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Games as Art
Urian
__BANNED USERS regular
__BANNED USERS regular
Are video games art? What kind of games have artistic or purposeful merit? To set off the conversation, I'm gonna talk about Silent Hill 2 to give you an example of what I think constitutes art in video games.
Watch this video for a good preface to what I'm talking about in this thread:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=21s45Yel5VM
Silent Hill 2 is one of the most personally influential pieces of entertainment/art i've ever come across. If it were possible for something to transcend most forms of artistic entertainment-- music, visuals, player interaction (video games), and make one complete package intended for full immersion from the audience/player, this would be it. It is a video game, but I think it's also so much more. It comprises elements of film, music, video game and player interaction, sense of atmosphere and immersion, all of these things to get the player/audience to live and breathe in the story and have such a close relationship with the main character that by the end of his journey (as well as the players own journey), the emotions of the main character are the same as the players emotions, which is an accomplishment that only the best films and the best games can ever get. And the feelings that games like this can evoke in my opinion are much different if not stronger than films, because while the story is predetermined, the player is actively involved in it because they are the ones who are in charge of the job of progressing the story, they're not watching it play out, they ARE playing it out.
Not only is Silent Hill 2 an incredibly immersive gaming experience, but it's a pure and simple psychological story about themes anyone can understand and relate to; only it takes those themes and sends them to the darkest depths of all aspects of human emotion, and cuts to the core truths that most people don't want to see or know about, and illustrates all of these emotions through the renowned visual style that Silent Hill is known for. Very fitting that the horrifying visuals in this game are simply there to represent the mindscape of the main character; the monsters and side characters to represent aspects of that mindscape-- guilt, fear, revenge, anger, lust, desire, etc. It's a metaphysical journey-- every moment of the game serves a purpose, and it all comes together in the end with an ending that you inadvertantly chose, as there are a few multiple endings, but all of them working towards the same artistic goal.
It keeps you immersed and entertained, provides a challenge, tells a masterful story, has characters with depth, and sends a strong message by the end, regardless of whatever ending you get to. Some say it's mostly a movie, some say it's a good game, I just say it's a combination of all the elements. It has cinematic values, general gaming values, good scares, great player interaction, a beautiful musical score that compliments the story and visual presentation, and a story that has always been thought provoking to this day (it's been 6 years since the game came out).
So, now you guys get to list off what you think qualifies the most as art in the world of video games. You don't have type up as much as I did about them, but at least say why you think it's artistic.
Watch this video for a good preface to what I'm talking about in this thread:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=21s45Yel5VM
Silent Hill 2 is one of the most personally influential pieces of entertainment/art i've ever come across. If it were possible for something to transcend most forms of artistic entertainment-- music, visuals, player interaction (video games), and make one complete package intended for full immersion from the audience/player, this would be it. It is a video game, but I think it's also so much more. It comprises elements of film, music, video game and player interaction, sense of atmosphere and immersion, all of these things to get the player/audience to live and breathe in the story and have such a close relationship with the main character that by the end of his journey (as well as the players own journey), the emotions of the main character are the same as the players emotions, which is an accomplishment that only the best films and the best games can ever get. And the feelings that games like this can evoke in my opinion are much different if not stronger than films, because while the story is predetermined, the player is actively involved in it because they are the ones who are in charge of the job of progressing the story, they're not watching it play out, they ARE playing it out.
Not only is Silent Hill 2 an incredibly immersive gaming experience, but it's a pure and simple psychological story about themes anyone can understand and relate to; only it takes those themes and sends them to the darkest depths of all aspects of human emotion, and cuts to the core truths that most people don't want to see or know about, and illustrates all of these emotions through the renowned visual style that Silent Hill is known for. Very fitting that the horrifying visuals in this game are simply there to represent the mindscape of the main character; the monsters and side characters to represent aspects of that mindscape-- guilt, fear, revenge, anger, lust, desire, etc. It's a metaphysical journey-- every moment of the game serves a purpose, and it all comes together in the end with an ending that you inadvertantly chose, as there are a few multiple endings, but all of them working towards the same artistic goal.
It keeps you immersed and entertained, provides a challenge, tells a masterful story, has characters with depth, and sends a strong message by the end, regardless of whatever ending you get to. Some say it's mostly a movie, some say it's a good game, I just say it's a combination of all the elements. It has cinematic values, general gaming values, good scares, great player interaction, a beautiful musical score that compliments the story and visual presentation, and a story that has always been thought provoking to this day (it's been 6 years since the game came out).
So, now you guys get to list off what you think qualifies the most as art in the world of video games. You don't have type up as much as I did about them, but at least say why you think it's artistic.
Urian on
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I'll make a substantial post about my opinions regarding video games and art, but for now I'll just sit back and read some of the comments first.
This thread can be fucking awesome or just down right retarded, so I hope all you people waiting to set this thread on fire think about coming up with good arguments first.
Honestly, asking a forum dedicated to playing video games whether or not video games are culturally significant? Are you actually expecting anybody here to say "No, I find games an intellectual void?" Start showing me some games that you think do not have artistic merit if you're going to claim that only some do. Pacman certainly evokes an emotive response in people, probably as much in some as Silent Hill could, and has certainly had a larger cultural impact. Does that make it an even greater work of art? Where is this line in the sand where something does or does not qualify as art? And if you're going to claim that all games are art, then what's the point in even asking the question as to what is the artsiest?
I do agree though. Most people here will agree to some extent. Maybe, first define what you believe art is, and what art is not?
I claim that certain games have grander ambitions, higher artistic aspirations than others. With the space, money, and time the developers have to craft an experience, some developers put more thought and sense of purpose into the game than others do.
A game needs to have a narrative, a story, to be even remotely artistic, so Pacman is obviously out. The only games I consider to be artistic are games that are about ideas or have the intention of provoking thought after you've completed the game.
The definition is highly interpretive and different for everyone. Crysis could be artistic to some people because of the specific experience it gives you, the presentation and the effect it has on the player. But when you turn it off you don't go to bed thinking about it, it was just a drug, a quick fun fix. At least that's how it is for me.
edit: Yeah, art is entirely subjective, so that's what most interests me about the responses people might give here. My concept of art is pretty specific and I try not to have a fragile line between what is and isn't art, but sometimes it's kind of difficult and it seems like my sense of it is actually very fragile, but then again everyone knows what games make them think about life and existence and emotions and all those big ideas, and what games don't.
Soul Reaver 2 or Okami with no dialogue or verbal communication or text whatsoever would still have stories. The player travels through areas and sees a progression of the main character, there are significant changes from the start to the end, and events have clearly happened.
The story is told through visuals. Ico is an EXCELLENT example of this. By the end of the visual journey, it leaves you thinking about the journey, and about bigger questions and bigger ideas. This is where it gets kind of fragile-- some games do this, same games don't, obviously with a more obvious narrative instead of a purely visual one it's easier to make a distinction. The games that don't work into what i'm talking about is stuff like Doom 3, Unreal Tournament, Serious Sam-- games that do take you on a visual journey, like any game, but do not have anything going on under the surface because of what those surfaces are. There's no depth to them, it's either point A to point B, or an adrenaline rush. To me, there just aren't any ideas behind these surfaces and the games just exist as entertainment pure and simple.
Ico, Okami, Soul Reaver, Shadow of the Colossus, Silent Hill, these games have stories ingrained into their visuals. We're obviously getting into opinionated territory here, but these are my feelings about it.
Art is so subjective it's really difficult to say. Anything can be art. I mean, on a very different note to FF, Halo has some really wonderful designs and a really believable, cohesive universe, even if the substance of Halo isn't so arty. Most wouldn't consider it art because of the way it plays and because the story is that of an action movie. But the design is great, and surely art. The music, too. The atmosphere it creates. So is the game as a whole art? Or is the gameplay and story more important than the art design.... I've gone cross eyed.
XBL/PSN/Steam: APZonerunner
At the same time I don't think there's any example of a game that is currently on the market that I would qualify as art.
To me one of the defining characteristics of art is that it produces a fundamentally different experience for each and every observer. As it stands I would say that this just doesn't exist currently in the market because no matter how "artistic" a game may be, the bottom line is; you are being lead, hand held, from beginning to end, through the experience. This very idea makes a game not art, because while interpretations of said game may vary as to the meaning of events or images, you're lead to and through a very particular point of view and the potential experience of the game is going to be intentionally narrow.
I think though, that as technology expands to the point of "games" being completely accessible to everyone and the interaction required to experience the "games" is so intuitive as to be completely indistinguishable from any other aspect of the experience, the possibility of a game as art will be achieved.
At this point in the game though, any attempt at making a completely subjective game, which could qualify as art, would be virtually impossible. Not only from a development standpoint, but from a gameplay standpoint. We still need to be lead by the hand from start to finish of a game. We still need to experience a game in a "set" manner (i.e. individual in front of an output device, holding an input device furthering the game). Even if someone did produce a game that went beyond this I think no one would even get it. By get it I don't really mean "buy it", though I think that is also the case, but "get it" the same way someone can look at a Warhol piece and "get it" but others just see crap.
Anyway that's my 2 cents. Obviously the entire subject is purely subjective.
Origin: Galedrid - Nintendo: Galedrid/3222-6858-1045
Blizzard: Galedrid#1367 - FFXIV: Galedrid Kingshand
So yes it is art.
With that logic, were being hand-held through every movie, piece of art, anything. Interpretation and the encouragement of thought is the key to something being artistic. In fact, the very act of holding your hand through a specific experience is what allows the ideas to be communicated.
Yes, it was a completely offtopic tangent that I kept shutting down. I don't think it came to a stalemate as much as I told people to stay on topic and take it elsewhere.
Someone interested in this thread would be well served going through and whipping out all the games is art posts from the Videogame Criticism thread and reposting it here.
I'm glad this thread exists, I can tell people being off topic to come here. Godspeed gentlemen, sadly the topic holds no interest for me.
Sometimes, yes. But if you look at, say, a jackson pollok painting virtually nothing is being communicated to the observer. I agree that one of the basic points of art is to communicate something, in the sense that art produces a response, which is by nature communication. However, I would argue the degree of being lead and something still being considered art. It's rare (I can't think of any off the top of my head actually, but I'm sure I could if I though hard enough) that I ever see a movie as "art" for this reason.
But then the debate goes to "what is art" which is impossible to conclude. Is "dogs playing poker" art? I mean, it could have meaning implied, it was a painting produced in a typical "artistic" fashion, but is it art?
That's for the individual to decide. Which is an amazingly lame answer but it's the truth. There are, sure, basic tenants of what makes something art; so someone can't just throw some trash on the ground and say "ART!" (though this actually does happen...) but in the end what makes art interesting to you is infinitely more important than what a textbook or scholar says is interesting about art.
But my point was less "what I'm saying is correct" and more "what I'm saying is how I feel about the subject, it's just my perspective on it".
Origin: Galedrid - Nintendo: Galedrid/3222-6858-1045
Blizzard: Galedrid#1367 - FFXIV: Galedrid Kingshand
.... this is really something I never understand.
Yes, it represents the artist, but, as you said, it represents a chosen subset of the artist's themes, feelings or ideas so wouldn't it be more accurate to say that it represents those themes, feelings and ideas?
And if you look at it like that what's the difference anyway?
Also, rather than argue why games are art, why not argue why games aren't art?
Really, can someone give an example of an element in games that objectively disqualifies it as art?
What constitutes art in games is not the same as what constitutes art in movies, literature, music, painting. Aspects of what constitutes art in all those media can feature in a game, and when asking "are games art" it's easy to compare games to those media, artistically. However, that's overlooking a huge amount of what makes games games. Level design can be art (and I don't mean in the sense of architecture, I mean level flow, item placement etc). Control schemes can be art. Game mechanics can be art. And if we're going to look at games as art, we need to be discussing the aspects that are unique to games at least as much as those which are common to many media.
I'm talking about art in relation to the affect the game has on the player once the game is completed, as well as the active experience they're having while playing it. The things relevant to that experience. Level design, control schemes and all that are part of the game and part of the process in completing the experience, but they are not apparent or important to the player in regards to the overall psychological impact of the experience of playing the game.
The most important thing in a game for me is the feeling you get when playing it, the connection you make with the gameworld and the overall effect it had on you when you finished it. For you, what's the most prevalent thought games usually leave you with when you finish them?
Michaelangelo's David is art but is so distanced from games and film that you can't compare the two. The only thing they have in common is that both are communicating to the viewer through different interpretations.
Games are primarily design and like design they utilise artistic elements.
Design is as, if not more, important to society than art so why care if they are or are not art? They're design, that's fucking brilliant all by itself.
I agree with this.
Though design itself to me is pretty much art.
You're not understanding me. Example: Silent Hill 2's design worked on a design level and as a design that complimented it's artistic intentions. It was a game with artistic design from the get-go. Design is the most important thing in games, but some games reach for the stars and try to go even further than that. Why not have a discussion about that kind of ambition? Design may be more important but why does that mean the discussion of trying to achieve something higher is irrellivant just because games might not need it?
What qualifies as "art" is subjective to the point that you cannot demonstrably prove that something is or is not art. Instead, a work, or genre, or medium, becomes art somewhere between the time that somebody asks "is this art?" and the time that nobody is asking that question anymore.
This is a shitty answer, but I think it's the best possible way to sum it up. What's art to one person is often mundane and forgettable to another--there's a critical point where enough people consider something art that everyone else start taking it for granted. I don't think games as a medium are anywhere near that critical point (which is not to say that they never will be).
It's funny that people get into arguments in threads like these, because there's so many different ways to approach the question.
You mention the narrative and expository aspects of games as being factors in whether you consider a game art. But somebody else approaching the question might argue that, since narrative and exposition are aspects of art that games share with other media--film, painting, sculpture, music, literature, i.e. basically everything else--that they are the least important aspects to consider when looking specifically at games.
There's guys like Rod Humble who'll tell you that the act of playing the game is what sets a game apart from any other form of media, and that the true artistry comes from creating a user interface and game environment that gives you a specific experience (or allows you a certain range of experiences).
I'm fairly convinced that this is a hugely important reason these threads always seem to crash and burn. There's so many goddamned ways to answer the question "is this game art?" that there's no right answers, and eventually somebody comes into the thread who's less interested in being right than in other people being wrong.
I guess so. My personal view is that games are art and then some. Like Antihippy says, design is a form of art and uses artistic techniques and has parallel goals with art. I disagree fundamentally with the notion that design doesn't 'reach for the stars' or is somehow emotionally, intellectually or spiritually inferior to art. Design calls on all the same functions as art but goes beyond art. The only way to argue that game design isn't art is to say that it is more than art. Which is of course entirely accurate. Design emerged from art but gathered up added intent on it's journey. It's like saying 'humans aren't apes'. No, they're apes evolved.
So fuck art. I piss on art. I chew it up and spit it on itself. Art is just another tool to a designer, the means to an end, not the end itself. A designer takes all the mediums and techniques of art, exploits symbolism and the emotional response of colour pallets, draws on cultural references, politics, the portrait, the landscape, the still life, artistic movements, abstraction, realism, surrealism and what does he do with it? He doesn't create a static piece of 'art', a statue or a painting or some other artefact that has no value beyond itself; he creates a living, breathing design that has function beyond the art; that serves a role, a function that generates wealth beyond the narrow dialogue of the emotions of the viewer and the bank balance of the dealer.
So yeah, lets talk about brilliantly well design games and how they're better than art.
No it just struck me as an odd thing to say.
I'll shoot, art is something created that moves you emotionally in someway be it intentional or otherwise. Great art is art that not only triggers an emotional response but also makes you think.
So that all sounded a bit loopy but I'll sit by it. And a game that so god damned frustrating that you end up pegging a controller into a wall doesn't count.
This is not to completely sideline art. It has an important and valuable role in our society. It's just limited in comparison to design.
This I agree with. Myst is an excellent example of art.
As design, however, :v:
Fuck the cover art, I'm talking about the GAME, bitches.
We know, it's just that the US cover art is a running joke, compared to the European cover art, which was IIRC inspired by some artist or other. Not that anyone should care about that, because it's an awesome design regardless.
And yeah, great game design also.
Shit, why should we care if games are? They probably are, whatever methodology they need to stand up to.
My problem with games as, I don't even want to use that fucking word art, so just my general problem with games is that they often go for giving the player simple entertainment instead of an emotional experience. It's like the difference between a good movie and the shit on tv. No, it's not easy to make people care about characters, worlds, themes, or narratives in a deeper sense than "oh, what happens next? ok". But that should be attempted. And what game developers are actually aiming for with elements like that is to accomplish the base level that players will forgive them for so everyone has an excuse to play, when they should be aiming for giving players a motive to play.
But what do I know about making games? I just know shit when I play it. But I probably shouldn't be complaining. It's getting better by leaps and bounds.