Comment by ideonexus | Hacker News Reader

Comment by ideonexus | Hacker News Reader

A major disconnect here comes from a lack of gaming literacy among critics. I read a great paper recently, Massively Multiplayer Online Gaming as a Constellation of Literacy Practices, where the author talks about how RPG games are actually quite literary in the sense of reading and writing than people give them credit for [1]. But what really impressed me about the essay is that he presented a screenshot of an RPG video game and pointed out that few critics could explain what was going on in the image, even though it was instantly familiar to me despite not having played the game.

Critics are not game-literate, so they can't appreciate them. They know nothing about mechanics like strategic imbalance, the Skinner box, achievements, power creep and other concepts I myself am only becoming familiar with thanks to the thoughtful folks at ExtraCredits[2]. They don't know anything about how video games tell stories, challenge players with moral choices, or the brilliant innovations artists have had to come up with to work around hardware limitations in both graphics and music over the decades. If you aren't literate in gaming, then of course you can't appreciate the many many layers of artistic expression from algorithms to writing to graphics to music and mechanics that go into making a game.

Video games are more profitable than films now. Critical theory surrounding video games simply needs to rise to the level of other mediums before more people will respect it. Remember, films were originally considered such a waste of time no one bothered to preserve 75% of silent films[3]. As the new generation of game-literate kids grow up, I trust that games will get the respect they deserve.

[1] http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.2304/elea.2007.4.3.29...

[2] https://www.youtube.com/user/ExtraCreditz

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_lost_films

> Video games are more profitable than films now. Critical theory surrounding video games simply needs to rise to the level of other mediums before more people will respect it.

This was one thing particularly frustrating to me about #gamergate. Much of it seemed like a backlash against serious game analysis (feminist or otherwise). It's one thing to personally ignore any deeper meaning baked into games (intentionally or not), but it's another to ask that no one even try to root it out.

Indeed. Although I think the whole thing throws the high/low/outsider Art debate into sharp relief. There definitely is gatekeeping which turns objects into Art by the process of putting it into a gallery and thereby acquiring respect. This is what the surrealists and others made fun of. Especially Warhol with his soup cans and the famous Duchamp urinal: what makes them Art is exactly and only their signature, in the social context of a gallery. Art is socially constructed.

"New Games Journalism" was the attempt in the early 2000s at producing the kind of critique that might legitimise games as Art. But I think what happened with #gamergate bears some similarity to punk/skinhead/ultras of the early 80s: if you can't get into legitimacy, throw a brick through its window. They (un?)intentionally sent the message that the sexism and violence is inseperable from what they consider "core" gaming.

(There's also the tragedy of people who don't know who Barthes is getting upset about the claim "gamers are dead")

I think both Ebert and this talk address this directly and you can't say the presenter in this case was game illiterate. Something can be complex, creative, require artistic talent to produce, enjoyable, etc, etc and still not really be art, certainly not of the timeless variety. Better critical theory probably isn't going to turn a non-art into an art.

The debate about defining art runs into the "No True Scotsman" problem because there are many different metrics that you can use to "define" art. If it's art and you don't want it to be, just pick a definition that excludes it. If it isn't art and you do want it to be, then pick one that includes it. Repeat more than a couple times and I think you lose the point somewhere in the back-and-forth.

I think the more productive way of thinking about it has to do with why one engages with art. Does it give you a way to socialize through discussing critiques? Is it a tool for inciting empathy? Do you simply want to bask in the emotions it inspires? And so forth.

When you look at it from a perspective of what you want it to do for you, then I think you can make a good case that for some purposes, games would work just as well if not better compared to books, movies, sculptures, dances, etc. Whether or not you call it art... isn't so important, really.

No it doesn't and both Ebert and Brian Moriarty make a detailed and strong case. 'No true Scotsman', 'just need better critical theory', 'what is art, really? it doesn't matter!' are just weaselly ways to avoid engaging in their actual arguments. All of this dancing about would be completely unnecessary if one could point to a single game that would be as much as a potential candidate for a long-lasting, culturally important and impactful artwork. This is true whether or not one finds it important, infuriating, irrelevant or regrettable.

I would offer SOMA, by Frictional Games. An exploration of the implications of consciousness.

Perhaps also To The Moon, by Freebird Games.

I think you can make an argument some of this stuff rises to the level of a decent-ish sci-fi novella or so. It pokes you in the eye because the medium is typically so narratively impoverished. But both of these, like many genuinely emotionally engaging games before them will be well-forgotten in a decade or so. The Discobolus, Hamlet or Guernica this is not.

You have to keep in mind that gaming is a very new medium. The more artistic variety of games has only been around for a few years. To demand something on the level of Shakespeare is very disingenuous.

A better way of seeing why games can be art is through a comparison to movies. Games can be made to essentially be movies but with the crucial difference of immersing the viewer entirely into the world through the choices it presents.

I do not see how adding more possibilities to an existing art form (movies) can ever demote something from art to non art (whatever you think these things mean).

I think a game like last of us is a great exploration of the potential of this form of game play.

Again, this is non-responsive to Brian Moriarty's and Ebert's argument. They specifically address your points and all you have is 'I don't see how'. And do you really think anyone is going to give a hoot about 'The Last of Us' in 20 years? 'The Third Man' is about to turn 70.

For the curious, I think this is the image from [1]: https://i.imgur.com/OOlZexh.png

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