We're winning because we offer something better than art. We offer Experience...Stop using the word 'art'. Erase it from your dictionary. It's too weak a word. I want nothing less than to compel you. I am coming to consume all your thoughts, all your attention. I want to absorb you to the point where it threatens your marriage and your livelihood.
Not all art is passive though. There has been performance and interactive art that can be pretty engaging. "Sleep No More", for instance. So I think the OP needlessly argues about the popular connotations of the word "art"
That said I completely agree with him that games such as "Last of Us" are not the ideal when it comes to video game as art. Just because a game's cutscenes can compete with a feature film in terms of theatrical quality does not mean it's great art as a video game. Nor does lacking cinematic quality disqualify a game from being art.
So far my favorite artistic epiphany from a game, not including games that shoot for being "art" more than being a playable game, came from the original "Portal".
There's a segment late in the game where you're asked to kill a inanimate object that you've been carrying around for most of the game. You know that it's inanimate. Yet as the narrator taunts you, I was tense the entire way because I was almost convinced it was a living breathing thing, solely because of the length of time I had been interacting with it. I half expected it to scream when I killed it. When nothing happened (I think) I laughed out of sheer relief. It was a feeling much more intense than watching a horror movie, and the only reason it was so intense was because of the interactive role I had -- both in carrying it and then killing it. That's the kind of unique artistic experience that a game can have that's not easily replicated in other mediums, certainly not film or books.
I think The Stanley Parable is a much better example of an artistic experience. The creator made another game called The Beginner's Guide which I thought was just as good.
Limbo, Papers Please, I Am Bread, Please Don't Touch Anything, are all good examples of games I would also consider art. These games are genuinely different and many of them are considered incredibly enjoyable by most people.
If you want something which really is just art and not much of a game, The Cat And The Coup is free on Steam. Frog Fractions 2 is also free and you can find it using Google (you have to play the whole game to understand).
For the most part I think gamers and developers are a bit sensitive about their medium, trying to argue it's "art" because it has a positive connotation. I think they should just enjoy it for what it is, as most games are designed to be fun instead of something else. That said, I think VR might try to change this. A friend of mine at Oculus mentioned how it's the very early stages, comparing VR to movies from ~100 years ago. Back then they just filmed plays, as they didn't realize what they could do with the medium. I'm sure VR will have lots of typical blockbusters following generic formulas, but I think indie developers (of which there are more every day) will build some pretty incredibly stuff in the coming years.
Ah yes, "Papers, Please" is also up there. I remember when the game was in alpha people asked he author if he would add keyboard shortcuts and other amenities to streamline the gameplay. He decided against it, and I'm glad he did because I feel the clunky monotony of manually shuffling things around is part of what builds empathy for the role. The work isn't supposed to be fun or feel fulfilling; perhaps that's why some TSA folks aren't pleasant and seem to relish the few opportunities to wield power over people.
That the gameplay is actually fun is what makes PP shine to me. If it weren't fun, then you wouldn't put in the time needed to feel like an overworked border guard.
Comments
Not all art is passive though. There has been performance and interactive art that can be pretty engaging. "Sleep No More", for instance. So I think the OP needlessly argues about the popular connotations of the word "art"
That said I completely agree with him that games such as "Last of Us" are not the ideal when it comes to video game as art. Just because a game's cutscenes can compete with a feature film in terms of theatrical quality does not mean it's great art as a video game. Nor does lacking cinematic quality disqualify a game from being art.
So far my favorite artistic epiphany from a game, not including games that shoot for being "art" more than being a playable game, came from the original "Portal".
There's a segment late in the game where you're asked to kill a inanimate object that you've been carrying around for most of the game. You know that it's inanimate. Yet as the narrator taunts you, I was tense the entire way because I was almost convinced it was a living breathing thing, solely because of the length of time I had been interacting with it. I half expected it to scream when I killed it. When nothing happened (I think) I laughed out of sheer relief. It was a feeling much more intense than watching a horror movie, and the only reason it was so intense was because of the interactive role I had -- both in carrying it and then killing it. That's the kind of unique artistic experience that a game can have that's not easily replicated in other mediums, certainly not film or books.
I think The Stanley Parable is a much better example of an artistic experience. The creator made another game called The Beginner's Guide which I thought was just as good.
Limbo, Papers Please, I Am Bread, Please Don't Touch Anything, are all good examples of games I would also consider art. These games are genuinely different and many of them are considered incredibly enjoyable by most people.
If you want something which really is just art and not much of a game, The Cat And The Coup is free on Steam. Frog Fractions 2 is also free and you can find it using Google (you have to play the whole game to understand).
For the most part I think gamers and developers are a bit sensitive about their medium, trying to argue it's "art" because it has a positive connotation. I think they should just enjoy it for what it is, as most games are designed to be fun instead of something else. That said, I think VR might try to change this. A friend of mine at Oculus mentioned how it's the very early stages, comparing VR to movies from ~100 years ago. Back then they just filmed plays, as they didn't realize what they could do with the medium. I'm sure VR will have lots of typical blockbusters following generic formulas, but I think indie developers (of which there are more every day) will build some pretty incredibly stuff in the coming years.
Ah yes, "Papers, Please" is also up there. I remember when the game was in alpha people asked he author if he would add keyboard shortcuts and other amenities to streamline the gameplay. He decided against it, and I'm glad he did because I feel the clunky monotony of manually shuffling things around is part of what builds empathy for the role. The work isn't supposed to be fun or feel fulfilling; perhaps that's why some TSA folks aren't pleasant and seem to relish the few opportunities to wield power over people.
That the gameplay is actually fun is what makes PP shine to me. If it weren't fun, then you wouldn't put in the time needed to feel like an overworked border guard.