Game Design 2 Journal #1: Games are not Art

I know we've had this discussion a lot, it's driven into the freaking ground. Are video games art? Roger Ebert has famously been quoted on the issue, originally denying video games as Art with an argument about "Authorial control," then in 2007 changing stances only slightly, comparing all games to sports and saying they cannot be "high art." Even Hideo Kojima, famously lauded for creating what some would call a work of art, Metal Gear Solid, admits games are not art. From Kotaku:

Hideo Kojima said: "The thing is, art is something that radiates the artist, the person who creates that piece of art. If 100 people walk by and a single person is captivated by whatever that piece radiates, it's art. But videogames aren't trying to capture one person. A videogame should make sure that all 100 people that play that game should enjoy the service provided by that videogame. It's something of a service. It's not art. But I guess the way of providing service with that videogame is an artistic style, a form of art."

I agree. But that's not the end of the discussion.

Art takes on many forms, from sculpture to the fine brush strokes of Van Gogh. It can be installation art, spanning many weeks or hours of time, or performance art that only exists while the performers deem it. You can Google "art" and get pictures, pictures of sculptures, videos of those performance art shows. Museums are, by and large, public and available for the viewing of great art. You don't pay to see the art, you pay to upkeep the building it is in. Now we get into the real meat: art can be bought and sold, value is placed on it by the artist and then a patron who finds it to their liking comes and picks it up. Art is unique. Even an artist that's made 1000 handpainted toilet seat covers uses a unique stroke or two each time. There is a sense of ownership. Art, though given value, has worth that can be assessed before it is bought, and exists as a singularity. There can be only one!

Video Games are mass produced, cannot be judged before being paid for (we hire people to review games for us, playing advanced copies so we can decide if we want to take the risk on spending 65 bucks), and is not unique. We all have (barring defects) the same game. Unlike art, the inability to judge and critique a game before it is purchased makes buying games risky. We wouldn't consider buying a painting a risk, when we can see and appreciate the whole thing before it is purchased. Video Games also lack that personal sense of "mine", like Kojima said "...A videogame should make sure that all 100 people that play that game should enjoy the service provided by that videogame."

From that, we also glean the purpose for making games: to make money. Games are designed to sell like hotcakes, they're intention is to make money. Sure, you can make artwork for money, but video games are implicitly designed to make money. They have careful, government regulated prices, can be taxed and returned...etc. There is nothing personal in buying a video game that the GAME is providing. If Halo 4 comes out, and you're the biggest Halo fan in the world, Halo 4 has meaning to you. But Halo 4 doesn't know you, and doesn't care about you...the single. Halo 4 has a community, a large group of people with expectations ready to dive down the throats of the developers and rip their hearts out if Halo 4 isn't awesome.

There's a far higher stigma of "Must be successful" placed over video games. "Indie" games, games that are available for free or have no publisher, could be considered art. But it's not possible to call "Shadow of the Colossus", "Rez HD" or "Modern Warfare 2" art, when we examine them against my statements above. The bottom line is: if your game is art, it had better be either free, or there better only be one copy.

Video Games as Art...another know-it-all-blogger's opinion

Writer Soo-Mahn wrote an article a little while back, that was much lauded and linked to about this topic. I loved the article, that cited Earthbound, Ico and Mario as good examples of games as art. He very effectively explained the transition a story has to make to become a compelling game, by giving players choices.

I want to forge my own path on this road. Here's my thesis:

Video Games, like all art forms, take a person with keen sense of vision, emotion, evocation and imagination to translate the written word or the formless thought into an enriching experience both engaging to the mind, and compelling.

Games have Designers for a reason. Designers are supposed to control and manipulate the game before the players eyes. They look at the situations in the game (any genre) from the eyes of the artist, and the eyes of the viewer. While some artists merely make art for themselves, a lot of artists take their audience into account when creating. They want to sell paintings. Designers are the same. They need to craft an experience that will hold people's attentions, draw them in and amuse their whimsy for at least a while. Whether the game is Shadow of the Colossus or Grand Theft Auto IV, two games from two entirely different ballparks. The Designer holds the brush, and with it they try their best to paint a picture worth seeing (More on Designers and sacrifice later...). I want to talk about the picture itself for a little.

The game as an artistic creation must be looked at from a few angles. The above article points out that a good game will typically offer the player choice. Instead of a movie/play/book where A always leads to B, in a game A could lead past B to C. The player will decide what goes. I think this is a great point, but there is so much more to a game as art. It can't just be left at that. Leaving it at that makes Choose-Your-Own-Adventure books art. Which some really are! But I digress. The look of a game, past it's actual game play flow, is essential to defining a game as an art form.

Take for example the Clover Studios creation Okami. Easily one of my top 5 video games. Beautifully made, amazing to play. Compelling story, sights, sounds...it's really a cream of the crop title. Is it art? Indubitably. The game from start to finish has the mark of the craftsman on it. The mark of an individual who knows the world through the eyes of the gamer, and knows how a game needs to look, as well as play. Every scene from Okami has care in its design. There isn't a single moment of that game that doesn't look like it could be taken aside to be a painting. The same goes for games like Shadow of the Colossus and Ninja Gaiden II in their own style. The hand of the artist is all over those games. The hand of the artist is imperative to anything being truly called art.

If I had designed Ninja Gaiden II, it would have been different in fundamental ways. Because I did not, and Itagaki did, it is an Itagaki. If I re-painted A Sunday Afternoon on the island of La Grand Jatte it would have been different, and not just because I'm bad at pointillism. In that sense, every game is an original work of art by the people who make it, who hopefully put care into people's perception of it.

Art is based off of experience, linear or not. The experience of seeing a beautiful painting by Jack Vettriano mimics the experience I get playing Okami when I've succeded in making the trees blossom, or in Grand Theft Auto IV when I witness Niko trying his damndest to succeed in a world ready to make him become the devil himself. Video Games give you the experience of experiencing, which may not make any damn sense at all. But if it does, I'd like to pretend it means that merely because you are there, making choices and participating, it'd be like walking among those people on La Grand Jette, talking and smiling and playing just as I do in my imagination every time I see it in person.

I hope more designers realize this, and take this into account. Games need to be an experience for the gamer, in a good way. Don't hold their hand, don't coddle them...but give them something that they can take away, and something to draw them back. All good art leaves a mark on the soul, and the medium of games should do no less.