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When he talks about players being able to alter the game's ending I don't tihnk he really knows what he's talking about. The player cannot invent completely new endings. If there are 15 endings for a game than the developers created every single one. Although the player can choose which one to experience, the player cannot create a whole new ending just by playing the game, which seems to be what he is implying. Although I still disagree with the premise that if players COULD do that that it would disqualify games from being art.
Anyway, discuss.
He's retarded. If he says that then he doesn't know how games work and should never comment on them again.
The moment he said "Prejudiced could also mean 'I disagree'", I knew he was an idiot.
Eye of the beholder, etc.
yeah exactly =3
I think Ebert lost his mind a few years back anyways.
I remember reading the post Ebert made about how "Video games is not art". Anyways I think he's an idiot. I sometimes find a game to be artistic. Okami was one of them games, but I never really played much of it. But seriously its what you believe is art. Like he said in his Games vs. Art, "Anything can be art. Even a can of Campbell's soup." So why can't a video game be art?
He ****ed me off.
I'm going to start off by saying this: I don't agree with you, and I'm offended by your blatant and unstructured bias. Not because its your opinion, no I'm not offended by that. I'm offended by your complete lack of education in the subject you choose to write about, and further more, deface based on very little empirical evidence with no backing. Your article was written as if you have some sort of grudge, and being that you do this professionally, it says very little of you. Feel free to read further, or stop now if you choose to feign further ignorance, but I'm going to give you an actual argument. I'm going to break apart what you've said, like you did to Clive Barker so rudely, and I'm going to elaborate on the mechanics of video games so that you may at least grasp some of the basic features.
A year or so ago, I rashly wrote that video games could not be art. That inspired a firestorm among gamers, who wrote me countless messages explaining why I was wrong, and urging me to play their favorite games. Of course, I was asking for it. Anything can be art. Even a can of Campbell's soup. What I should have said is that games could not be high art, as I understand it.
How do I know this? How many games have I played? I know it by the definition of the vast majority of games. They tend to involve (1) point and shoot in many variations and plotlines, (2) treasure or scavenger hunts, as in "Myst," and (3) player control of the outcome. I don't think these attributes have much to do with art; they have more in common with sports.
So in other words, you're admitting to basing this entire argument on a generalization of a massive industry filled with thousands of stories? Some may be weaker than others but that doesn't justify a generalization. You're probably basing your entire argument off of the bottom end of the barrel, that, might I also say is further overshadowed by your lack of playing them. It is true, Video Games are inherently just that, games, but crafted around their system of game-play, is a story from someone's soul and thousands of hours of hardwork placed into physical characters (IE. Models created via computer, similar to how a concept artist fashions clothing and physical changes to an actor.), the backgrounds, and skins. Backgrounds themselves can turn out to be beautiful, and even breathtaking in some instances. And what are these? A reproduction of a picture in someone's mind, or of a place in time that they remember. Just like many pieces of art, highly-appraised art might I add.
One of the notables taking exception to my opinion was Clive Barker, the British horror novelist, short story writer and "Hellraiser" writer-director. Barker studied English and philosophy at Liverpool, is an accomplished artist and quite possibly knows more about art in its many manifestations than the average gamer does. How can I say that? Only a guess.
You may want to work on that superiority complex, as you build him up, only to break him down later in the article. It's funny, because after you relate him to the average gamer as being superior, you attempt to make yourself look higher than him, and thus through base inference, higher than the average gamer. Keep in mind, I'm making this personal because you made it personal to him.
Barker was a speaker at the recent Hollywood and Games Summit, and chose to respond to some of my statements. His responses are posted at [url]www.GamesIndustry.biz[/url]. I find them stimulating, and I extend the dialogue here with further responses of my own:
Barker: "It's evident that Ebert had a prejudiced vision of what the medium is, or more importantly what it can be."
Ebert: The word "prejudiced" often translates as "disagrees with me." I might suggest that gamers have a prejudiced view of their medium, and particularly what it can be. Games may not be Shakespeare quite yet, but I have the prejudice that they never will be, and some gamers are prejudiced that they will.
This, Mr. Ebert, is what one calls an equivocation in logical argument. You changed the definition of his word, because it has more than one, in order to better your argument. This isn't congruent, though, it doesn't work like that. His use of the word prejudice referred to your lack of knowledge on the subject, coupled with your negative opinion. Yours refers to a difference of opinion. Basically, two different words.
Barker: "We can debate what art is, we can debate it forever. If the experience moves you in some way or another ... even if it moves your bowels ... I think it is worthy of some serious study."
Ebert: Perhaps if the experience moves your bowels, it is worthy of some serious medical study. Many experiences that move me in some way or another are not art. A year ago I lost the ability (temporarily, I hope) to speak. I was deeply moved by the experience. It was not art.
Whether or not you see it as art is cursory. One can find beauty in anything, even if it is "simply" the progression of mind.
Barker: "It used to worry me that the New York Times never reviewed my books. But the point is that people like the books. Books aren't about reviewers. Games aren't about reviewers. They are about players."
Ebert: A reviewer is a reader, a viewer or a player with an opinion about what he or she has viewed, read or played. Whether that opinion is valid is up to his audience, books, games and all forms of created experience are about themselves; the real question is, do we as their consumers become more or less complex, thoughtful, insightful, witty, empathetic, intelligent, philosophical (and so on) by experiencing them? Something may be excellent as itself, and yet be ultimately worthless. A bowel movement, for example.
Hey, another equivocation. His term "Reviewer" refers to someone paid to do so, not the audience in which he is typically concerned with. He's saying let his audience decide, not the opinion of one man or woman. One person such as yourself, with an obviously uneducated grasp on what video games actually are. Fortunately for gamers, however, is the fact that their reviewers are typically video game savvy, and have similar interests. Similar to movie reviewers, you find one you like, typically, and follow them.
Barker: "I think that Roger Ebert's problem is that he thinks you can't have art if there is that amount of malleability in the narrative. In other words, Shakespeare could not have written 'Romeo and Juliet' as a game because it could have had a happy ending, you know? If only she hadn't taken the **** poison. If only he'd have gotten there quicker."
Ebert: He is right again about me. I believe art is created by an artist. If you change it, you become the artist. Would "Romeo and Juliet" have been better with a different ending? Rewritten versions of the play were actually produced with happy endings. "King Lear" was also subjected to rewrites; it's such a downer. At this point, taste comes into play. Which version of "Romeo and Juliet," Shakespeare's or Barker's, is superior, deeper, more moving, more "artistic"?
Barker: "We should be stretching the imaginations of our players and ourselves. Let's invent a world where the player gets to go through every emotional journey available. That is art. Offering that to people is art."
Ebert: If you can go through "every emotional journey available," doesn't that devalue each and every one of them? Art seeks to lead you to an inevitable conclusion, not a smorgasbord of choices. If next time, I have Romeo and Juliet go through the story naked and standing on their hands, would that be way cool, or what?
And this is where you falter the most. Video games lead you to a single conclusion as well, vastly depending on the story.
But it seems to me here that you believe the gamer can craft their own ending? If we're speaking about Role Playing Games here, which I'm assuming we are, they are set on a linear path. Though certain events may happen in different order, based most simply on the game's battle-system or world-map, this is inconsequential because no matter what, unless the developers try to make the game unique (Which, in of itself can be considered a form of art. Though, "High Art" as you referenced earlier is still undefined.), it will follow a straight path. No matter what the player does, aside from debugging and breaking the game down into its most basic format and altering it (An analogy to this would be tearing a book apart and putting in your own pages.), the player cannot do what the developer does not intend. Like a book, they guide you through the experiences of the characters, they are developed and you know who they are and what they stand for. You cry when they die, and hate them when they betray you. It may be a different medium, but that doesn't make it any weaker. Just because there is a board game tossed into the fray of the story, doesn't mean its any weaker of a story.
Barker: "I'm not doing an evangelical job here. I'm just saying that gaming is a great way to do what we as human beings need to do all the time -- to take ourselves away from the oppressive facts of our lives and go somewhere where we have our own control."
Ebert: Spoken with the maturity of an honest and articulate 4-year old. I do not have a need "all the time" to take myself away from the oppressive facts of my life, however oppressive they may be, in order to go somewhere where I have control. I need to stay here and take control. Right now, for example, I cannot speak, but I am writing this. You lose some, you win some.
The irony is painful in this passage. A child makes wild conjectures based on things they don't think they'll like. They won't eat broccoli or spinach because they don't like what it looks like, yet they have no knowledge of what it tastes like. You, who is uneducated in the taste of these stories, makes a similarly wild conjecture. So who, really, is the child? It's best you don't throw stones in a glass house.
That said, let me confess I enjoy entertainments, but I think it important to know what they are. I like the circus as much as the ballet. I like crime novels. (I just finished an advance copy of Henry Kisor's Cache of Corpses, about GPS geo-caching gamesters and a macabre murder conspiracy. Couldn't put it down.) And I like horror stories, where Edgar Allen Poe in particular represents art. I think I know what Stan Brakhage meant when he said Poe invented the cinema, lacking only film.
I treasure escapism in the movies. I tirelessly quote Pauline Kael: The movies are so rarely great art, that if we cannot appreciate great trash, we have no reason to go. I admired "Spiderman II," "Superman," and many of the "Star Wars," Indiana Jones, James Bond and Harry Potter films. The idea, I think, is to value what is good at whatever level you find it. "Spiderman II" is one of the great comic superhero movies but it is not great art.
Barker is right that we can debate art forever. I mentioned that a Campbell's soup could be art. I was imprecise. Actually, it is Andy Warhol's painting of the label that is art. Would Warhol have considered Clive Barker's video game "Undying" as art? Certainly. He would have kept it in its shrink-wrapped box, placed it inside a Plexiglas display case, mounted it on a pedestal, and labeled it "Video Game."
But alas, Warhol would have missed the true art, now wouldn't he have? The story, the backgrounds, the music, the entire atmosphere wrapped into one powerful package. Within a video game, the amount of art and personal creativity invested into each and every frame is immeasurable. Each of these things may not equate to "High art" in your book, and that is simply a personal definition, as to which I can concede is your own. But to me, and many others, the summation of all the parts is "High art". So you're welcome to your opinion, I honestly don't care; but if you're going to spout uneducated and caustic waste, be sure that you'll be called on your ignorance.
wow...that guy is like the essence of retarted
Ive seen this critic before. For a guy who thinks he knows alot about art, its a shame A Clockwork Orange was too much for him to understand.
Video games have the potential to be a new art form. However seeing as its still relativily new its going to be a while. Film was never seen as an art form when it was born and many beleived it would never be one.
Although there are some games and devlopers that try to cross over into art its still not there.
But I will say the most artistic or artistic like game is Conkers Bad Fur Day. Why? For its social commentary on the video game industry at the time. :3
I think there's a few games you'd think qualify as art if you played them. Give Shadow of the Collossus or Terranigma a shot, the way the stories unfold and make you feel the main character's pain rather than just witness it is confirmation enough for me. Manhunt 2, from what I've heard so far, also seems like a work of art.
Yeah, in the same taboo way that modern nudity seems to get activists crazy.
No, there is actually quite a bit of depth to it. The whole time you're being instructed by some insane freak to kill people inside a gameshow and are constantly rewarded for it and encouraged to push it further. Yet you can resist and do the bare minimum to survive and reduce people's suffering as much as possible and at the end of it you're rewarded for your humanity. If that's not some kind of social commentary on violence in videogames I don't know what is.
The last time Ebert's opinion was worth anything was when Siskel was alive.
Art is meant to inspire emotion, right? Seems to me like playing through a game as a character, building a sense of empathy, and eventually a limited sense of "I am this character" is what usually sets aside the best literature around.
Oh, gee, pretty much everyhalf decent game does that. huh.
When playing Tetris, I could so relate to the falling blocks.
Me too man. I totally felt what it was like to be a soulless, mindless automaton, being manipulated by the hungering needs of a faceless omnipotent controller.
That game is deep, man. Also, you're an ***.
Ico, FFX, Okami, Shadow of the Collossus
Those games are true ****ing works of art. I know there are other perfect examples, but those 4 (and many, many other titles) are works of art. Who ever says otherwise should crawl under a rock and die alone. Which is what Roger Ebert should do.
Or how we're all on a downward trajectory and though we may look different from others, we are essentially serving the same purpose. We all line up and do the same thing to lay groundwork for those coming after us, and then we cease to exist. And the only way to the top is to **** someone over, a la the player. Tetris is ****ing deep. Poetry in geometry.
Deep Soul. Very deep
*clicks fingers repeatadly*
this guy is almost as much as a douche at jack tompson, almost.
It frightens me the amount of bull**** I generated with just one post.
Well played, vgc. Well played.