Games as Art Rant

[Keltrick]

Beauty is int eh eye of the beholder, and the same can be said for art. What is garbage to me is art to someone else. While I consider the Mona Lisa art, someone else my find it completely uninspired. We will never be able to set up perimeters within a medium, of what is an isn't art. Hard to justify why one person's opinion outranks another in determining which are art and which aren't.

It's all or nothing, and normally all, because to SOMEONE out there, pong was the most beautiful expression of human emotion they'd ever seen.

 

[KalosCast]

I don't understand why this website keeps ranting on about games as art it doesnt matter. Just play the games and appreciate them for what they are.

Really the whole games as an art thing is getting wide acceptance for games to be considered a legitimate form of human expression, so it gains the same legal protections that art gains, as well as removing the stigma that video games are just for young children and socially-inept nerds, which benefits all gamers because a wider acceptance will lead to more people making games, which leads to new innovations, which leads to more good games, which will entice more people to try them, so on and so forth.

Gamers already appreciate games for what they are, but we're a minority of the population. Everybody can find at lease one television show, or made-for-tv special that they enjoy, there's nobody who hates movies as a general medium, nobody who's fundamentally opposed to the very concept of books, but there ARE people who think of games as nothing more than a children's toy at best, and a vice borderline to drug abuse at worst.

inb4 somebody claims one of my "nobody" points as a view they hold in an attempt to be witty

 

[jboking]

I hear a lot of posters saying art is subjective. Technically, it's not. It has a definition.
Art: "the products of human creativity." Video games already qualify for this. The debate is over and I really wish we never had to see a thread about this ever again (which is a sentiment I think most escapists can agree with). those who say video games shouldn't be art can deal with it. Those who say video games are not art need to accept the fact that they are wrong.

What is subjective, however, is the quality of art. As it stands, by definition, all games are art. However, not all games are quality art.

 

[TheHecatomb]

The reason this debate turns out pointless every single time is because all you fanboys and other wankers keep arguing about which game is and isn't art. You're missing the point and for heaven's sake shut up for once!

The discussion wether games are art or not has nothing to do with the individual games. It is about the artistic potential of the videogame as a medium. Therefore the question is not "is Mario 64 art?" but rather "can this medium as a whole be used to make something of artistic value?" And the only reason this question is asked is because legally it would be advantageous for videogames if their content was lawfully protected as art.

Film as a medium is an acknowledged art. So is literature. Do you really think that has anything to do with every single book or movie out there? Do you really think film became an art because every single movie that is made is considered to be art? Appearantly you do. And it's ruining this discussion every single time and I'm willing to suggest that it's also one of the main reasons the discussion is still going in the first place.

 

[Unrulyhandbag]

TLDR: Games should be classified as art, but not all games need to apply to this form of thinking.

I'm going to say 'Wrong!'. This type of thinking should be applied to just about everything you do*.
To appreciate whether something is art or not requires you to consider it's function, meaning and the choices in it's design. You need to come to an understanding of the piece, the culture for which it is intended and that in which it was created. In short, you must consider something beyond it's face value.

You can apply that sort of thinking to everything from crappy 30 second commercials and the news broadcast through to weirdo arthouse films. From Garfield comic strips and matchstick man scribbles through to one of Turners creations. I could keep going but the fact is you can and should apply that style of thinking most of the time it's how we develop our understanding of the world around us and improve our literacy.

Arguing that all games are art or are incapable of being art is pointless as the label 'art' is appended on a personal basis after that thought process has been run; however your argument is a far worse thing.
You state that we shouldn't even be thinking about some games in complex terms at all. How do you decide which to think about? if you take everything at face value or purely in entertainment value then none of it is art.
How do we appreciate the structural elegance in the mechanics of a simple arcade game without thinking about it properly? How do we appreciate Planescape torment unless we take the time to fully consider the ramifications or it's dialogue?

Not all paintings are art, nor all filmography, not even all writing and all music and certainly not all games but every single one of those needs to be examined and considered to have it's artistic value determined.

*I say just about as thinking like that can be tiresome sometimes and some things, that are very enjoyable, don't stand up to that kind of scrutiny. Some-days you just want to take your brain out, put your feet up and watch an action movie.

TLDR: stop being lazy and get back to the top (or skip the whole post).

 

[Zhukov]

Oh for the love of...

You cannot debate this stuff unless you give your definition of "art".

 

[Geekosaurus]

Art has no purpose. Games are made to entertain and make money. Ergo, games cannot be art.

 

[EzraPound]

Games are all art, they they are just really pathetic art for the most part