Games as Art or Games as Sport?

Evac101

I was thinking about this whole deal in the wake (continuing kerfuffle) which has arisen with people comparing games to other Art forms and the legitimacy of criticism (be that reviews or feminist examination) for the medium when it struck me that there is no single perception of games. In the same way we see RPG's, MOBA's and shooters I think the majority of us view games (broadly) as being of artistic merit or being competitive. It might even be as simple as "no multiplayer game is artistic" though I suspect that, given my relatively small stable of played games even I could come up with example to disprove that. What it comes back to however is, if some games are art and some games (to me in any case) fit more into the sport category should we be evaluating both using the same criteria?

K.O.Kiki

They're art, and you can enjoy them competively.

But I think the term "e-sports" is utter junk, and that's coming from a longtime Street Fighter player.

richymcdermott

Not all games are art. Sports games and military shooters are only entertainment products

gizmo

Evac101 wrote: »

I was thinking about this whole deal in the wake (continuing kerfuffle) which has arisen with people comparing games to other Art forms and the legitimacy of criticism (be that reviews or feminist examination) for the medium when it struck me that there is no single perception of games. In the same way we see RPG's, MOBA's and shooters I think the majority of us view games (broadly) as being of artistic merit or being competitive. It might even be as simple as "no multiplayer game is artistic" though I suspect that, given my relatively small stable of played games even I could come up with example to disprove that. What it comes back to however is, if some games are art and some games (to me in any case) fit more into the sport category should we be evaluating both using the same criteria?

This is what I love about games, they can be so many different things to so many different people. I can sit on the couch, on my own and be utterly engrossed in something like Journey or I can sit beside a friend laughing away as our favourite heroes knock each other around the place in Marvel Vs. Capcom 3, I can have some folk around for some drinks and watch as they flail about to Wii Sports or I can sit and watch in awe as 40,000 Koreans fill the World Cup Stadium in Seoul to watch the League of Legends World Championship Final.

Does any one of those points diminish the validity of the other as an art form or sport? Absolutely not.

Reekwind

I don't really buy into the proposed dichotomy here: that a game can be art OR sport. Leaving aside the 'all things to all men' argument, and stepping away from games entirely for a moment, it can be argued that even sport is art. David Foster Wallace wrote a relatively famous article a few years back in which he likened watching Roger Federer to a religious experience. The same article discusses how "high-level sports are a prime venue for the expression of human beauty". It's well worth a read.

The same theme crops up semi-regularly in football, particularity a few years back when Spanish teams were weaving intricate patterns across the pitch. Even if the game itself may sometimes resist categorisation (I'd reference Big Sam here but ugliness is no barrier to art) there is a vast amount of writing surrounding football, much of it excellent in its own right and not afraid to tackle big subjects. Whether a sport or artform, computer games could only benefit from having a writer like Barney Ronay commenting on them.

So, to come back to games, I don't see why we need to use labels. An intense multiplayer game of Quake 3 has, despite being very much competitive, a beauty all of its own. It's not the same sort of art as Dear Esther but that's a genre issue (similarly, you wouldn't slate The Exorcist for a lack of laughs). So why get too concerned about categorisation? We should be looking for the best writing on a game regardless of whether it concerns the tightly-tuned recoil physics or the nuanced exploration of emotional trauma.

Evac101

My point was that some games I would consider to be both game and art and others are just game - I wouldn't categorise Serious Sam as Art in any respect as an example - similarly rag doll physics games are still games, but the sceintific rigor applied would, to me, negate any artistic conatations.

Reekwind

Evac101 wrote: »

I wouldn't categorise Serious Sam as Art in any respect as an example

Why not?

johnny_ultimate

Gaming is moving further and further away from allowing for absolute definitions. There's no benefit IMO in trying to fit everything into categories, because too many games defy simple classification. The whole 'what constitutes art?' rabbit hole is an endless one, and that's applicable to any medium (what separates JJ Abrams and Michael Haneke, The Beatles and Mozart, JK Rowling and Alice Munro, Jason Rohrer and Cliffy B?), so I don't think there's any real benefit in trying to apply definitive criteria outside the broadest, most open ended ones.

Just be glad that games are so varied. If a developer wants to make a game with complex mechanics that people can play competitively and professionally, great! If someone wants to express something personal, abstract and poetic, they can do that either. Or they can aim to make a game that is simply fun - not profound or with anything to say other than to have a good time. None of these are mutually exclusive - there's an art to balancing gameplay mechanics or refining an action setpiece or making sure the feedback on a punch is just right. Let them just do what they do, IMO

SeantheMan

K.O.Kiki wrote: »

But I think the term "e-sports" is utter junk, and that's coming from a longtime Street Fighter player.

Why ?

I guess I kind of agree, if the point your making is that a sport is something in which you should be physically moving about and active.
Maybe the term "competitive gaming" is better, but it doesn't have the same ring to it.
Also, if I submit to that classifcation of sports...then I can't consider darts or similar things sports either.

E-Sports is a thing though, and gaming is now a spectator (sport) event as well as a hobby.
Only last week I was in a stadium with 40,000 other people watching 2 teams play a computer game against one another

Grumpypants

I don' think the question is are games art, but rather what is art?

If a concept artist draws a picture for a game that is art, so when does that stop being art? When it is mixed with an animators artistic representation of it? when it is brought to life by a programmer using his artistic creativity?

When the work of hundreds of artists all coming together in something far more complex than any song, painting, film, piece of pottery why is it regulated to anything other than a piece of art?

For me art is anything that stimulates the conversation on whether something is art or not. A red square on the wall is a red square to one person it is an incredibly moving piece of art to another.

As works of art they should be open to critique, but at the same time those critiquing this work should understand that they are in turn opening their own work up to critique.

Generic Dreadhead

Needs a poll option

Retr0gamer

Saying multiplayer games can't be art ignores the existence of Journey.

CiDeRmAn

Games are so subjective they can mean many things to lots of people, and so they can legitimately be a sport to some, a competition to others, art to someone else and a casual past time to a misguided few.
But, the thing is, each view point is valid and variable depending on, not only who you talk to but when you talk to them.
I would consider ico and SotC to be art, I would be tempted to put Metroid Prime in there as well.

Evac101

Sorry for the belated response, work has been... odd. Just a couple of points that came up in discussion with some friends who game regarding this subject and I'm curious what peoples responses to these would be:

1) One argued that if we consider games as art, while we can critique them from a moral/ethical framework that it's unsupportable to attempt to force them fit into that framework. He cited the Victorians breaking off parts of Grecian and Roman statue's during their grand tours to bring them into line with the morals of their culture.

2) The other argued that experiences like Gone Home, Depression Quest, etc are more easily defined as "interactive storytelling" rather then games. He put this forward in a positive regard citing examples of it in Manga over the last couple of years (which I have no familiarity with tbh) where the distribution of manga via digital means allows the artists/writers to have non-static panels/pages? Honestly, given I've never seen it I may well be butchering the description of this so I'll leave it to more educated folk to elaborate on it.

o1s1n

Grumpypants wrote: »

I don' think the question is are games art, but rather what is art?

If a concept artist draws a picture for a game that is art, so when does that stop being art? When it is mixed with an animators artistic representation of it? when it is brought to life by a programmer using his artistic creativity?

When the work of hundreds of artists all coming together in something far more complex than any song, painting, film, piece of pottery why is it regulated to anything other than a piece of art?

For me art is anything that stimulates the conversation on whether something is art or not. A red square on the wall is a red square to one person it is an incredibly moving piece of art to another.

As works of art they should be open to critique, but at the same time those critiquing this work should understand that they are in turn opening their own work up to critique.

Art functions as emotion/aesthetic over function.

I guess the argument here is that videogames are in a large part functional things, they're 'games' to most people.

But then, you can appreciate any item which has been created as a piece of art if you approach it from that point of view. Duchamp's 'fountain' would be a perfect example of this.

So can games be art? If you want them to be, then of course they can.

Are they art to everyone? Well, is anything truely art to everyone? All art is subjective.

Mr.Saturn

Having been to many thesis exhibitions (yes, reader, against my will), I'd wage that if a vagina kaleidoscope can qualify, there's plenty of room for gaming.

Potatoeman

If golf can be a sport so can games.

If a toilet can be art so can games.

o1s1n

They're different things though.

The definition of art is a lot more open ended than the definition of sport.

Doesn't sport require physical exertion? I know you can play really long games, but endurance does not automatically make something a sport. I can think of lots of things that require endurance that wouldn't be sports.

In the end, does it need to be considered a sport? Why not find a more apt term?

CiDeRmAn

Is Bayonetta's backside art?
Deep questions such as this remain.
Is Nathan Drake a homicidal maniac?

Overtime I can really appreciate the craft that has gone into classic games like Pacman, Galaga and Tempest. Without cutscenes, QTEs and voice overs to attempt to distract they really insist on the player coming face to face with the gameplay, glowing dots and lines on a black background. All the rest is just window dressing.
But art?
They can become art, but they are certainly iconic.

C14N

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Saying multiplayer games can't be art ignores the existence of Journey.

I think it refers to competitive multiplayer rather than something vaguely co-operative like Journey or Dark Souls.

I'm not sure about the term "sport" because to me, a sport is still something that requires significant physical exertion. I wish I had a word to describe it but to me, games broadly fall into two categories, neither of which I have a good name for:

1) "Gamey" games. These are things where story is basically non-existant and their purpose is to be competitive in some way. It's not an "experience" and to me it's not art. This covers a wide range of games including some really retro stuff (Pacman, Space Invaders, Pong) and a lot of multiplayer games (TF2, DOTA, Rock Band, Civilization, modern shooters' multiplayer component, multiplayer fighting games), almost every driving game, sims and even non-video games like poker or Scrabble. Most mobile games fall into this category too. To me, these are not art.

2) "Campaign" driven games. Usually games that have a plot but more importantly, games that you don't "win" at. You may be able to "complete" them but in a non-competitive way. Examples would be things like The Legend of Zelda series, Castlevania, Mario Galaxy, Uncharted, Halo, Monkey Island, Command and Conquer, Final Fantasy, Journey, Braid, The Last of Us, Gone Home and Call of Duty's single player component. To me, these are art.

One thing I do want to say is that I don't in any way consider calling something "art" to be praising it. There's bad art and good art and being heavily commercialised, moronic or pandering doesn't change its status as art.

Many games will include separate modes that will fall into each category and that's fine. I mean Blu-rays and DVDs include plenty of bonus features that are not art but just educational documentaries, even to the point where that outweighs the film itself, and it doesn't change the fact that the film is still art.

I think there is an unfortunate rift forming between people who like games being the former and people who like the latter where the ones who like the former will go out of their way to berate games like The Last of Us or Gone Home for being so story driven (inexplicably, The Walking Dead is rarely brought up here) or say that games these days "just aren't fun" or whatever but I don't think that's the case at all. Similarly, I used to complain about how games like Call of Duty were holding the industry back with their mediocre stories and exploitive multiplayer but at the same time, I now realise that's just what a lot of people would rather play instead of something that you have to think about or that subverts your expectations. I see people who worry that their old-fashioned types of games will be replaced and everything will become Spec Ops: The Line but that's just not going to happen, there's still and always will be a huge audience for the former kind of "fun" game and people need to just realise that we're not all looking for the same thing and that different games suit different people.

Doctor DooM

SeantheMan wrote: »

Why ?

I guess I kind of agree, if the point your making is that a sport is something in which you should be physically moving about and active.
Maybe the term "competitive gaming" is better, but it doesn't have the same ring to it.
Also, if I submit to that classifcation of sports...then I can't consider darts or similar things sports either.

E-Sports is a thing though, and gaming is now a spectator (sport) event as well as a hobby.
Only last week I was in a stadium with 40,000 other people watching 2 teams play a computer game against one another

Heading a little off topic here, but most fighting game players have a problem with the term e-sports that stems from FG’s origin as one of the original competitive gaming scenes.

To them, E-sports has come to mean the crass, commercialised presentation of gaming that’s analogous to the way people who watch football on the beebs feel about American presentation of sport.

FG players tend to pride themselves that even in the biggest FG tournament in the world, anyone can enter, and the best in the world will be in the groups with you. There is no velvet curtain. Practice enough, on your own, and you can be the champ. there’ is no requirement for a team, or points, or barely even finance (a console and a pad is all you need). For better or worse, FG players tend to stuck in the arcade mentality. Put your 20p down, and say “I got next”, and it’s up to the other guy to stop you. Nothing else matters.

Back on topic, Games can be both, or neither. I’ve gotten the same feeling from an excellent string of plays in SF as I do listening to an amazing piece of music.

cherryghost

Why not both?

Why not Zoidberg?