intellect.


If we go by this definition then games are already art and have been for some time.

And before anyone starts arguing, yes I know wikipedia isn't the best site for getting information considering how often it can be changed. But look at the definition above and tell me that it doesn't at least have some truth to it.

 

[Stalydan]

"In terms of storytelling, a game like Grand Theft Auto is enormously complex and works on loads of different levels"
wait GTA had a story?

From 3 onward they're actually very well written crime comedy/dramas.

I agree with the bored looking owl. GTA3, Vice City and San Andreas have the story of a personal quest for vengeance becoming a tale of "From rags to riches" where the person starts as a low-rate criminal and eventually becomes notorious millionaire and kills their enemy.

GTA4 mixed it up a little with a quest for vengeance being the side plot to a lot of the game whilst the "From rage to riches" plot really changes to "From rags to slightly better rags" which I find weird for the fact you can amass half a million at least in the main plot so why no mansion or at least better house at the end of it :/ But whatever, I'm going too deep into that.

Yeah, there's a plot to Grand Theft Auto.

 

[dyre]

What is this illusive "art" thing anyway? The Witcher 2 has given me both more enjoyment and more to think about than the Mona Lisa, the Mozart Symphony no 25, or Heart of Darkness has, so what the intellectual/artistic elite has to say about what is and isn't art seems largely irrelevant to me.

Honestly, I haven't seen many paintings, works of music, or even films that made me think about the world around me in anything other than superficial terms (documentaries sometimes do a better job of it, but I bet most people don't call those art anyway). I think only literature consistently achieves that sort of "elite art" status.

 

[Adam28]

I will continue to define art as works produced by such skill and imagination. Therefore video games are art, there's good art and terrible art. Anyway, I would like to stay out of this debate, too many snobs in the art world for my liking. Here included.

But...but...but... video games are played by the stupid common mindless people!

Edit: This isn't an attack at the guy in the article, at least he sees potential.

 

[raankh]

Those are ridiculous statements. He's disqualilfying instrumental music as an art-form. Instrumental music is abstract to the point of being near-spiritual experiences, but it certainly does not fulfill those criteria. Does Tchaikovsky facilitate questions about who we are? If we are reaching that far, then absolutely games can easily be classified as art too. Certainly a game like Perimiter facilitate questions about who we are and the likes, if a classical symphony does.

BZZZZZZZZ, try again.

A lot of what you said is true. I wouldn't say Permiter is art, but whatever. Don't bother responding to that part. But his mistake isn't his overall opinion, and most of his statements are not that radical. The main problem is giving too broad of criteria for, and too broad a definition of, art. This allows for too many groundless statement and examples to be thrown around without a full understanding of the intent of the other.

Well, to me computer games are in general not art because of the process by which they where created. To me art is produced by a creative and artistic process-- although there is art that takes the form of a computer game, computer games as such are not art.

The entire question "Are video games art?" confuses the expression with the medium. So I would disagree, he does make a fundamental mistake in forming that opinion-- as do many others. In my opinion, of course.