Poll: Are videogames art?

[LobsterFeng]

I have this sneaking suspicion that the OP is taking the piss.

As do I. Either way I haven't laughed so hard at a post in a while.

Oh yeah, that's exactly what I want. Games to become like movies but with only slightly more button presses than a DVD menu.

Besides which, I doubt david cage's stories would impress the prime time NBC audience, much less prove the medium's ability to be art. I mean, maybe beyond two souls would make a good low budget syfy movie, but it's not good.

I mean, with thomas was alone I can at least see you having a good point, because that game actually gives a crap about using interactivity to tell a story. The Stanley Parable and Bastion and Brothers are other good examples of this.

David cage shoved some button pressing into a movie that plays like christopher nolan wrote a shitty, melodramatic version of the Blue Dragon anime. It's nothing more than an overly complicated DVD menu where you basically select the ending, but in a really roundabout way. I get it that people like his games. Whatever, people can like what they like. But being the next evolution of this medium and having all games follow in his way? Hell no.

This guy gets it. The primary reason to play a game for me has always been game play. The people trying to make interactive experiences or whatever seem to be going about it in a way to prove to people like Ebert that games can be art, and that's the wrong way to approach making a game as it gets rid of its primary purpose imo. Also I kind of agree with Ebert but I wonder if I can say that without the whole escapist community assaulting me with quote posts.

 

[Colour Scientist]

I have this sneaking suspicion that the OP is taking the piss.

Video games are a main reason people in today's society are strong. Video games are the reason why we have solidarity; fighting transphobia, homophobia, sexism, transsexism, racism, and classism is a rally behind the media of video games and developers like BioWare. I would even argue that we are stronger than we were in the 60's. No one is a Ku Klux Klan member if they have video games. This post is a thank-you letter - a love letter - to the medium that is changing this world.

You know, I think you might be right.

 

[LetalisK]

While I found the OP amusing, I'll answer it seriously and say "Potentially". Just like any other medium, a specific work can be considered art. That doesn't mean all of that medium is art.

 

[BobblyDrink]

Everything's art as long as you can explain it's artistic integrity. Since art can vary, from a grand painting depicting the trouble and hardship with the very essence of life pouring from the canvas. To someone standing naked in a room, with the word "Clothes" felt-tipped onto the forehead and a carrot up their bum.

Both can be explained and dismissed as being art and not being true art. As long as there's an explanation behind what's there, it can be art. But where there is an explanation there will always be questions, queries and dismissals from personal preferential stand points. There will also be instant acceptance from other people, and that's how art has always been and will always be.

Not all "Art" is good looking, beautifully designed or stunning visually. Sometimes it's just a blank piece of paper with some clever words jumbled together in order to show it's making some form of personal point from the creator. Everything is art. And art is nothing more that personal tastes put on show, it's not going to be for everyone. It can't be.

People need to stop cherry picking out the "best of the best", when trying to argue for gaming in general as an art form. There's a difference between discussing the concept of art under Gaming, and discussing the art of a particular game. So don't try and name drop as many popular game titles as you can in one go, then just sing their praise. One's a discussion of art, the latter is just talking about things you personally like.

Or something along those lines, I'dunno. The title got me thinking, then after reading through the inane babble of words blarghed together. This thread is probably just based around the OP taking the piss, 'cos fuck it. So whatever.

 

[linwolf]

I don't consider them to be, for the most part games focus is entertainment and things where entertainment is the primary goal doesn't fall under art to me. It's the same with movies I don't see it.
For me for it to be art emotions have to be the main focus and well a great number of games do invoke and uses emotion to tell their story, it just isn't the many part of it. Instead it's a tool in bringing the entertainment.

 

[karloss01]

I think it would be better to liken video games to art galleries, yeah the game as a whole isn't art but the individual textures, models and dialogues used within definitely are. the video game is the theme of the exhibition and we're all just moving from one piece to the next with varying levels of understanding and interest.

 

[OmniscientOstrich]

If you can sign a urinal and call it art I think games more than qualify.

 

[Jadak]

No, nothing is art, art is a stupid term that can be selectively applied to anything or nothing, it has no merit as a categorization. Play your games, listen to your music, view your visual mediums, whatever. Calling it art or not doesn't make fuck all of a difference, enjoy it or don't and quit debating "art".

 

[FrostDragon]

Thanks for all the serious replies. As for those who think me a troll, you exemplify the kind of conservative "no-progress" attitudes criticized so commonly by David Cage and others, and it is perhaps your unwillingness to accept games as an artform that has trapped us in our current quagmire of non-progress and pitiful "Call Of Duty" style games. If you took a computer programming class, you would see that programming itself is an artform.

Also those who criticize Cage's works as simply "movies with buttons" have clearly missed the point. Had you played and replayed B:TS and Heavy Rain, it would become most apparent to you that there are, in actual fact, multiple different ways for the game to play out based on the player's input. And it is in this way that games propel themselves beyond books and movies as a narrative storytelling device - interactive fiction is inherently superior. Can you imagine if we could interact with classics such as "Citizen Kane", "Casablanca" or "Gone With The Wind"? Guide the characters through their journey? This is what developers like Cage aspire to, and this is one day what videogames will be - the New Media, the choice of all. The Roger Eberts of this world will be long forgotten as relics, their trade (cinema) an obsolete medium.

 

[Zhukov]

As for those who think me a troll...

Oh, I don't think you're a troll. A troll posts incendiary things intended to get a rise out of people and start fights.

No, I think you're just joking around with us.

I once read about this scientist, a physicist if memory serves, who wrote a long article and submitted it to a journal of sociology. The article was gibberish, complete nonsense carefully constructed to look like it was saying something when in fact it was just a lot of long words and run-on sentences. The journal published the article, then the guy who wrote it turned around and had a good laugh at their expense.

I think you're doing something like that guy.

I mean, come on.

Innovators such as David Cage spearhead gaming's march toward enlightenment, with his magnum opus Beyond: Two Souls showing us the kind of storytelling games are capable of. B:TS is a piece of transcendental fiction - slipping the bonds of it's medium and becoming something greater than both games and movies, a piece of true art.

B:TS didn't transcend jack shit, it was a hilarious mess.

"You just hate David Cage and can't accept that someone else can enjoy and find meaning in his work!"

Okay, fine, ya got me there. But even this bit is ridiculous:

Video games are the reason why we have solidarity; fighting transphobia, homophobia, sexism, transsexism, racism, and classism is a rally behind the media of video games and developers like BioWare.

I like Bioware, and even I find this silly.

And that's before we get to gems like this:

Think about the Civil Rights Movement. What if Martin Luther King Jr. didn't have the courage to fight for what he thought was right? Now think of Phil Fish. Do you think he could have told his story? Fought for what he thought was right?

Video games are a main reason people in today's society are strong.

I have no problem with video games being art. I enjoy some art-y games. I love Journey. The Walking Dead made me cry despite basically being a poorly animated episodic movie. I loved Bioshock Infinite and The Last of Us.

And reading your post makes me feel like a Christian who has just stumbled across the Landover Baptist Church [http://www.landoverbaptist.net/] website.

Which is why I think you're taking the piss.

 

[FrostDragon]

B:TS didn't transcend jack shit, it was a hilarious mess.

As you proceed to say yourself, enjoyment and meaning is subjective, although Cage comes as close as one may get to being objectively good as all his games set out to do, they accomplish superbly, seamlessly weaving story, emotion, sound and gameplay together into one glorious whole.

I like Bioware, and even I find this silly.

Perhaps you did not fully experience BioWare's message? Indeed, many BioWare staff themselves confirm that their games battle against issues like transphobia and cissexism, and represent the frontier of the battle for social justice in the West:
http://www.polygon.com/2014/3/19/5528066/mass-effect-manveer-heir-gdc-social-injustice

While trolls and bigots may conspire to cause BioWare's efforts to flounder, their goals are clear - and we have them to thank for being a major stepping stone on the path to games being appreciated as an artform, a reflection of the human soul.

I do not see any problem with comparing Fish to Dr. King, as both of them struggled against overwhelming opposition for what was ultimately right. I also fail to see the error in stating that videogames are one of the primary contributing factors to societal strength in today's world. While racism and sexism may no longer exist in mainstream American society, we can always look for ways to improve, and videogames light the way.

 

[Racecarlock]

B:TS didn't transcend jack shit, it was a hilarious mess.

As you proceed to say yourself, enjoyment and meaning is subjective, although Cage comes as close as one may get to being objectively good as all his games set out to do, they accomplish superbly, seamlessly weaving story, emotion, sound and gameplay together into one glorious whole.

Ok, you clearly don't know what objectively means. It means that everyone finds it good. There is no such thing as an objectively good game. It's all subjective. You need to understand that.

As for weaving together story and gameplay, no. The gameplay is just pressing buttons to watch cutscenes. Compare that to something like The Elite Series, wherein you are a space pilot and you get to choose any career. You can be a delivery boy, a bounty hunter, or a member of the military. You can explore any solar system, go anywhere you want and be who you want to be.

Beyond two souls just has you pick from different endings. That's all it is. You don't get to make your own unique story or characters. It's a DVD with an overly complicated chapter selection screen. I'm fine with people liking that. Whatever.

But objectively good? I don't think so.

 

[Robot Number V]

I have this sneaking suspicion that the OP is taking the piss.

Christ, I sure hope so. That post is just a whirlwind of insanity. "No one is a KKK member if they have videogames"? Haha, what?

And OP, I'm looking at some of your other posts, so I'll just say this preemptively: Yes, videogames are art. Yes, programming is art. Hell, I think if some engineer out there designs a really efficient toilet, that's art too.

But you are either you're being entirely satirical (and doing it pretty well, I might add) or you are utterly, blisteringly insane.

PS: Also, "art" is completely meaningless and subjective distinction. Arguing about whether or not something constitutes "art" is sort of like arguing over which language has the best word for "table".

Or something.

 

[2012 Wont Happen]

It depends on the game. Most games that are released aren't art just like most movies that are released aren't art.. However, just as with movies, there are plenty of games that are art.

 

[NoX 9]

Bump as the subject of this thread deserves a greater level of discussion. As gaming matures as a medium through titles such as BioShock Infinite and Spec Ops: The Line, this is a discussion that needs to be had.

Hasn't this discussion already been going for many years? Not that we can't continue talking about it, but you seem to imply that it is an overlooked subject that deserves a turn in the spotlight. The debate has been raging for ages, countless popular videogame personalities have voiced their opinion, and the overwhelming majority within the gaming world seem to think that videogames can indeed be art. The 'fight' will be out in the general world now, but in any case it is only a matter of time before the generations that grew up with videogames 'take over' and they become accepted alongside any other form of entertainment, which essentially is what all art is. Just entertainment. Well, I say 'just'...

For the record, my vote is YES.

 

[Avery]

Yes. Whether there are too many games that actually take advantage of that fact is debatable though.

 

[D YellowMadness]

I find it weird that Picasso's random insanity is called art so readily yet people still argue about whether or not videogames are art. They have pictures, music, & story. That means they're art.

 

[Racecarlock]

I think Saints Row IV is pretty great art. Come at me, bro.

 

[Phrozenflame500]

Innovators such as David Cage spearhead gaming's march toward enlightenment, with his magnum opus Beyond: Two Souls showing us the kind of storytelling games are capable of. B:TS is a piece of transcendental fiction - slipping the bonds of it's medium and becoming something greater than both games and movies, a piece of true art.

Jesus Christ just reading this made me super butthurt, B:TS had the dumbest plot imaginable and was pretty much the definitive proof that David Cage couldn't write even if he had a cool idea handed to him.

But yeah, video games are art even the bad ones. To argue otherwise would imply a greater consensus on the definition of "art" then what actually exists.

 

[BearShark]

I'd say they're art in the way movies are. You have your big AAA/Blockbuster titles that aren't as artsy and are designed to make the most possible money, but there are also smaller titles, that often make less, but most certainly qualify as "art".