Am I the only one that finds the "Games are art" argument really pretentious?

[Snotnarok]

It's not about taking games seriously. The whole argument makes 0 sense in any respect and to that extent it drives me insane.

Concept artists, musicians, 3D sculptors, painters, writers, programming all artforms but when you combine them into a game it makes not art? As an artist that logic makes me go insane. God of War 3 was one of the most pretty things I've ever seen. There was this part where Kratos drops into this cave with this single lightsource and I was stunned. It looked like a photo of a miniature, the detail unbelievable for a game (especially of a beat-em-up sorts) and someone is going to say ...it's not art?

That's what bothers me about it, I see artists creating things and they get brushed off because of the medium they do it for.

 

[SuperNashwan]

I have seen people on here get really angry and genuinely compare computer games to Mozart or great classic works of art, and that made me laugh to be honest. To take the movies example - there are movies that many will agree are 'great', but you are not going to find them in a national museum in 30 years time as an example of a piece of history that was so significant, so defining that it deserves to be preserved for centuries to come.

That said, what is regarded as art is quite a loose thing, and many would argue that many examples of modern art do not deserve a place in a gallery, eg a bed covered in used tampons or a rotting cow head with flies living in it. If art is simply what people consider to BE art, then I guess you could say computer games are art. I am sure that there are people that pay a lot of money for art concept designs from popular games as well. But comparable to Mozart? No.

 

[oooooooooooooooooooooooooo]

Videogames are simply a medium, just like film, music, painting, etc, and like all other mediums it has the capacity to produce art, but is not art in and of itself. Call of Duty, for example, does completely lack any artistic merit, its there for the action, as are films like Die Hard. In contrast, like the film medium has its Allegro non Troppo, 2001, etc, videogames have their Eulforia, Machinarium, Bioshock, etc.

Also, like all other mediums, you're not supposed to look at videogames as a whole. Some of it is meant to be taken seriously, some not, depends on the game. Saying we are taking videogames to seriously is like saying we are taking film to seriously, which doesn't really make sense.

 

[AVATAR_RAGE]

There are games that I will say without hesitation, have artistic merit to them. To name a few, Killer7, Eternal Darkness, Bioshock, Deus Ex, Braid, Okami, The Darkness, and I'm sure there are many others out there that I either forgot about or simply have not played. But whenever people start to argue games as a whole being an art form, honestly, I just roll my eyes and shake my head.

I mean, I love games, but I play games mostly to have fun. If I can get an artistic experience out of it then great. But still, when people start the whole "Games are art" argument, I can't help but feel like, maybe, they take games a little too seriously.

That's just my two cents.

Most TV is just fun. Most movies are just fun. Most books are just fun. Yet that doesn't diminish the fact that we acknowledge each of these as a valid artistic medium.

That is the games are art argument.

Pretty much what I was gonna say. Infact games actually just a mish mash of all sorts of art forms, from cinematography to the music in the game. .

Funny thing is I have just wrote a report on this subject

 

[RYjet911]

Yeah, but it depends on the person, not everyone thinks games as a whole are art.

I think in a way all games are art, some more than others.
But a good photograph or artwork has an almost infinate amount of artworthy-ness compared to a game.

I immediately and totally disagree with this statement.

Firstly, a still image can only portray so much of a message, where a game is capable of providing something much broader.

Secondly, it's much more difficult to get absorbed in a picture than it is in a game, thanks to a game requiring observer ineraction, where a picture just has a still image and more than likely has to say what it is in its title or, if it has one, its caption.

Thirdly, games can be a lot more subtle about their messages, where as a picture has to be either fairly in your face about it, or if its modern art it just goes "What does it make YOU feel?"

Games > Photographs in pretty much any case in recent years. Even bad games outrank bad pictures, simply because you can enjoy them more. Their art, while not being a single captured image to be seen forever, lasts longer, and can protray a greater message. Photorealistic graphics, epic stories, set pieces etc. are showing that you can get much more detail in a game than in ANY still image, and even in comparison to moving images.

 

[Sikachu]

There are games that I will say without hesitation, have artistic merit to them. To name a few, Killer7, Eternal Darkness, Bioshock, Deus Ex, Braid, Okami, The Darkness, and I'm sure there are many others out there that I either forgot about or simply have not played. But whenever people start to argue games as a whole being an art form, honestly, I just roll my eyes and shake my head.

I mean, I love games, but I play games mostly to have fun. If I can get an artistic experience out of it then great. But still, when people start the whole "Games are art" argument, I can't help but feel like, maybe, they take games a little too seriously.

That's just my two cents.

I think people take the word 'art' a little too seriously, or rather it is too difficult to define what is 'good' and 'poor' art, and so we kind of use the word a a catch-all for almost any kind of self-expression. So what then happens is that when we see an amazing painting that really aesthetically pleases or makes you question something (etc.) it's quite easy to agree 'this is art' because most people find it moves them in some way. When you are shown some piece of turd drawing by someone's 7 year old, you naturally don't categorise it as art, because it isn't very good. I think games are art, and most games are TERRIBLE art.

 

[Sikachu]

Yeah, but it depends on the person, not everyone thinks games as a whole are art.

I think in a way all games are art, some more than others.
But a good photograph or artwork has an almost infinate amount of artworthy-ness compared to a game.

I immediately and totally disagree with this statement.

Firstly, a still image can only portray so much of a message, where a game is capable of providing something much broader.

Secondly, it's much more difficult to get absorbed in a picture than it is in a game, thanks to a game requiring observer ineraction, where a picture just has a still image and more than likely has to say what it is in its title or, if it has one, its caption.

Thirdly, games can be a lot more subtle about their messages, where as a picture has to be either fairly in your face about it, or if its modern art it just goes "What does it make YOU feel?"

Games > Photographs in pretty much any case in recent years. Even bad games outrank bad pictures, simply because you can enjoy them more. Their art, while not being a single captured image to be seen forever, lasts longer, and can protray a greater message. Photorealistic graphics, epic stories, set pieces etc. are showing that you can get much more detail in a game than in ANY still image, and even in comparison to moving images.

You sound like the videogame equivalent of the bigots who think games aren't art because they haven't learned to read them fluently. Your comments about pictures are staggeringly ignorant.

 

[Jezzy54]

Not all games have to be art, it's just that some are.

 

[SoranMBane]

I think part of the problem here is that too many people think of the word "art" as either a subjective term or as a term that reflects quality and not format. There has to be an objective definition of "art" before the question of whether or not games can be art can even be seriously considered. Another thing people seem to caught up in is the idea that something not being art automatically means it's worthless, which is absolutely not true.

 

[ComicsAreWeird]

Games can be art or just pure entertainment. or both.i guess that every game has a certain amount of creativity...character concept artwork, level design, etc., so yeah...i guess all videogames are art.

 

[Halceon]

So, a game is only art when someone plays it? Okay, I'll buy it. More than that, I love it. But what of the craftsmanship that predicts and takes advantage of player behavior as a means of conveying a story; the subtle (or not subtle) ways in which a level designer can manipulate a player? A game, and a video game especially, is not just a set of rules; it is an environment in which those rules exist. Even if it's as simple as the line down the middle of the Pong field, that line informs behavior; it recalls a border, and prompts the instinct that the dash on the other side of that seemingly innocent line is my enemy.

Does level design qualify as a sort virtual installation piece? (Keep in mind that I'm not talking about aesthetics, or even world building; these are things that other art forms do already. I'm talking about manipulating the way the playing chooses to interact with the environment on an intellectual and emotional level.)

Hrmm...

I'd like to make a quick note that I like you.

The environment that surrounds you, the level design, the textures on the walls, and the layout that leads you where you go, it's all one giant picture in the end, one giant picture that must have a message. That most definitely would HAVE to be art, as it inherently has a message to it.

While I would stand by my notion that a "game" is not inherently art. The virtual world built within a video game must inherently be art. Along those lines so must be the characters that we see, and really anything visual within the game.

You're entirely right. No video game is "just" a set of rules. I think where the difference comes in is that people seem to treat the entire video game as an art form, whereas I would say any game (including a video game) is a set of rules, which can have any kind of different art imprinted on it.

That's my opinion at least. And it varies depending on your definitions of course.

Have you developed any games by any chance? Your perspective sounds like one a developer might have, with rules/systems and environment logic so clearly divorced from one another, as they are often created in separate stages of the development process.

In contrast, I guess my view would be that of the consumer (which, of course, I am), taking the complete package off the shelf and considering it as such. EDIT: Okay, maybe not the whole package, but certainly the interactive aspects of it, which is where I think games exhibit the most artistic potential.

EDIT Again: And I have to disagree with the environment being "a picture in the end." When a level guides you in a certain direction?not by making it the only way to go?but by making it so appealing that the player chooses (or thinks that they chose) to go that way, don't think any single image can capture that. I think there's art in creating the illusion of choice. The appeal doesn't have to be strictly visual, either. Suppose a player is guided in a direction because s/he is led to believe that s/he will be able to exploit the rules to their best advantage that way? Can any other medium capture that phenomenon and the resulting emotion?

But you're right, it's all down to the personal definition of the terms. Which I suppose is why there are about 6 billion threads about games being or not being art on the internet.

I'd give you several crates of cookies, if I could.

I see games similar to semi-improvisational theatre in many ways. You can consider a game's programming to be the play, the environments, background, storylines and level design - the directing. But it only matters when there are viewers and their feedback. Each part of the preparation process has the potential to be artistic, but the result isn't a simple sum of the parts.

In fact, I just finished writing a review of AI War, focusing on the artistic experience derived from playing it. I can say that playing it has felt like watching a good Greek tragedy, and not just because it took up a whole day.

 

[Linakrbcs]

Some games are art, so the medium as a whole has the potential to be art. Like in every other medium, what is art and what isn't is debatable, and there are certainly a lot of games that have little artistic value. I think we just need to adjust our definition of art, because the ones we use for books, and movies and paintings don't really apply to an interactive medium.
In terms of visual style, Final Fantasy or Oblivion may be considered art. In terms of story-telling, God of War I is a good example. As for the interactive part...well, I guess a game has artistic value if it can make you look at the world a little differently, or think about yourself. The kind of game where you feel empathy for the characters instead of viewing them as just a random pixel construct

 

[Jenova65]

I don't think people take art too seriously, I don't think people take games too seriously, I do think people take themselves too seriously by attempting to dissect everything.
Of course games are an art form, just because some of them don't fit in with what one person considers artistic merit doesn't mean they aren't art! That is like me saying anything by Da Vinci is art and anything by Picasso isn't, because I don't like Picasso. THAT is being pretentious, assuming that your view is the centre from which people should form their view.

And by the way.............

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_population

How? How is it ever 'just you'???? ;-)

 

[amucha98]

.

 

[9Darksoul6]

My opinion:

- Are games art?
No, they aren't.
They're not art, same way "The Da Vinci Code", "Harry Potter" (literature), "Transformers" or "Spiderman" (cinema) aren't art.

- Can games be art?
Yes, they can.
They aren't art, because there is (the way I see it) not a single videogame title, in the present day, that can be called art, except one or two, that aren't really called "games" (for instance: http://tale-of-tales.com/TheGraveyard/).
This happens, because videogames are still a very recent form of medium. Despite the fact that there are countless brilliant artists working on videogames (Take the God of War series, or Bioshock, for example), the final product still isn't more than a *pretty* rollercoster. This will change in a decade or two, when a) people will start making "games" not to sell the most copies they can, but for the simple artistic pleasure of it; and b) the so-called "gamers" will dissapear, letting game-designers understand that a "game" is nothing more than an interactive world, and not a challenge were you collect the most orbs, kills enemies an then save the princess.

- Why is this such an important topic?
Because that will define the type of censorship this medium will recieve.
A simple example: developpers are scared of putting anything resembling sex in a videogame. Why? remember the moral panic over the "hot-coffee" section of GTA? (Google it, if not.) People were concerned that if there was sex in a game that lets you steal cars and kill random people with bazukas, that would turn it immoral. Not to mention all the fuss over the Mass Effect/Dragon Age sex-scenes. Now the better part: there isn't any graphical sex in any of those examples.
The point is, if games are recognized as art, and artist are granted free speech, they're more likely to resist moral panics, and game developpers will have more freedom.

 

[Gethsemani_v1legacy]

I'd say that there are many games that qualifiy as good Art. See all games are art, just as all paintings are art or all literature is. The question isn't whatever it is art or not but if the individual game, movie, book or painting is Good Art, if it manages to give us something we enjoy. Mona Lisa is a life-like portrait and is considered one of the biggest masterpieces in the world, Guernica in turn is an abstract representation of terror bombings and is also considered a masterpiece. My point is that anything that sets out to be art is art, the questions we should ask is if the art in question is good. Does it affect us, amuse us or make us think? That's art. Can anyone on the escapist tell me that they have never had fun with a game or faced something in a game that made them think or felt emotionally engaged by something that went on in a game?

To me, Heavy Rain is arguably one of the best examples of why games are Art, because if you go into it not knowing much about the game you'll be spending the coming 8 hours sitting on the edge of your seat as you try to find out who the killer is without getting the characters killed.
But there are plenty of examples, Left 4 Dead with its' minimalistic design is arguably as much Art because of how it elicits emotional response with almost no backstory and very few assets. I think everyone who's played L4D has panicked at least once or has a story to tell about "that time when Bill was down and...".

Art isn't some esoteric, lofty intellectual thing. Art is, at its' most base, a way to express ourselves and entertain others.

 

[boholikeu]

There are games that I will say without hesitation, have artistic merit to them. To name a few, Killer7, Eternal Darkness, Bioshock, Deus Ex, Braid, Okami, The Darkness, and I'm sure there are many others out there that I either forgot about or simply have not played. But whenever people start to argue games as a whole being an art form, honestly, I just roll my eyes and shake my head.

I mean, I love games, but I play games mostly to have fun. If I can get an artistic experience out of it then great. But still, when people start the whole "Games are art" argument, I can't help but feel like, maybe, they take games a little too seriously.

That's just my two cents.

The problem is that the above sounds like a double standard to me. Is it pretentious to talk about movies as art? Are film buffs taking movies too seriously?

 

[tunderball]

If the arguement is that you only play games for fun, people also watch movies and read books for fun. I'd say that games deffinately can be works of art as can movies and books, but not all of the time.

To use movies as an example nobody would argue that 'the Godfather' isn't a beautiful piece of work clearly a marvel and a perfect demonstration of what the medium of film can achieve. But is 'Attack of the Killer Tomatoes' or 'Meet the Spartans' art? If the idea is that all films are pieces of art, does trash like that really count as works of art? I think not.

The same should therefore apply to games, yes works such as Bioshock are art, but not all games are, same with films, same with books, same with photography........etc

 

[RobfromtheGulag]

I think people are arguing that games can be art. Like drawings on deviantart, not a ton are good, but they are all arguably art.