Infinite Ammo

Previously I’ve “ranted” about games-as-art, simply stating that I believe them to be art, while explaining that I don’t believe that to be a pretentious statement.

Amanda Palmer, being awesome

I feel that what causes some people to run screaming from games-as-art discussions is a combination of exaggerations and misinterpretations. One side in a debate might overstate their case, while the other seizes on that, characterizes it and perpetuates it – for example. The sad thing is, as far as I can see it, there really isn’t a need for this “rift”.

The definition of “art” that I subscribe to is a very open one. For example, it doesn’t require something to be “good” (ranked above and beyond other works) and it could be said of almost any medium.

One of the reasons I don’t include “good” in my definition of art, is because “good” is subjective. I think “good” is one of the points where debates about art become pretentious. The question is: is there an objective way to evaluate art?

Well there are ways that are certainly considered more objective than just our own internal opinions, but are they really that objective?

* Reviews: It would be hard to argue that reviews are purely objective. Most of the time we want reviews to be subjective, because they’re more interesting. (i.e. someone saying “I LOVED this game” or “I HATED this movie” in so many words) Many of us tend to follow critics that we feel will recommend things that we like, and some of us get upset at critics that trash the things we do like. But I don’t see how two or more people sharing a subjective opinion makes them become objective.

* Review Aggregators: For example, Metacritic or RottenTomatoes. These are also fun to look at, but they really only tell us what a majority of subjective opinions think. There are also box office rankings, which can measure the financial success of movies. But this doesn’t necessarily speak to what we might refer to as the “artistic qualities” of a movie. Are these types of rankings the closest to objectivity that we can get?

* Awards Shows: These can be quite similar to review aggregators, but in some cases they may have a limited of panel of judges. Either it’s again “a majority of subjective opinions” or “a small group of subjective opinions”.

So how much value does an opinion have? I think we’d all like to believe that our opinions have some importance, after all we present them, debate them, question them (I’m presenting one right now) – in a few terrible cases some of us even try to force others to agree. But is it the fact that we have an opinion that’s valuable, or is it about the exchange?

If there isn’t an exchange (or conversation if you like) that comes out of the opinion, I’m not sure how much value derives from it. If an opinion is shared openly, presumably someone is going to read it, think about it and/or present their views. Ideally, this exchange of data leads to wiser, more understanding people. I think ultimately those types of conversations about particular works are more valuable than basic rankings. I would be much more interested in having a conversation with someone about what was meaningful to them in a particular game than in reading MetaCritic. The reason? The conversation format acknowledges more openly the subjectivity of the opinions.

One thing I like about the indie scene is that it celebrates creative freedom, and with creative freedom can come diversity. In the mainstream where you generally have a lot of large companies that must maintain a bottom line, you tend to see a lot more “safe” creative decisions. Ones that will, in the hopes of the large company, appeal to a “majority of subjective opinions” so that they can stay afloat, and maybe turn a profit. Indie game developers that are trying to make a living are still motivated by generating income, but in general their teams are smaller and sometimes of more modest life styles – so they can create a game that fills a niche audience and still manage to survive.

Is the value of a particular piece measured by how popular it is? To my personal tastes, I would disagree. We all have unique ways of feeling and experiencing things. It’s a powerful and moving experience when a particular work comes along that happens to speak to something that is unique about yourself or makes you think about an important aspect of your life in an entirely different way.

I’ll pick three examples :
* Synecdoche, NY (movie)
* Super Mario World (game)
* Ed Wood (film)

All these works stick in my mind because they had a profound impact on me. There were elements I could relate to, but also elements that were completely new. In the case of “Ed Wood”, I’m not sure if it’s a film that everyone would enjoy, but it happens to be one of my favourite movies of all time because it touches on something so well that no other film has really achieved – a very particular take on the creative process.

Super Mario World is a favourite game because it was my introduction to the Mario universe. It introduces us to an entirely imaginary world filled with wonder. The creative freedom is joyful. One phrase that I would associate with all good Mario games is “joie de vivre”.

Synecdoche is an example of a story that is about stories themselves. I was moved to tears by it, because it managed, for me at least, to sum up all the important things about life – building them up, tearing them down and revealing a raw core that I found to be hauntingly true. Many other people watch this movie and get nothing out of it. That’s perfectly fine.

Are these particular examples that important? Not so much in and of themselves. The point is that some of them are popular, some are not as popular. Some people love them, some people hate them. There are many other things that I love that are on nobody’s radar. There are many other things that I love that are on everyone’s radar.

Would I care if any of these things I love happened to have a 50% aggregator rating? No, I really wouldn’t.

Another factor in the “equation of opinions” is time. Group opinions tend to expire or mutate. The formation of a “classic” is kind of like a review aggregator with a large gestation period. (Will “Avatar” be thought of as a ‘masterpiece’ in the future, or is it just really popular right now? It depends on how the opinions of large groups of people and key critics change.)

This is why I think it’s pretty futile to try to convince others of the “badness” of particular forms of art. Unlike science where you can measure the usefulness of something quantitatively through studies and experiments, art is most of all subjective. We either like it or we don’t. (and in many cases we wrestle with it) We can talk about various production values, but ultimately it’s possible that people will enjoy certain things in spite of terrible production values. We can talk about how much something emulates other trends, but trends are temporary and subjective.

“So Alec, if you believe that games are art, and yet subscribe to a definition of art that is so loosely defined, why do you seem to care so much about calling games art?”

I mulled over this for the last while, and came up with an example that helps illustrate why I feel this way.

Part of it comes out of the technology roots of games. The computer scene in the earlier days was often dominated by “uber nerds” who would collect lots of hardware and not actually have that much to use for it. My impression was that a lot of games were created for this market in the earlier days.

I love my “uber nerd” friends (“omg my new rig runs Crysis 67 at 3000fps” etc) but the downside to this market is that it encourages the “feature list”. We’ve all seen this – a list of bullet points on the back of a box with goofy names of “systems” (the ultimate blood engine!), gameplay “features” (eviscerate your foes with 70 different finishing moves!) and general masturbation. (9.5 billion polys each with 256 shader layers!) The end result feels like a weird “macho” male stereotype. The downsides of this “macho” illusion spill into misogyny, unnecessarily contentious competition and other silly things.

One example of a game that likely was boosted by this market is “Doom”. Doom also happens to be a really fun game, but the reason it exploded was because it used technology in a relatively new way. Businesses smelt blood, and we’ve seen piles and piles of FPS games ever since.

To me, calling games “art” is a step that helps us think about games in ways other than feature lists. We can think about the meaningful experiences that someone may get out of the context of a game. We can think about the way different elements of a game tie together. We can start to question our assumptions about the medium and imagine where new possibilities can take us. We can present more to the general public than a “feature list”. (and many games do)

You may argue that we could do these things without the word “art”, and I’d tend to agree. But in terms of larger society, perception of the value of games is still an issue. One example is middle-aged people. I was in the awkward position of being at a local job fair for kids, helping to promote New Media Manitoba and hopefully encouraging a few younger folks to pursue their passion. The glazed and sometimes frightened looks that came over most of the parents’ eyes when I told them I was a game designer disappointed me. I had hoped we had moved past most of the irrational misunderstandings and general ignorance by now.

I aim to make a small contribution towards a more open-minded view of games as a medium capable of meaningful creative expression, and that’s why I think it is valuable to call games “art”. In my view, it’s just a simple fact, and I repeat it in hopes that it will be both empowering to other creators and a way to encourage players to think about games in many different ways.

-Finis!-

Appendix A

I also see that you could break components of games into these three major categories: art, technology and business. You could even call it a “Tri-Force of Game Development” if you wanted to.

(Aside: ‘Business’ I take to include freeware games. In that case, ‘Business’ would refer to the time required to release a game, and considerations for the audience)

“How can you believe that games are art and yet they also combine technology and business?”

My belief is that the art element “contaminates” the other elements. That in spite of meddling businessmen, and the limits of technology – valuable art can emerge. In fact, one could argue that interesting art is more likely to emerge from situations where there is conflict. (you may read the story behind any one of Terry Gilliam’s best films for a few examples)

Game development is inherently more complex (involves more components) than something like writing a poem or a jamming on a piano – but just because something is more complex or has many different components does not negate its artistic value. (film is a good example, but there are plenty of others)

Appendix B

“The story in Super Mario World is not important.”

I would argue that story is a part of the “context” in a game. Context is important, because we humans really savour a mixture of flavours. (i.e. multiple simultaneous stimulations)

In the case of Super Mario, the context of the character and the world are very important to what the final game is. You could remove the sprites, or change the brothers into bureaucrats instead of plumbers – and this arguably wouldn’t hurt the gameplay too severely – but it would still change the game. It would change the way people experience and think about it, subjectively.

In fact, the character of “Super Mario” and the world he inhabits is so iconic that he has become a mascot, for better or for worse. In terms of “better”, all of the imagination that goes into the best Mario fan-art confirms for me that the story of this plumber has meant a great deal to people.

You may prefer to remove “story” from “context”. In my view something that has a “character” and a “world” constitutes at least the basis of a story. In my currently preferred terminology, I would say that “Super Mario World” has a very light emphasis on story, but the characters and world (in particular the player’s ‘relationship’ to Mario) are key components of the game. We could go further and say that Mario games provide the characters, the world and a very loose framework for a story – and the player helps fill in the missing pieces.

This “creative collaboration” aspect to games between the developer and the player, whether it’s explored explicitly (through some kind of game mechanic) or more implicitly (through a player’s imagination), is another aspect of games that is fascinating and I love to see it explored.