[WARNING FOR SENSITIVE VIEWERS: My opinions are not rated by the ESRB and may enrage you, I will occasionally make statements where I offer my opinion of the value of certain works of media [example: Modern Warfare is a really bad games, all things considered [I also will make suggestions of certain ideas and ideals that game designers can utilize, but not all ideas I present are suitable for all games, as i quite obvious.]]
Many gamers like saying silly things like "games are art", or rather, they say it in a silly way. That is they just say it, then say Shadow of the Colossus and Braid (or any of the about 10 acceptable "art" titles of the videogaming medium) without ever making their statement meaningful. For while much has been said in the discussion about games potentially being art, less has been said what that means. Unfortunately I don't either really know what that means. But there apparently is a lot of great art out there that isn't a videogame. I have even consumed some of it!
Long story short: it's a lot better (as art) then anything the videogame industry is bound to make any time soon.
The wise Ken Levine told us why. He let us in on the industry secret that all videogame makers have read one book and seen one movie, Lord of the Rings and Aliens (or was it Star Wars?) So he read Atlas Shrugged and some Jules Verne (I'm guessing about the Verne - which is highly recommended) and made Bioshock.
This gets ya thinking, are there other books out there to semi-adapt into good games?
WRONG QUESTION. While there are many books out there that deserve to be retold as videogames, there is a more important question at hand, the question of how the cultural sphere of our world (lets be honest here, we (I) are talking about the western cultural history) can make games actually become good (hyperbole).
[note to self: remind readers that Dante's Inferno is a akin to calling someones mother a hoar, then sleeping with her]
For the sake of our conversation imagine it as a train journey through the Himalayas, we are sitting in the fancy first class compartment decorated in Victorian style. Fortunately there are many distinguished guests that are here to speak with (to) us, some of them even learned English for the present conversation.
The butler (here played by the ever so charming George Clooney) introduces our guests.
Fyodor Dostoevsky [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dostoevsky], Russian author, wrote the best novel ever [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Brothers_Karamazov_(novel)].
James Joyce [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_joyce], Irish teacher, wrote a book [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ulysses_(novel)].
PaulArtSimonGarfunkle [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_%26_Garfunkle], dudes from the East Coast, sang a song [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_%26_Garfunkle].
Anton Chekhov [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anton_Chekhov], another Russian author, wrote plays [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cherry_Orchard], had a gun.
Sonja Åkesson [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonja_Åkesson], Swedish dudette, wrote feminist poetry (you people can't read Swedish anyway).
Neil Gaiman [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neil_gaiman], British storyteller, made the best comic book [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sandman_(Vertigo)] ever written.
Bono [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesus], Irish person, made me cry at least six times last summer when I saw him live.
Pixar [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wall-e]. dirty hippies. [readers may if they wish to imagine Pixar as any character from Wall-E]
And a few empty seats, that in case of emergence will be filled by other artistic luminaries.
Now, a perceptive reader might observe that among other things: all but one (relatively unknown on the internet) of these people are male; all are artists that I personally value very highly; most come from literature; and your favorite artist isn't on the list. All this is fine. I am in no way claiming that these are the only standards from which to measure artistic endeavor from, but they represent many different styles of art and will all contribute to our conversation in some way.
Suddenly the stumbling artistic efforts of the videogame industry throw open the door and enter! [Here represented by Roger Ebert, Brian Crescente and Hideo Kojima]
"Sit" Fyodor says with a thunderous voice, clearly the head of the gathering.
The immature trio quickly, in a subdued manner shuffle into a corner seat.
"We have summoned the three of you here today to discuss matters of vital importance. The gods have blessed you with a brand new medium, but unfortunately for the last 40 years you have been wasting it like the stupid children you are. You are to be taught respect for your elders and to make children of your own. The best way to do so is that each and every one of your grand parents and uncles (and aunt!) that could come here tonight will tell you about what they have done."
[And here we reach the meat of the post, for the sake of fun-fun I am going to talk about art-that-isn't-videogames like it actually was important.]
Dostoevsky is credited with saying "we all came out of Gogol's Overcoat", basically he meant that all the Russian literature of the time was greatly in debt to the Russian novelist Nikolai Gogol, who wrote a popular short-story called "The Overcoat". It was about a poor clerk who is neglected by the world and dies. The idea to write about the downtrodden sides of society and the dark sides of man was quite new and it become the perhaps most defining idea of the Russian literary tradition. It was a idea that most certainly formed the writings of Dostoevsky.
One of the perhaps most remarkable features of him is the incredibly slow pace of his works. His longest work (The Brothers Karamazov) can be up to a thousand pages long (depending on translation/edition) and not really a lot of stuff happens in it. In fact, the following events occur: people talk, people go places, a person goes crazy, at least two people die (only one in a dramatic fashion), a guy parties up some money he stole and a trial happens. And then they talk some more. Reading Dostoevsky is often slow, boring and quite a chore. But! All this slow, lumbering build-up that takes place really really pays off. The conversations have an intensity, despite their dreariness, that is basically unrivaled in any kind of dramatic art. Games are often unwilling to take the time to let their stories unfold properly (see: the abysmal Modern Warfare 2) and perhaps could occasionally learn how to be intense, without keeping a high speed.
Another interesting aspect of Dostoevsky's work is his characters. They often are given symbolic roles that are essential to the story. In Crime and Punishment the main character Raskolnikov is meant to represent the "new enlightened Europe", while the prostitute Sonja is the purity of the simple, Christian people and Svidrigaljov is the decadent nobility. Another way he plays with characters is that he lets them represent very distilled essences of the human experience. In Karamazov he for example uses the character Fyodor (named after himself) to describe debauchery, Alyosha (named after his deceased son) is virtuous and pure, Zosima is Christ(like) and Mitja is wild and can't control his emotions. The things that are expressed with these characters often goes beyond things like "love can be hard" or "I want revenge" and instead dig deep into the human soul, touching the reader (me) at a profound level. It is to much to ask for a videogame to recreate that (no other piece of art in any medium before or after Karamazov has), but the effective use of symbolism in it's characters would be a huge step forward.
It is worth noting that games like Bioshock and Portal (games I shall return to throughout this series) do use at least a little symbolism, especially if you allow for some interpretive wiggle-room (GLaDOS as the overbearing mother, Andrew Ryan an Randian philosophy).
But perhaps the most Dostoevskian game of all is Braid. While the game is primarily poetic is nature it does have a definitive confidence in itself that it actually takes some time to let itself unfold. Not really in terms of gameplay hours, but rather in story development it has a steady pace. There is also a symbolic language at play here, of princesses and lost opportunities. Unfortunately it went straight over the head of most of the gaming community and the game was merely recognized as a pretty, really smart, puzzle game.
[Hence concludes Part 1 of my series that I may just keep writing. I would like to remind you again that I don't suggest all games or even most games follow the ideals I present here.]
Many gamers like saying silly things like "games are art", or rather, they say it in a silly way. That is they just say it, then say Shadow of the Colossus and Braid (or any of the about 10 acceptable "art" titles of the videogaming medium) without ever making their statement meaningful. For while much has been said in the discussion about games potentially being art, less has been said what that means. Unfortunately I don't either really know what that means. But there apparently is a lot of great art out there that isn't a videogame. I have even consumed some of it!
Long story short: it's a lot better (as art) then anything the videogame industry is bound to make any time soon.
The wise Ken Levine told us why. He let us in on the industry secret that all videogame makers have read one book and seen one movie, Lord of the Rings and Aliens (or was it Star Wars?) So he read Atlas Shrugged and some Jules Verne (I'm guessing about the Verne - which is highly recommended) and made Bioshock.
This gets ya thinking, are there other books out there to semi-adapt into good games?
WRONG QUESTION. While there are many books out there that deserve to be retold as videogames, there is a more important question at hand, the question of how the cultural sphere of our world (lets be honest here, we (I) are talking about the western cultural history) can make games actually become good (hyperbole).
[note to self: remind readers that Dante's Inferno is a akin to calling someones mother a hoar, then sleeping with her]
For the sake of our conversation imagine it as a train journey through the Himalayas, we are sitting in the fancy first class compartment decorated in Victorian style. Fortunately there are many distinguished guests that are here to speak with (to) us, some of them even learned English for the present conversation.
The butler (here played by the ever so charming George Clooney) introduces our guests.
Fyodor Dostoevsky [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dostoevsky], Russian author, wrote the best novel ever [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Brothers_Karamazov_(novel)].
James Joyce [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_joyce], Irish teacher, wrote a book [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ulysses_(novel)].
PaulArtSimonGarfunkle [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_%26_Garfunkle], dudes from the East Coast, sang a song [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_%26_Garfunkle].
Anton Chekhov [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anton_Chekhov], another Russian author, wrote plays [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cherry_Orchard], had a gun.
Sonja Åkesson [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonja_Åkesson], Swedish dudette, wrote feminist poetry (you people can't read Swedish anyway).
Neil Gaiman [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neil_gaiman], British storyteller, made the best comic book [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sandman_(Vertigo)] ever written.
Bono [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesus], Irish person, made me cry at least six times last summer when I saw him live.
Pixar [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wall-e]. dirty hippies. [readers may if they wish to imagine Pixar as any character from Wall-E]
And a few empty seats, that in case of emergence will be filled by other artistic luminaries.
Now, a perceptive reader might observe that among other things: all but one (relatively unknown on the internet) of these people are male; all are artists that I personally value very highly; most come from literature; and your favorite artist isn't on the list. All this is fine. I am in no way claiming that these are the only standards from which to measure artistic endeavor from, but they represent many different styles of art and will all contribute to our conversation in some way.
Suddenly the stumbling artistic efforts of the videogame industry throw open the door and enter! [Here represented by Roger Ebert, Brian Crescente and Hideo Kojima]
"Sit" Fyodor says with a thunderous voice, clearly the head of the gathering.
The immature trio quickly, in a subdued manner shuffle into a corner seat.
"We have summoned the three of you here today to discuss matters of vital importance. The gods have blessed you with a brand new medium, but unfortunately for the last 40 years you have been wasting it like the stupid children you are. You are to be taught respect for your elders and to make children of your own. The best way to do so is that each and every one of your grand parents and uncles (and aunt!) that could come here tonight will tell you about what they have done."
[And here we reach the meat of the post, for the sake of fun-fun I am going to talk about art-that-isn't-videogames like it actually was important.]
Dostoevsky is credited with saying "we all came out of Gogol's Overcoat", basically he meant that all the Russian literature of the time was greatly in debt to the Russian novelist Nikolai Gogol, who wrote a popular short-story called "The Overcoat". It was about a poor clerk who is neglected by the world and dies. The idea to write about the downtrodden sides of society and the dark sides of man was quite new and it become the perhaps most defining idea of the Russian literary tradition. It was a idea that most certainly formed the writings of Dostoevsky.
One of the perhaps most remarkable features of him is the incredibly slow pace of his works. His longest work (The Brothers Karamazov) can be up to a thousand pages long (depending on translation/edition) and not really a lot of stuff happens in it. In fact, the following events occur: people talk, people go places, a person goes crazy, at least two people die (only one in a dramatic fashion), a guy parties up some money he stole and a trial happens. And then they talk some more. Reading Dostoevsky is often slow, boring and quite a chore. But! All this slow, lumbering build-up that takes place really really pays off. The conversations have an intensity, despite their dreariness, that is basically unrivaled in any kind of dramatic art. Games are often unwilling to take the time to let their stories unfold properly (see: the abysmal Modern Warfare 2) and perhaps could occasionally learn how to be intense, without keeping a high speed.
Another interesting aspect of Dostoevsky's work is his characters. They often are given symbolic roles that are essential to the story. In Crime and Punishment the main character Raskolnikov is meant to represent the "new enlightened Europe", while the prostitute Sonja is the purity of the simple, Christian people and Svidrigaljov is the decadent nobility. Another way he plays with characters is that he lets them represent very distilled essences of the human experience. In Karamazov he for example uses the character Fyodor (named after himself) to describe debauchery, Alyosha (named after his deceased son) is virtuous and pure, Zosima is Christ(like) and Mitja is wild and can't control his emotions. The things that are expressed with these characters often goes beyond things like "love can be hard" or "I want revenge" and instead dig deep into the human soul, touching the reader (me) at a profound level. It is to much to ask for a videogame to recreate that (no other piece of art in any medium before or after Karamazov has), but the effective use of symbolism in it's characters would be a huge step forward.
It is worth noting that games like Bioshock and Portal (games I shall return to throughout this series) do use at least a little symbolism, especially if you allow for some interpretive wiggle-room (GLaDOS as the overbearing mother, Andrew Ryan an Randian philosophy).
But perhaps the most Dostoevskian game of all is Braid. While the game is primarily poetic is nature it does have a definitive confidence in itself that it actually takes some time to let itself unfold. Not really in terms of gameplay hours, but rather in story development it has a steady pace. There is also a symbolic language at play here, of princesses and lost opportunities. Unfortunately it went straight over the head of most of the gaming community and the game was merely recognized as a pretty, really smart, puzzle game.
[Hence concludes Part 1 of my series that I may just keep writing. I would like to remind you again that I don't suggest all games or even most games follow the ideals I present here.]
