I also get the impression he took a lot more deliberation to come to his conclusion than a lot of the people who say 'I liked Portal, therefore it is art'.
Yes, but did HE play any games in coming to his conclusion? Did his deliberation involve playing video games? If so, which games?
Video games are an interactive medium. If you don't play them, you can't really experience them. Watching them be played, or reading about them is never enough.
Ebert's entire career is built upon him wheezing opinions out in a way that gets attention and implies authority. If he doesn't huff and puff periodically to regain media attention, his hot-air balloon will deflate and his career will shrivel and he won't be able to buy groceries or pay rent.
Take this kind of shit not as insults or ignorance or ignominy, but as a warning: Roger Ebert needs food badly.
But here he was responding specifically to a video which countered his original statement. That is probably my biggest issue with the whole thing, the video argument for "Video games are art" is extremely weak to begin with. The examples are weak and the meaning drawn from them is flimsy at best.
In this instance it doesn't matter if he never played them and just came to his opinion by accident, because in the cases presented he is right. Waco is not art and is not exploring how we feel about the tragedy. And being able to reverse time in Braid is not a metaphor for how we deal with regret, it's just a game mechanic to get around the Fail->Reload tedium.
I'm pretty sure any of us could make a better case than the one Ebert was responding to. None of us would present this as the pioneer of video games as art at the very least.
What I got from Braid is we can be monsters without even realizing it, and what makes us good or evil is the light that we are portrayed in, kinda deep for an indy game. I really liked it as a game too.
I would like to argue that games have some severe problems when it comes to tackling heavy issues, because for it to be a game, you have to experience them, rather than see them.
Is a cutscene of the player's character shooting the same thing as a first person shooter? Of course it is not. Is a cutscene of the player's character struggling with difficult themes the same thing as a game about difficult themes? Not any more so. And by that, I dare say that I don't think games like Final Fantasy have any story at all. Their cutscenes have a story, but that's an entirely different matter; cutscenes aren't games, they're inserted movies for when a game designer is too poorly skilled to tell a story in gameplay. Hi, Hideo Kojima!
Right, now that we've established that, does anyone think it's actually possible to portray love through gameplay? It's not enough to see the player character fall in love - that's not gameplay, gameplay needs to be experienced. Can you fall in love with a game character? Most sane people can't. So games can't handle a theme like love, while books and films can, because there you only need to see, and not experience.
Waco is not art and is not exploring how we feel about the tragedy.
I look at his examples as perfect strawmen. I compare wacko to the art a little kid makes. Using a kindergardeners art to say that nothing artistic can ever come from crayons is kind of silly.
Is wacko in its entirety art? I don't know. It's too early to call, give it 15-20-100 years and see what the kids are calling it.
Is there art in Wacko, sure. Even if it sucks big fat rat tits, its still art.
Does art need to hang in a gallery to be enjoyed? Of course not.
Can a game be a digial interactive museum, sure it can.
Can Ebert be a big douche picking an old scab, you betcha.
I'll just drop by quickly to clear up something.
I do in NO way consider Rembrandt or any of the "old masters" bad in any way shape or form. I just find art by newer artists more impressive, it's just my opinion.
I apologize if what I said came off as "stating something as fact".
What qualifies as art is purely subjective, and saying one piece of professional art is better than the other is also purely subjective.
It's just an opinion, just like Ebert says games are not art.
Robert Brockway (word puncher) has a pretty good write-up about this. A few of his points have some minor flaws (I don't think Modern Warfare was the first game to do what he's saying, but I digress). Interesting read if you've got the time.
Ebert should simply have titled it "Video Games will never be art to me" because that is essentially what he says in the article (he says that art is a matter of personal taste).
While he may or may not be correct that Kelly Santiago's examples are not great ones, he could have been a more thoughtful in his criticism. He is after all a professional critic, but his arguments are weak an not founded on any actual experiences.
People play games because games foster experiences, and Ebert is predisposed to never being open to the types of experiences (artful or not) which games can offer. Perhaps those experiences will never be labeled as art, but that does not devalue them. The Mona Lisa is considered a masterpiece, but I would never have thought so if someone hadn't said so in an art book. But just because it is not moving to me doesn't make it so for everyone.
That is the biggest flaw of Ebert's article - he acts as if he speaks for the everyone, when in fact it's just one man's opinion. He is correct to wonder why we care if a game is art or not, but as long as those making the judgements are predisposed against it the opinion's won't change.
I would like to argue that games have some severe problems when it comes to tackling heavy issues, because for it to be a game, you have to experience them, rather than see them.
Is a cutscene of the player's character shooting the same thing as a first person shooter? Of course it is not. Is a cutscene of the player's character struggling with difficult themes the same thing as a game about difficult themes? Not any more so. And by that, I dare say that I don't think games like Final Fantasy have any story at all. Their cutscenes have a story, but that's an entirely different matter; cutscenes aren't games, they're inserted movies for when a game designer is too poorly skilled to tell a story in gameplay. Hi, Hideo Kojima!
Right, now that we've established that, does anyone think it's actually possible to portray love through gameplay? It's not enough to see the player character fall in love - that's not gameplay, gameplay needs to be experienced. Can you fall in love with a game character? Most sane people can't. So games can't handle a theme like love, while books and films can, because there you only need to see, and not experience.
You cant fall in love with a character in a film or book. You are detached and removed from the events. I wouldnt want to fall in love with something that isnt real.
In games you can become attached to the personification of a fictional creature. Like the Ico, Shadow of Collosus games. Or the Guards and Scientists in the first Half Life. The player can experience the actions of love(or a lesser form of it), the feelings are up to them.
Really people can fall in love with characters in movies?
The can feel an attraction or infatuation, but go through the physiological process of love. They might say they've fallen in love, does it mean they have?
I wasnt saying you'd fall in love with the characters in games, I meant you may go through the process of actions which some would describe as love or a lesser form. Like perhaps with the cube in portal, it encourages you through, verbal cues and your actions to fool yourself.
I've treated and seen others treat certain of these AIs with a manner which is beyond being just a tool.
I did say a lesser form, say an attachement. Like someone watching them handle that cube might say they love that cube or they like that guard, or companion.
I didnt use Alyx Vance as an example because, I felt no attachement to her as she was a complete blatant engineered AI, an obvious robot. You had no problems of loss, your will was not involved in anything with her.
Its always up to the viewer, we're not some machines that are at the mercy to the whims that surround them.
f*ck him. video games are so art!! Game artists pour their everything into the games they make. i bet u he's just saying that cause he sucks turd playing videogames:p !!!!!!!!!!!!!!! effing dumba*s
You cant fall in love with a character in a film or book. You are detached and removed from the events. I wouldnt want to fall in love with something that isnt real.
Well, that's my point. In a book or a movie, you don't have to, because the character already does it. In a game, you are the character, you have to be the one to experience it.
I must admit I haven't played either Ico or Shadow of the Colossus, but HL's guards were mostly like a challenge to me - how long can you keep them alive? - and a feeling of loss about that is obviously not even remotely like you'd deal with the loss of people.
I was gutted when the combine captured Alyx, i jumped down the sewer, ran a little way then stopped to catch my breath and curse the combine over what just happened. It's the game and your imagination combined into one. I wasn't physically out of breath but gordon freeman sure as hell was. It was like I was an actor playing him, feeling what he was feeling.. that's art to me
You cant fall in love with a character in a film or book. You are detached and removed from the events. I wouldnt want to fall in love with something that isnt real.
Well, that's my point. In a book or a movie, you don't have to, because the character already does it. In a game, you are the character, you have to be the one to experience it.
I must admit I haven't played either Ico or Shadow of the Colossus, but HL's guards were mostly like a challenge to me - how long can you keep them alive? - and a feeling of loss about that is obviously not even remotely like you'd deal with the loss of people.
I guess its somewhat the same in a few games. Not all games do you play yourself. Planescape Torment, you play a well defined character although you have choices, if you understand the story and whom the scarred one is them, then you sort of become one with the character, making the choices he would make as if you were him. Or Sanitarium another game. Where you can experience the loss of the characters sister in an interesting way.
I think with most fictional medias people experience pretend emotions, they allow themselves to experience what their supposed to feel, although they arent quite the same(although perhaps they are) as real emotions, the viewer is aware of the collusion and could get out of it at any minute.
I would equate the guards to simple pets, there not developed enough for you to form attachements to them as you would people. But they do have enough push and pull interaction for you to perhaps, think of them as a simple pet like a bug or insect, whom sort of helps you out a bit and can get easily squashed.
To get a faux real attachement to some virtual creature, they wouldnt need to be perfect turing machines. They would just need to exhibit certain traits, exhibit pain, die, appear to have a will of its own, non predictable dialogue. It would have to promote emotions of guilt, inhibit the players tendencies towards excessive wild behaviours.
Although saying that I'm sure you would never get attached to a virtual dog as you would a real one, because you know the fragility of the real one. A virtual dog you can just reset reload, even if you coudnt you know its just bits and ones.
Video games are weird in the sense that the player has all the control, unless you're trying to tell a story with cut scenes, then how the player plays doesn't always represent the character. So there's really no way to get real emotions and have feelings for and about characters. Most of the time I just run around not caring about the story, but just completing my goals (get enough money to by this or unlock that).
Seems like a pretty poor argument to me. Movies, plays, operas, etc all have outcomes as well. It just sounds like he's never experienced a video game in the way we have and is under the impression that there is only one way to play through a game.
exactly, games can be won? Well technically all single player games are won its just a matter of finishing it so does that mean all books are won too cause they have an outcome?
Generally, art can be categorized by the way it is experienced, right? You look at a painting, hear a song, watch a movie, eat a sandwich, drive a car, and so on. The question is, how does one define the experience of a videogame in such a way that it could be considered art?
One could argue, I suppose, that what the player experiences is the current level at the current moment, and that, therefore, the true 'art' of the game is it's level design. Although, for that to be valid, you would then have to consider things like theme park rides and standup comedy in the same light.
Note: I wrote the first bit, had a 45 minute break, and then figured out this next bit, so I might contradict myself or reiterate something that someone else said while I was away.
Painting is art. Looking at a painting is not art.
Filming a movie is art. Watching a movie is not art.
Composing music is art. listening to music is not art.
Therefore
Designing a game is art. Playing a game is not art.
Replies
Yes, but did HE play any games in coming to his conclusion? Did his deliberation involve playing video games? If so, which games?
Video games are an interactive medium. If you don't play them, you can't really experience them. Watching them be played, or reading about them is never enough.
Take this kind of shit not as insults or ignorance or ignominy, but as a warning: Roger Ebert needs food badly.
Roger Ebert is about to die.
In this instance it doesn't matter if he never played them and just came to his opinion by accident, because in the cases presented he is right. Waco is not art and is not exploring how we feel about the tragedy. And being able to reverse time in Braid is not a metaphor for how we deal with regret, it's just a game mechanic to get around the Fail->Reload tedium.
I'm pretty sure any of us could make a better case than the one Ebert was responding to. None of us would present this as the pioneer of video games as art at the very least.
[ame]
Is a cutscene of the player's character shooting the same thing as a first person shooter? Of course it is not. Is a cutscene of the player's character struggling with difficult themes the same thing as a game about difficult themes? Not any more so. And by that, I dare say that I don't think games like Final Fantasy have any story at all. Their cutscenes have a story, but that's an entirely different matter; cutscenes aren't games, they're inserted movies for when a game designer is too poorly skilled to tell a story in gameplay. Hi, Hideo Kojima!
Right, now that we've established that, does anyone think it's actually possible to portray love through gameplay? It's not enough to see the player character fall in love - that's not gameplay, gameplay needs to be experienced. Can you fall in love with a game character? Most sane people can't. So games can't handle a theme like love, while books and films can, because there you only need to see, and not experience.
Is wacko in its entirety art? I don't know. It's too early to call, give it 15-20-100 years and see what the kids are calling it.
Is there art in Wacko, sure. Even if it sucks big fat rat tits, its still art.
Does art need to hang in a gallery to be enjoyed? Of course not.
Can a game be a digial interactive museum, sure it can.
Can Ebert be a big douche picking an old scab, you betcha.
I do in NO way consider Rembrandt or any of the "old masters" bad in any way shape or form. I just find art by newer artists more impressive, it's just my opinion.
I apologize if what I said came off as "stating something as fact".
What qualifies as art is purely subjective, and saying one piece of professional art is better than the other is also purely subjective.
It's just an opinion, just like Ebert says games are not art.
so hail Craig Mullin!
While he may or may not be correct that Kelly Santiago's examples are not great ones, he could have been a more thoughtful in his criticism. He is after all a professional critic, but his arguments are weak an not founded on any actual experiences.
People play games because games foster experiences, and Ebert is predisposed to never being open to the types of experiences (artful or not) which games can offer. Perhaps those experiences will never be labeled as art, but that does not devalue them. The Mona Lisa is considered a masterpiece, but I would never have thought so if someone hadn't said so in an art book. But just because it is not moving to me doesn't make it so for everyone.
That is the biggest flaw of Ebert's article - he acts as if he speaks for the everyone, when in fact it's just one man's opinion. He is correct to wonder why we care if a game is art or not, but as long as those making the judgements are predisposed against it the opinion's won't change.
You cant fall in love with a character in a film or book. You are detached and removed from the events. I wouldnt want to fall in love with something that isnt real.
In games you can become attached to the personification of a fictional creature. Like the Ico, Shadow of Collosus games. Or the Guards and Scientists in the first Half Life. The player can experience the actions of love(or a lesser form of it), the feelings are up to them.
The can feel an attraction or infatuation, but go through the physiological process of love. They might say they've fallen in love, does it mean they have?
I wasnt saying you'd fall in love with the characters in games, I meant you may go through the process of actions which some would describe as love or a lesser form. Like perhaps with the cube in portal, it encourages you through, verbal cues and your actions to fool yourself.
I've treated and seen others treat certain of these AIs with a manner which is beyond being just a tool.
I did say a lesser form, say an attachement. Like someone watching them handle that cube might say they love that cube or they like that guard, or companion.
I didnt use Alyx Vance as an example because, I felt no attachement to her as she was a complete blatant engineered AI, an obvious robot. You had no problems of loss, your will was not involved in anything with her.
Its always up to the viewer, we're not some machines that are at the mercy to the whims that surround them.
I must admit I haven't played either Ico or Shadow of the Colossus, but HL's guards were mostly like a challenge to me - how long can you keep them alive? - and a feeling of loss about that is obviously not even remotely like you'd deal with the loss of people.
http://encyclopediadramatica.com/Otakukin (NSFW, probably)
back on topic, Scott Sharkey chimed in on this.
I guess its somewhat the same in a few games. Not all games do you play yourself. Planescape Torment, you play a well defined character although you have choices, if you understand the story and whom the scarred one is them, then you sort of become one with the character, making the choices he would make as if you were him. Or Sanitarium another game. Where you can experience the loss of the characters sister in an interesting way.
I think with most fictional medias people experience pretend emotions, they allow themselves to experience what their supposed to feel, although they arent quite the same(although perhaps they are) as real emotions, the viewer is aware of the collusion and could get out of it at any minute.
I would equate the guards to simple pets, there not developed enough for you to form attachements to them as you would people. But they do have enough push and pull interaction for you to perhaps, think of them as a simple pet like a bug or insect, whom sort of helps you out a bit and can get easily squashed.
To get a faux real attachement to some virtual creature, they wouldnt need to be perfect turing machines. They would just need to exhibit certain traits, exhibit pain, die, appear to have a will of its own, non predictable dialogue. It would have to promote emotions of guilt, inhibit the players tendencies towards excessive wild behaviours.
Although saying that I'm sure you would never get attached to a virtual dog as you would a real one, because you know the fragility of the real one. A virtual dog you can just reset reload, even if you coudnt you know its just bits and ones.
exactly, games can be won? Well technically all single player games are won its just a matter of finishing it so does that mean all books are won too cause they have an outcome?
One could argue, I suppose, that what the player experiences is the current level at the current moment, and that, therefore, the true 'art' of the game is it's level design. Although, for that to be valid, you would then have to consider things like theme park rides and standup comedy in the same light.
Note: I wrote the first bit, had a 45 minute break, and then figured out this next bit, so I might contradict myself or reiterate something that someone else said while I was away.
Painting is art. Looking at a painting is not art.
Filming a movie is art. Watching a movie is not art.
Composing music is art. listening to music is not art.
Therefore
Designing a game is art. Playing a game is not art.
I now feel kinda sorry for the dude. To have lost his jaw and voice....damn. Kinda ironic too