Games are usually not profound and thought provoking for the same reason food is usually not profound and thought provoking. That's just not the path to enjoyment that the medium is naturally inclined toward.
Food, above all else, must be tasty. Likewise, games, above all else, must be fun to play -- or more precisely, must provide unusually fulfilling analogs of the plights and labours of real life.
If you manage to make food that is both tasty and cerebrally stimulating, that's pretty awesome. But food that is strictly cerebral is always going to have marginal appeal at best. And you can't accuse chefs of being lazy and unimaginative just because their food isn't cerebral.
(For the nitpickers: yes, food is an extreme analogy. There is more room for expressiveness in games than in food, and it's probably underexploited. But you see the point I am making?)
> Food, above all else, must be tasty. Likewise, games, above all else, must be fun to play
For broad appeal this is true, but says nothing of real value or artistic merit. Expression in every medium is mostly banal schlock, with a few shining examples of quality.
I don't see the good in slighting any artist or craftsperson for taking a road less travelled, or in suggesting that an entire medium for creative exploration should constrained by need of easy acceptance.
Art needs to command attention, to force people to think carefully about the ideas that are its payload. It can do this with beauty, or it can do it with ugliness.
To continue the food metaphor: Sea Urchin. Hákarl. Bitter melon. All of which are awful-tasting to most, but delicious to those who have fostered an appreciation for their peculiarities. Anyone who can stomach such foods are offered absolutely unique flavours that defy description or comparison.
It's a powerful tool in the chest of artists, to force their audiences to confront something they may find uncomfortable or unsettling. In every case where the work is truly great, the confrontation is simply an effective mechanism through which something deeply meaningful about the human condition may be revealed. Exemplar are the works of Damien Hurst, Odd Nerdrum, Marcel Duchamp, John Cage, Alvin Lucier, David Lynch, and so many others — all exhaustively-praised once the dust of their highly-confrontational works has settled.
Rohrer's games all exist in this domain, defying casual pursuit, but offering something immensely powerful for anyone willing to overcome their own reservations.
Couldn't the same point be made about cinema, though? Specially in the early years of the medium, it's easy to say that movies must be entertaining to watch. And yet we got fantastic works of art in cinema.
Comments
Games are usually not profound and thought provoking for the same reason food is usually not profound and thought provoking. That's just not the path to enjoyment that the medium is naturally inclined toward.
Food, above all else, must be tasty. Likewise, games, above all else, must be fun to play -- or more precisely, must provide unusually fulfilling analogs of the plights and labours of real life.
If you manage to make food that is both tasty and cerebrally stimulating, that's pretty awesome. But food that is strictly cerebral is always going to have marginal appeal at best. And you can't accuse chefs of being lazy and unimaginative just because their food isn't cerebral.
(For the nitpickers: yes, food is an extreme analogy. There is more room for expressiveness in games than in food, and it's probably underexploited. But you see the point I am making?)
> Food, above all else, must be tasty. Likewise, games, above all else, must be fun to play
For broad appeal this is true, but says nothing of real value or artistic merit. Expression in every medium is mostly banal schlock, with a few shining examples of quality.
I don't see the good in slighting any artist or craftsperson for taking a road less travelled, or in suggesting that an entire medium for creative exploration should constrained by need of easy acceptance.
Art needs to command attention, to force people to think carefully about the ideas that are its payload. It can do this with beauty, or it can do it with ugliness.
To continue the food metaphor: Sea Urchin. Hákarl. Bitter melon. All of which are awful-tasting to most, but delicious to those who have fostered an appreciation for their peculiarities. Anyone who can stomach such foods are offered absolutely unique flavours that defy description or comparison.
It's a powerful tool in the chest of artists, to force their audiences to confront something they may find uncomfortable or unsettling. In every case where the work is truly great, the confrontation is simply an effective mechanism through which something deeply meaningful about the human condition may be revealed. Exemplar are the works of Damien Hurst, Odd Nerdrum, Marcel Duchamp, John Cage, Alvin Lucier, David Lynch, and so many others — all exhaustively-praised once the dust of their highly-confrontational works has settled.
Rohrer's games all exist in this domain, defying casual pursuit, but offering something immensely powerful for anyone willing to overcome their own reservations.
Couldn't the same point be made about cinema, though? Specially in the early years of the medium, it's easy to say that movies must be entertaining to watch. And yet we got fantastic works of art in cinema.
Keto and Paleo people will argue that good, cerebral food is also very tasty.
Think about a dessert that requires pig fat in its recipe.