Tom RhodesIn a world without games, perhaps we would see other technologies fill the void. Tom Rhodes looks at this possibility, which is rather likely to occur anyway.
Issue 35 - Unremembering William
- Thread starter The Escapist Staff
- Start date
Original Comment by: Dave Allen
I took the time to click on your Roger Ebert link, and was dismayed but unsurprised to read the following:
"...I did indeed consider video games inherently inferior to film and literature. There is a structural reason for that: Video games by their nature require player choices, which is the opposite of the strategy of serious film and literature, which requires authorial control.
I am prepared to believe that video games can be elegant, subtle, sophisticated, challenging and visually wonderful. But I believe the nature of the medium prevents it from moving beyond craftsmanship to the stature of art. To my knowledge, no one in or out of the field has ever been able to cite a game worthy of comparison with the great dramatists, poets, filmmakers, novelists and composers. That a game can aspire to artistic importance as a visual experience, I accept. But for most gamers, video games represent a loss of those precious hours we have available to make ourselves more cultured, civilized and empathetic."
Wow! Didn't he write the screenplay for a Russ Meyer movie? "Beyond the Valley of the Ultra-vixens?" That's 2 precious culture-grubbing hours that many people are never going to get back. Unless that was the other guy, the late Gene Siskel.
I would have to say that based on most of the popular movies this year?and Ebert has been a tireless champion of the popular movie?most filmgoers aren't lapping up any more of the milk of human kindness or the cream of intellectual civilization than any given gamer. And I have to say I honestly feel my precious cultural time is better spent on "Diablo 2" than on reading "The DaVinci Code."
Seriously, though. If you are trying to make an apples-to-apples comparison of conventional narrative vehicles vs. computer/video games, what is the basis of comparison? The experiences they provide? Learning? empathic Bonding? Emotional turmoil? How can you rule out the idea that a game couldn't provide all that? Maybe gaming doesn't have its Shakespeare yet, but that doesn't mean there can't be one.
And don't get me started on the idea of authorial control--far better minds than mine have argued that the idea of the author itself is moot.
Anyhoo. Phew! Had to vent. I enjoyed your article very much. And it's nice to see that you understand that the urge to play is so essential to humanity that no matter the platform, whether it's tic-tac-toe drawn in the sand or Halo 3, games will always be played.
I took the time to click on your Roger Ebert link, and was dismayed but unsurprised to read the following:
"...I did indeed consider video games inherently inferior to film and literature. There is a structural reason for that: Video games by their nature require player choices, which is the opposite of the strategy of serious film and literature, which requires authorial control.
I am prepared to believe that video games can be elegant, subtle, sophisticated, challenging and visually wonderful. But I believe the nature of the medium prevents it from moving beyond craftsmanship to the stature of art. To my knowledge, no one in or out of the field has ever been able to cite a game worthy of comparison with the great dramatists, poets, filmmakers, novelists and composers. That a game can aspire to artistic importance as a visual experience, I accept. But for most gamers, video games represent a loss of those precious hours we have available to make ourselves more cultured, civilized and empathetic."
Wow! Didn't he write the screenplay for a Russ Meyer movie? "Beyond the Valley of the Ultra-vixens?" That's 2 precious culture-grubbing hours that many people are never going to get back. Unless that was the other guy, the late Gene Siskel.
I would have to say that based on most of the popular movies this year?and Ebert has been a tireless champion of the popular movie?most filmgoers aren't lapping up any more of the milk of human kindness or the cream of intellectual civilization than any given gamer. And I have to say I honestly feel my precious cultural time is better spent on "Diablo 2" than on reading "The DaVinci Code."
Seriously, though. If you are trying to make an apples-to-apples comparison of conventional narrative vehicles vs. computer/video games, what is the basis of comparison? The experiences they provide? Learning? empathic Bonding? Emotional turmoil? How can you rule out the idea that a game couldn't provide all that? Maybe gaming doesn't have its Shakespeare yet, but that doesn't mean there can't be one.
And don't get me started on the idea of authorial control--far better minds than mine have argued that the idea of the author itself is moot.
Anyhoo. Phew! Had to vent. I enjoyed your article very much. And it's nice to see that you understand that the urge to play is so essential to humanity that no matter the platform, whether it's tic-tac-toe drawn in the sand or Halo 3, games will always be played.
Original Comment by: Adriana Aires
To follow up on the conversation about culture and games being part of high culture or not:
Being a former art history and philosphy student and a literature devotée I would like to say that the reason why all these subjects are seen as so "superior" has more with time to do than them actually being superior. The study of art in itself helps art to establish itself as important (follow what I'm getting at?). If you compare literature to film, the latter is much lower in the invisible hierachy of the arts, because of it's young age (more or less).
What I'm getting at is that with time, when for example universities over the world encourage game-creating, when we start to study the history of gaming and documenting it, game-creation will be more and more seen as an art.
To follow up on the conversation about culture and games being part of high culture or not:
Being a former art history and philosphy student and a literature devotée I would like to say that the reason why all these subjects are seen as so "superior" has more with time to do than them actually being superior. The study of art in itself helps art to establish itself as important (follow what I'm getting at?). If you compare literature to film, the latter is much lower in the invisible hierachy of the arts, because of it's young age (more or less).
What I'm getting at is that with time, when for example universities over the world encourage game-creating, when we start to study the history of gaming and documenting it, game-creation will be more and more seen as an art.
Original Comment by: Slartibartfast
Adriana:
I think exactly the same thing. Almost every form of art that is considered "serious" today was at one point thought to be vulgar and inferior and the time of its inception.
Our time wil come.
Adriana:
I think exactly the same thing. Almost every form of art that is considered "serious" today was at one point thought to be vulgar and inferior and the time of its inception.
Our time wil come.
Original Comment by: Tom Rhodes
Adriana:
I think a big part of it is a pissing contest, to be frank. It breaks down like this:
Authors: Our art form is better because it's one of the oldest, and we create the entire universe with WORDS!
Artists: No! Ours is better because we are definitely the oldest (cave paintings, anyone?) and a picture is worth a thousand words, doncha know.
Musicians: Not even. Music can soothe the savage breast, move mountains, let people fall in love, and evoke an emotion each and every time it's heard!
Filmmakers: Pheh, please. Film combines all the best aspects from all of your artforms -- a great story, powerful music, stunning visuals, strong character connections -- into one package. Therefore, we are the best.
Game Designers: Uh...we have pong!
Obviously the designers haven't found their voice just yet. ;-)
Adriana:
I think a big part of it is a pissing contest, to be frank. It breaks down like this:
Authors: Our art form is better because it's one of the oldest, and we create the entire universe with WORDS!
Artists: No! Ours is better because we are definitely the oldest (cave paintings, anyone?) and a picture is worth a thousand words, doncha know.
Musicians: Not even. Music can soothe the savage breast, move mountains, let people fall in love, and evoke an emotion each and every time it's heard!
Filmmakers: Pheh, please. Film combines all the best aspects from all of your artforms -- a great story, powerful music, stunning visuals, strong character connections -- into one package. Therefore, we are the best.
Game Designers: Uh...we have pong!
Obviously the designers haven't found their voice just yet. ;-)
Original Comment by: Dave Allen
"Obviously the designers haven't found their voice just yet. ;-)"
Well, if so, it's not your fault. Great piece.
We'll just live for the day when the computer game has its own "Academic-Critical-Industrial Complex" to rival literature and film, when we have our Buadrillards, Harold Blooms, and Pauline Kaels fiercely slinging shibboleths at each other in the pages of the New Yorker. Of course, by then, the Escapist will be beamed directly into our I-Head implants by global Braincast(TM), so we'll all be on the same wavelength.
"Obviously the designers haven't found their voice just yet. ;-)"
Well, if so, it's not your fault. Great piece.
We'll just live for the day when the computer game has its own "Academic-Critical-Industrial Complex" to rival literature and film, when we have our Buadrillards, Harold Blooms, and Pauline Kaels fiercely slinging shibboleths at each other in the pages of the New Yorker. Of course, by then, the Escapist will be beamed directly into our I-Head implants by global Braincast(TM), so we'll all be on the same wavelength.
Original Comment by: Brian Easton
It's interesting that you chose Tennis For Two. While it was clearly the first video game, only visitors to Brookhaven in the span of 1958-59 would have been able to play it. Spacewar seems to be the first widely known video game. I guess for the purposes of the article Tennis For Two was easier since it only had one creator.
It's interesting that you chose Tennis For Two. While it was clearly the first video game, only visitors to Brookhaven in the span of 1958-59 would have been able to play it. Spacewar seems to be the first widely known video game. I guess for the purposes of the article Tennis For Two was easier since it only had one creator.
Original Comment by: Tom Rhodes
Brian:
Yeah, plus the whole thing about William was meant as a backdrop to a thought piece on how the world would have evolved without games.
Dave:
Who told you about the implants? WHO?!
Brian:
Yeah, plus the whole thing about William was meant as a backdrop to a thought piece on how the world would have evolved without games.
Dave:
Who told you about the implants? WHO?!
Original Comment by: Dave Allen
"Who told you about the implants?"
Well, gee, I just woke up one morning knowing about them. Of course, I did fall asleep the night before with my head on my laptop.
"Who told you about the implants?"
Well, gee, I just woke up one morning knowing about them. Of course, I did fall asleep the night before with my head on my laptop.
Original Comment by: Mark
The artistic power of a video game is, in my opinion, like a film with elements of a live storyteller - not even theater, just a narrator who listens to the audience. Granted, that's only for some types of game, usually - but not always - the kind with an actual story to tell or a coherent setting or something. The Legend of Zelda. Super Mario Brothers. Metal Gear. Mega Man. Even The Sims. Some of them are fairly silly, but they're no less artistic than your average h0memade science-fiction-horror B-movie starring a rubber mask.
Other games are, of course, much more difficult to make a case for, as they're abstract representations of a private or interpersonal competitive or cooperative situation. Tetris. Pong. Madden 2006. These can provide the basis for other art, but in and of themselves they are no more artistic than chess or backgammon or basketball. They are not the work, but they can be the symbols.
Others still are not so much art as they are tools for creating art. The Movies and Electroplankton are obvious as a examples, but any game with a level editor or toolset can be counted among these. And, of course, single games can fulfill several roles.
Online games are abstractions of social interaction constructed with static art and with elements of the other three scattered throughout to taste.
Simulations, of course, are not art, but rather tools. Tools can be entertaining and profound, and I suppose that qualifies some of them to be art.
A thing that contains art is not automatically art, nor is everything art that contains art. A video game with which the author intends to present something more than a set of rules, in my opinion, is - or has the potential to be - art. The rules are what make it a game, and the electronically visual nature is what makes it a video game. The expressive content makes it art.
The more important question is not whether video games can be art, but whether video games are meritorious as art.
The artistic power of a video game is, in my opinion, like a film with elements of a live storyteller - not even theater, just a narrator who listens to the audience. Granted, that's only for some types of game, usually - but not always - the kind with an actual story to tell or a coherent setting or something. The Legend of Zelda. Super Mario Brothers. Metal Gear. Mega Man. Even The Sims. Some of them are fairly silly, but they're no less artistic than your average h0memade science-fiction-horror B-movie starring a rubber mask.
Other games are, of course, much more difficult to make a case for, as they're abstract representations of a private or interpersonal competitive or cooperative situation. Tetris. Pong. Madden 2006. These can provide the basis for other art, but in and of themselves they are no more artistic than chess or backgammon or basketball. They are not the work, but they can be the symbols.
Others still are not so much art as they are tools for creating art. The Movies and Electroplankton are obvious as a examples, but any game with a level editor or toolset can be counted among these. And, of course, single games can fulfill several roles.
Online games are abstractions of social interaction constructed with static art and with elements of the other three scattered throughout to taste.
Simulations, of course, are not art, but rather tools. Tools can be entertaining and profound, and I suppose that qualifies some of them to be art.
A thing that contains art is not automatically art, nor is everything art that contains art. A video game with which the author intends to present something more than a set of rules, in my opinion, is - or has the potential to be - art. The rules are what make it a game, and the electronically visual nature is what makes it a video game. The expressive content makes it art.
The more important question is not whether video games can be art, but whether video games are meritorious as art.