Games will never be accepted as an art form

[Mr.Squishy]

And yet the world keeps on spinning.
You know what, I don't need games to be an artform if it takes the fun out of them (not that it's needed at all, but hey). I don't need the wider population's validation to keep playing games.

 

[Vegard Pompey]

I didn't read the whole thread but there is one large problem with the OP's post; Hir implies that art cannot be interactive, which is incorrect.

 

[Al-Bundy-da-G]

Art: use of imagination or skill in the production of things of beauty.

Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder

In short webster's dictionary says yes, any argument in english is void, as long as at least any one being finds it attractive.

 

[Slinker07]

I was at an art school, and most people there saw games as art already. I think most people that has an general idea of what games are and what they can be can view them as art.

What they didn't get along with was what the whole concept of "what is art and what is not". A decades old debate that is only repeating itself with games without adding any new air into it really.

Looking at the indie games now I think we are very much in a period where more games develops mainly for an "artsticaly" purpose of it. With games like The path, Flower and Limbo.

Art nowdays for me is a pretty personal matter of viewing and how affects the person viewing it. Games may not be seen as art, by a few "elits". But games is the biggest entertaiment form out there now. To say that the general population would never see it as art is simply riddicules and goes against everything that says that most people like games nowdays.

 

[ascorbius]

For me art is something that makes you feel something differently or shows you how to feel something you never experienced. It's something that teaches us about ourselves in ways not limited to the restrictions of modern life.

If you can play a game and the game makes you think about something, then it was art. If a game gives an emotional connection which was beyond the story or the visuals. If it takes you somewhere and shows you something you didn't expect.

My problem with the Games as art thing is that Games seem to be transient. They will not survive individually to be recognised or appreciated as art later on. Games need technology to play them and as technology advances, it leaves old games behind.
Old paintings can be stored and displayed in museums for all to see.
Games need a bit more than that. Advances in paper did not make canvas obsolete or prevent it from being seen.


Here are a few games which have made me think... mostly about the human condition.

Mass Effect - We are insignificant in the universe and no matter how far we feel we have advanced, we are as barbaric as ever. With all of the improvements in technology, we still choose to be shitty to each-other, greedy and violent. We have not outgrown our base instincts to survive and grow at all costs. We know this and hide behind a thin veneer of civility But as Commander Shepherd, you can choose to do something different, to be a force for good and try to make a difference. To buy humanity more time so that we may grow up a little.

Mah-jong & Bejewelled - Life starts out pretty easy with seemingly unlimited choices, but with each choice you find that you limit yourself in some way and have to suffer the consequence. If you're lucky, you'll clear the table and win. Most of the time though, your choices just take you down a path where there is no return. We cannot see the future, We are not in control of our destiny, we just have to play the game with the options we see and hope for the best.

Mario - A jong journey faced with countless dangers. You can be as prepared as you like but in the end, every choice you make could be your last. Rescuing the princess is always in the back of your mind driving you onwards but before then there is the journey.

Oblivion - Walking in the countryside, I see places I want to explore, I can almost smell the forest. I am alive. I am free. I stumble upon a wild animal who turns to fight me. The animal slain, I see ancient ruins and consider what kind of civilisation was here before me? Even though I am powerful, beings greater than myself have been lost and their structures lie in ruins. What fate for me then?


Or maybe, Games aren't art and I just need to get some therapy..

 

[Saviordd1]

I'd disagree no matter what but since the US has already legally declared it an art form theres no point.

 

[Snoozer]

For me "Art" rather means qualitiy and depth and not "random and boring stuff" (As most people consider it, who never really have dealt with Art). I don't see what's so bad about that.

 

[Psytrese]

The same way movies have exploded over the past century, games will also. All the kids that grew up watching and loving movies, grew up and made them a generally accepted art form.

It will be generally accepted because eventually the number of people who play and love games will grow to outnumber the people who don't, in a manner similar to how it has done exponentially in the past 10years.

 

[zehydra]

The Supreme Court of the United States has declared it an art form no different from movies or books. Your point is invalid (at least in the US).

yeah, I was going to say..

OP, it already HAS.

 

[SageRuffin]

I think what a lot of people (myself included) fail to realize is that it's not so much the gameplay aspects of the game that are deemed to have artistic merit, but more so the various machinations that make the game itself, gameplay notwithstanding of course. Things like writing and storytelling, music, artistic direction (El Shaddai: Ascension to the Metatron comes to mind), all those are art forms. Not everyone is gonna agree with me on this, but I still find it somewhat ridiculous for a video game as a whole to be considered an art form unless we're strictly talking in a creationism sense.

I think the gaming community as a whole would a lot less like a bunch pompous, self-entitled, jackass man-children if we sit back and look at the finer points of video games - art direction/graphics, writing, music, what have you - as opposed to saying "gaems r art W00t!" and being done with it.

 

[K_Dub]

Art is objective people! No one answer is absolute! Let's all chill the hell out now!

Personally, I think games are already an art form. I mean, art is something that makes you feel certain emotions. It doesn't really matter how an art form gets those emotions across, so long as the viewer feels them.

 

[oktalist]

I'll play the game for fun, scares, interaction and more fun. Please don't take that away from me by making me analyse and think bullshit about entertainment.

It is for these same reasons that people consume art.

Not that I don't like the idea, but I didn't know this industry is supposed to be run by those cheese-eating, beret-wearing, wine-swilling trumpet-farters in art galleries that I'd rather kick in the face than hear them talk on and on about what art is supposed to be and how godly they are compared to us filthy commoners.

This is a huge problem the "art world" has with how it is percieved. It's come about only recently, due to the tendency for art colleges to try to fit into the traditional academic world of exams and coursework. In order to do that, they need to have something to write about, which means fabricating some bullshit false meaning or significance or mysticism about their work. They do this to get funding from whatever bodies fund these things.

Picasso never worried about that crap. Da Vinci never worried about that crap. Van Gogh never worried about that crap. And most of the people who appreciate their paintings every day never worry about that crap.

It's only a new medium if all the artsy fartsy types let it be, which they won't.

So wrong. They don't get to choose. They are not the leaders of a heirarchical command structure. Art is largely democratic; as long as enough people think something is art, the critics would have to acknowledge that.

Why can't we have a game that is fun to play and that many people can just sit down and play through, while at the same time include many hidden messages and characters with interesting stories and backgrounds that other gamers can analyse and pick apart themselves?

But games are art anyway, without any of that hidden messages, deep meaningful bullshit. Those things are not what makes something art. The dictionary says it's "the conscious production or arrangement of sounds, colours, forms, movements, or other elements in a manner that affects the sense of beauty, specifically the production of the beautiful in a graphic or plastic medium" but really art is whatever you want it to be.

 

[EternalFacepalm]

Now think clearly for two seconds, and you'll know you're wrong.

 

[ChupathingyX]

Why can't we have a game that is fun to play and that many people can just sit down and play through, while at the same time include many hidden messages and characters with interesting stories and backgrounds that other gamers can analyse and pick apart themselves?

But games are art anyway, without any of that hidden messages, deep meaningful bullshit. Those things are not what makes something art. The dictionary says it's "the conscious production or arrangement of sounds, colours, forms, movements, or other elements in a manner that affects the sense of beauty, specifically the production of the beautiful in a graphic or plastic medium" but really art is whatever you want it to be.

I wasn't saying that games have to have those things to be art, I was just responding to a particular comment.

Also, "bullshit"? What's so bad about having meanings in games, yeah sure it's nice to have games that are mindless fun, but it's also nice to have a game with an insightful story with interesting characters, and it's even better when a game includes both.

 

[Marik Bentusi]

Even if we leave out sandboxes like Minecraft, it's a completely different experience whether you watch someone play a game or do it yourself (with most good games anyway, I do agree there's quite a number of games where the player doesn't have any real input).

You cannot play a game without a player.

Even games that are full of cutscenes and linear corridors need some sort of button pressing to load the next scene. Thus there's always a quantum of interactivity and the "game" part of the game is still valid.
And if you're still worried about actual people not accepting it as an art form, look at a certain US court and remember that the kids of today are the adults of tomorrow. It's a scary thought sometimes, but people that grew up with the medium can have a radically different view on things. Seeing how big and influential the industry already is, I have no doubt at all it will be just as natural a form of art and entertainment as television and movies.

 

[KAPTAINmORGANnWo4life]

Expressing something is art. Making a speech is art, telling a dirty joke is art, giving an honest opinion is art. Games are art, that fact can't change, we don't need to talk about it anymore.

 

[Verlander]

I say it everytime, there is a difference between an art movement and an art medium. Ergo they CAN be art, but don't have to be art. Some games and their respective iconography are already considered art.... so yeah.

 

[oktalist]

Why can't we have a game that is fun to play and that many people can just sit down and play through, while at the same time include many hidden messages and characters with interesting stories and backgrounds that other gamers can analyse and pick apart themselves?

But games are art anyway, without any of that hidden messages, deep meaningful bullshit. Those things are not what makes something art. The dictionary says it's "the conscious production or arrangement of sounds, colours, forms, movements, or other elements in a manner that affects the sense of beauty, specifically the production of the beautiful in a graphic or plastic medium" but really art is whatever you want it to be.

I wasn't saying that games have to have those things to be art, I was just responding to a particular comment.

Also, "bullshit"? What's so bad about having meanings in games, yeah sure it's nice to have games that are mindless fun, but it's also nice to have a game with an insightful story with interesting characters, and it's even better when a game includes both.

OK, we were both responding to particular comments that caused us to exclude some things in order to get through to people with a different worldview. Of course meaning is great. Deus Ex and The Longest Journey are in my top 3 games of all time. But it is not strictly necessary. And by bullshit meanings I meant specifically that faux-intellectual symbolism which is so killing the art world and putting people off art because they think it's all boring writing and analysis.

 

[guntotingtomcat]

Even if your story is the best in the world, even if your dialogue would put Shakespeare to shame, even if your game world is beautiful and mystical, your game isn't going to be called art outside of the gaming community. You want to know why? It's the "GAME" part of a GAME. You know, the part where you spend hours fighting off hordes of zombie and play phiysics puzzles and take part in random violence. Why is this a dooming quality? Because it could effectively be replaced by cutscenes, and it has no point. "But, you filthy, dirt encrusted dog whose name I don't dare speak lest it soil my soul," I hear you spit from the corner of your mouth as you try to comprehend ralking to someone so utterly disgusting and morally bankrupt, "A lot of art is pointless! Some great works of art don't send us a window into the artists soul. Think of the Dada movement. They just took fucking toilets and turned them into art!" And so you sit back on your throne of moral superioty, having won the day.
Or so you think. But first off, the dada movement was a load of shit between to shits on a shit sandwich, (so I basically included them just to get a dig in,) and all those other pointless bits of art are pointless because that's what they are supposed to be. Their meaning is to be meaningless, so to speak. Whereas all of gaming in games could be replaced by cutscenes. oh, sure, some games will be art, but they won't be games. They'll be linear corridors where your character is savaged by monsters that represent the artists inner demons a few times and then falls down a pit, and your only purpose for playing is to "make you feel his pain." But they won't be called games, oh no. They'll be called "immersive representations" or some such crap. So don't delude yourself. No meta-game is going to come along and redefine art and gaming as we know it. Games will never be accepted.

Now, I'm not just here to get beaten up and have my lunch money stolen, and you're not just here to beat me up and steal my lunch money! Your job, escapists, is to engineer a likely scenario in which games will be accepted. LIKELY! REALISTIC! KEY WORDS, PEOPLE! Or, failing that, just comment on what I've written. I'm just as depressed as you aren't, and I want you to pull me out of my funk. I apologize for the wall of textiness.

Art is subjective.
You are right, by your definition of the word art perhaps. But not by mine.

 

[Smooth Operator]

Sorry mate they already have, maybe sharpen your pitchfork for the next rally and I'll bring the torches.