{"id":630,"date":"2014-04-15T02:10:06","date_gmt":"2014-04-15T02:10:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mckeestory.wordpress.com\/?p=333"},"modified":"2014-04-15T02:10:06","modified_gmt":"2014-04-15T02:10:06","slug":"are-video-games-art","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mckeestory.com\/are-video-games-art\/","title":{"rendered":"Are Video Games Art?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1080\" height=\"608\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/sq6WlWS3TTA?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Robert McKee discusses the storytelling potential of video games, and helps to frame the &#8220;Game vs. Art&#8221; debate by delineating the key difference in the experience each aims to provide: the required activity or passivity of the audience.<br \/>\n&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h4>\u00a0Bassim El-Wakil Weighs In on the Debate<\/h4>\n<blockquote><p>The &#8220;Are Games Art?&#8221; debate is something that has been talked about for years as video games become more and more complex and financially successful.<br \/>\n&nbsp;<br \/>\nBut the debate is essentially down to people trying to <em>legitimize<\/em>\u00a0games. The word &#8220;art&#8221; seems to mean to a lot of people, &#8220;an important, cultural artifact that gives meaning to the lives of people in society&#8221;. As such, people want to say that &#8220;X&#8221; is art so that it is now legitimate and respected in the eyes of society. And others, who are snobbish to games and sports, claim it&#8217;s an immature pursuit that one should grow out of and thus, it cannot truly be art. And this goes back and forth, all built around the fundamental problem of not knowing what <em>art<\/em> is.<br \/>\n&nbsp;<br \/>\nMr. McKee points out precisely why they&#8217;re not <em>art<\/em>, not by discussing the politics, nor the demographics, nor the histories of gaming, but by what it is to sit down and <em>play<\/em>\u00a0one.<br \/>\n&nbsp;<br \/>\nIt&#8217;s such a cut through all the bullshit and I can&#8217;t be happy enough. There&#8217;s no snobbery. It&#8217;s just &#8220;Games are this&#8221; and &#8220;Art is this&#8221; and there&#8217;s no shame in being a game.<br \/>\n&nbsp;<br \/>\nChess isn&#8217;t art, but it is an important, cultural artifact that is timeless, and exquisitely designed. It is a better game than most artworks are art. The same can be said for many sports.<br \/>\n&nbsp;<br \/>\nI hope this kind of thinking catches on; that art is not synonymous with quality, but an aesthetic experience and games offer a different, but wonderful experience. The desire for games to be \u201cart\u201d is the cause for a lot of problems in video games as they replace playing the game with poorly designed cut sequences.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<div class='one_half'>\n\t\t\t\t\t<h4>Different Perspectives<\/h4>\n<p><a title=\"Narrative Evolved: Video Games &amp; Storytelling\" href=\"http:\/\/youtu.be\/1jdG2LHair0\" target=\"_blank\">&#8220;Narrative Evolved&#8221;: Video Games &amp; Storytelling<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>For a different perspective on this debate, check out Daniel Floyd&#8217;s video lecture.\n\t\t\t\t<\/div><div class='one_half et_column_last'>\n\t\t\t\t\t<h4>Have Your Say<\/h4>\n<p>If you want access to more insight like this, or wish to join\u00a0in this debate, visit <a title=\"Storylogue: Are Video Games Art?\" href=\"http:\/\/www.storylogue.com\/docs\/question-answer.html?documentId=287\" target=\"_blank\">Storylogue<\/a>.\n\t\t\t\t<\/div><div class='clear'><\/div><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Robert McKee discusses the storytelling potential of video games, and helps to frame the &#8220;Game vs. Art&#8221; debate by delineating the key difference in the experience each aims to provide: the required activity or passivity of the audience. &nbsp; \u00a0Bassim El-Wakil Weighs In on the Debate The &#8220;Are Games Art?&#8221; debate is something that has [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"video","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[47],"tags":[48,29,50,52],"class_list":["post-630","post","type-post","status-publish","format-video","hentry","category-lessons","tag-qa","tag-robert-mckee","tag-storylogue","tag-youtube","post_format-post-format-video"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mckeestory.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/630","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mckeestory.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mckeestory.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mckeestory.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mckeestory.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=630"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mckeestory.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/630\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mckeestory.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=630"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mckeestory.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=630"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mckeestory.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=630"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}