Is call of duty an art?

[Tiger Sora]

An art of travesty maybe. Hahaha.

Edit: I should throw in that I play the game and really like it. But I mock things constantly so I do what I do.

 

[Particulate]

Like all of you, I try to preach about how games are an art as much as I can and am willing to debate it with the naysayers. But I always get a frequently asked question: what about all of duty or other first person shooters? people understand other games like RPG's because of the story or the innovation but what about FPS's? yes some games are mindless shooting but... those are still fun, and I will defend them. but how can I explain that first person shooter's are an art as well?

For the last few years the in-game (non-cinematic) graphics of First Person Shooters have beaten the pants off of every other genre. And for a good reason. In Final Fantasy the creators knew they wanted it to look good but they didn't need the kind of resolution and precision of control needed to allow players to knee cap people from half a mile away. But looking good isnt the only thing that merits art, is it?

Call of Duty and other FPS games get a lot of crap thrown at them because of the multiplayer crowd and it's true, the multiplayer is as visceral and ugly as it gets. You run, you shoot, but most importantly you get to do it exactly like you want. CoD has broken ground in multiplayer customization that's yet to be rivaled. You want to be sneaky? Well between the weapon upgrades and perks to choose you can be any kind of sneaky you want. Or you can be a tank or a sniper or anything else.

But what about the story? This is where a lot of the "art" feel comes from. Well lets look at the stories of the last few games:

Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare- US soldiers are engaged in the middle east and fighting terror and a corrupt regime (what's new?). Meanwhile a band of SAS dudes are running around Europe looking for an informant and trying to protect him. Suddenly a nuke goes off and kills a bunch of Americans. The Americans flip out and start trying to murder everyone in sight. Meanwhile the SAS finds out that the regime leader isnt even in the country any more and then they learn who sold him the bomb. They tell the Americans and form a coalition of sneaky badasses to go into Russia and stop the impending Nuclear apocalypse.

Call of Duty: World at War- The story of the US Marines fighting the Japanese and the Russians pushing back the Nazis, two stories which are often overlooked when it comes to WW2 related media.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2- After the war people rejoiced for a while but that soon soured. Russia's had been grumpy at the rest of the world for a while but after a false-flag terror strike they had an honest reason to throw down with the US. While the East Coast was getting curb stomped a band of sneaky weasels picked up a lead about the terrorists most hated rival, thinking that by catching him and delivering him to the Russians they could stop this. Well they found him and guess what? It's the mutton chopped leader from the first one. He then flips out and uses a Nuclear EMP to save the east coast but in doing so gets painted as the worst person in the world. He leads the rest of the group to track down the terror leader who helps direct them to the actual mastermind, the American commander who no doubt had a latent hatred of communism and fear job security after the war was over. They tracked him to his secret lair and stabbed him to death after shooting through his own praetorian guard.

Call of Duty: Black Ops- A CIA agent and his special forces buddies go running across Asia in order to catch a rogue communist leader that wants to start WW3. Along the way they encounter one of the Russians from World at War, a mad scientist, a not so mad german scientist, and then manage to stop the world from setting itself on fire. In doing so though they also go into great depth about how awful and confusing Vietnam and Cold War in general was, psychological torment and PTSD, and how it's related to the world of sneaky spies and in doing so related to global politics.

Now if any of those were movies or TV shows YOU WOULD WATCH THEM. Hell Black Ops featured the voices of numerous big name actors including Ed Harris and Gary Oldman and conveyed some very human themes of betrayal and being forgotten by one's friends. How is this not Art?

 

[mariodude23]

No, video games are an art form. Singling out a game as a form of artistry is like saying that Citizen Kane is an art.
However you obviously didn't mean that so, I wouldn't say that CoD is a work of art. It really is the same basic game over again with mainly superficial upgrades, much like the 'Transformers' movies.

 

[neonsword13-ops]

Nope. It's just arbitrary.

 

[Xearin]

For something to be art, it should have no purpose other than itself. And therefore only games without a specific purpose (or parts in the game) are art (or artistic).

Asking if Call of Duty, or for that matter, any kind of FPS is art. Would be like asking if watching a Rembrandt would be the same as a tube in the face....

 

[Kian2]

When they ask about games like Call of Duty, ask them instead: Is cinematography an art? What about the latest summer blockbuster, would you host it in an art gallery?

Something can be an artistic medium, without every single example of it being art. Writing is an artistic medium, but a quarterly financial statement needn't be artistic even if it was written.

Games like Call of Duty have fine craftsmanship (the models, sounds, coding, everything has to be just right). Summer blockbusters are exactly the same. Whether they are art depends mostly on your definition.

 

[Wintermoot]

I don,t think so it,s kinda like a dramatized WWII documentary or in the case of the MW series/BLOPS a action game (as in action movie) not exactly high art but still fun.

 

[luccadeas]

I specifically didn't mean CoD but more of first person shooter's in general. amazing points of view here though.

 

[ZeroMachine]

If we were to get prickish and hypocritical about it - no.

If we were to judge it as the whole "games as art" argument should be judged - yes.

Call of Duty 4 is. Halo 1 is. Singularity is. These are art, and if we want to say that games are art then we need to include all of them, or we will just make our medium more confusing to people who are just trying to look into it. Do we really want to look even more like anti social nerds?

Also, for anyone that says shooters can't be art:

Spoiler

I won't pretend that I don't have several problems with it as a game, such as bad level design and having to take pictures of enemies to be able to even have a chance at beating them, but as art it's up there.

The argument is that games can be art... they aren't all inherently art, and it's not hypocritical to say certain games aren't art. After all, film is an art form, but I doubt there are many people that consider "Dude, Where's My Car?" to be a work of art. Not every piece of a medium that can be considered art is art.

With that said, it is all up to what the individual's view of art is. As much as I love Call of Duty, I say it isn't art. Others, though, will disagree either on principle or other reasons.

 

[Optional Opinion]

I don't understand why so many people are trying to drag gaming into the pretentious art world.

Are you embarrassed that you play games and wish to legitimise adults playing games by calling it art? I just don't understand.

How about we all just play the games and have fun, instead of debating what we call it.


Honestly, I would rather video games be associated with a childish hobby than a pompous pursuit of art

 

[Wicky_42]

Like all of you, I try to preach about how games are an art as much as I can and am willing to debate it with the naysayers. But I always get a frequently asked question: what about all of duty or other first person shooters? people understand other games like RPG's because of the story or the innovation but what about FPS's? yes some games are mindless shooting but... those are still fun, and I will defend them. but how can I explain that first person shooter's are an art as well?

NO, all games are not art, just like doodling in the corner of your essay notes isn't art. Are, say, the Goosebump novels "art"? No? And yet Lord of the Rings is? But they're both books!

Art isn't an explicitly defined field. Many of the people we now view as artistic masters were regarded as dangerous mad men in their time, their work labelled worthless trash that now sells for millions; definitions change, the field is mutable.

Can games be art? Undoubtedly. Are all games artistic? Fuck no, just as not all films or books are artistic. Snakes on a Plane is fun and silly, no pretensions to be beyond a B movie, but it is still given the same legal standing as Girl with a Pearl Earing.

Even FPS games can be art - take Amnesia, as an obvious mainstream example - novel-like story, dramatically stylised presentation, Lovecraftian horror. Or Mirror's Edge (imo) with its beautiful aesthetic and sensation of flowing over the rooftops of the city (well, in the good bits...).

Your average shooter doesn't try, but there's something sublime in a game such as Serious Sam: just you, an arena and waves of single-minded death. It's like minimalist or modernist art, only with a physically interactive element.

Art isn't just pretty pictures, people

 

[mechanixis]

I don't know, is a stoner comedy art? Or a ninety-nine cent romance novel?

In other words, no, it isn't, but gaming being an art form doesn't hinge on that.

 

[Reincarnatedwolfgod]

yes it is.
well to be exact crappy art but still art when playing.

but if the the creation of the game involves some art. it count as art end of story

 

[The Floating Nose]

In short: No.
In long: Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo.

That said, not even close. It's brainless time wasting, the cultural equivalent of cotton candy. It may technically be "food", but it's insubstantial and provides no actual value.

WOW ! That's really well said !

 

[The Floating Nose]

Is Call of Duty art ? ...pff....pffff....pffff.....HAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAA !!!!! No. It's not !

 

[SoranMBane]

Yes, or at least the single player portions of the games are. It's just that Call of Duty 4 is the only entry in the series that would really qualify as "high art."

 

[Tdc2182]

As much as that painting of a house I drew in 2nd grade.

My parents liked that thing way to much. Suspiciously so...

 

[ThunderDumpling]

IMO, the process of making videogames and the games itself are art. However, the playing of videogames is a form of entertainment. You can't say watching the TV is art (well at least not by the standards of modern art).
The playing of the game competitively is considered more of a sport.

Now when you have art, you have good art, and bad art. This is entirely opinion based and it all depends on the player to judge the game. Every game ever created I could consider to be art, but it can be glorious or poop.