207. Treacherous Waters
So here I am, sticking my oar in, into these treacherous waters. I refer to the “videogame as art” debate. Again.

I’m being silly, of course; not only is there no actual oar involved, it’s hardly dangerous. It’s just something that gets a lot of people riled.

Generally, I’ve noticed, it seems to get – and this may just be from the people I’ve seen talking about it, but – on the pecks of the people who are declaring videogames aren’t art. Whenever these debates come up, they’re the more reactionary and irritable. This doesn’t surprise me, but it does rather hurt me. It seems to me that people who are, at heart, preaching an acceptance of something, are no doubt going to be more open-minded, or, to be fair, simply more inclusive. Those who are against it are going to vehemently deny a lot of points, and, well, are going to be narrow-minded in what they’re arguing about. I find that, in these arguments, those who are for videogames as art have often conceded points about why videogames could be considered not art.

208. Hell on Earth
There’s no easy answer to this, of course. I mean, if there was an easy answer to this, then there’d also been an easy answer to whether, say, Scientology, or Jedi Knight for that matter, are religions. You know, genuine religions and not just groups banding together and pretending they’re religious.

Thing is, though they’re not the main players, they are both religions. In the strictest sense, Scientology is more a religion than Jedi Knight, and that’s purely because I sincerely doubt that the majority of those who consider them Jedi Knights actually walk around talking of their connection to the force, whereas Scientologists are quite happy to scan each other with their e-meters. I’m not certain how many members take it utterly seriously – I mean, the whole thing is based on Hubbard’s own views and writings. Yes, yes, we could say the same of the Bible, but the Bible is more... well, it’s more fractured since it’s full of many different views, but it is also – particularly in the bits that Christians are really supposed to pay attention to (Jesus, in other words) – full of deliberate parable and morales rather than actual instructions on how to live out one’s life. But what astonishes me is that most Christians don’t take the stories in the Bible as much more than historical exaggeration mixed with feel-good messages (much like Hollywood, then :) ), and yet to treat Scientology completely seriously seems... well... alien to me. There’s nothing wrong with the core values of the religion or anything, but it’s dressed up in a strange branch of... well, it’s not even science. It’s overtly science fiction, and I think that’s what astonishes me. By rights, it should be called Scifientology, and it should all be taken as metaphor and a guide rather than literally, and yet... I can’t help shaking the fact that Scientologists (or a great deal of them) don’t. Sure, they seem to have a sense of humour about it, but they do genuinely believe that there’s an alien demigod of evil. For something with the name Scientology, it just seems rather odd.

Then again, I could wave that accusation at “Catholicism”, which is not always as all-accepting as the translation would have you believe. But what really confuses me is that they almost seem to be on polar opposites in their exploration of good and evil. Christianity – now, anyway – tends to err on the side of believing in God, in a being of good who created us all (well, actually, it’s Jesus who’s technically the moral guide, not God, but if we’re talking gods-wise, deified-wise...), and yet the notion of Satan, of this nasty creature that resides in hell, is usually taken more as a metaphor, as a state of inner turmoil and humanity rather than anything else. The good of Jesus exists in mankind’s hearts and the evil of Satan in mankind’s (well, insert the relevant naughty bit of anatomy here. Your choice!), and yet God operates on another level that is beyond our comprehension. Despite what those-blokes-who-knocked-on-your-door-yesterday would have you believe, “hell on Earth” doesn’t really refer to the nomadic tendencies of a torturous world of fire suddenly deciding to collide and merge with our own, it doesn’t mean the apocalypse; it simply refers to humanity in its capability for evil. And not just immorality, but amorality too. I’m sure that the higher echelons of the Church will still talk of these concepts as if they’re facts, but your average priest is going to have his own interpretation of, rationalisation of, and indeed will draw his own experience from, such concepts.

Whereas Scientology almost appears to be the opposite; there’s no being that represents good except for humanity itself. Every human is born good, and can only endanger that good through miserable and dark times. And yet there’s basically a Satan figure representing “bad”; Xenu/Xemu. Yes, it’s dressed up in discussions of spirituality and souls, and yet at heart Xenu is just a representation of bad, and yet a literal one. One that not only a Scientologist is supposed to actively believe exists, but is even asked to believe “brought billions of people to Earth in spacecraft resembling Douglas DC-8 airliners, stacked them around volcanoes and blew them up with hydrogen bombs.” (from Wikipedia, naturally) It’s just... what? I mean, even Genesis doesn’t have the audacity to try and tell us exactly how God created the universe, or what exactly this paradise that Adam and Eve lived in was like (largely left up to the interpretation of the reader), yet here, at the heart of Scientology, you’re expected to believe that somehow some blokes have the knowledge of what spacecraft Xenu used, and what bombs he happened to be carrying with him too. God. I mean... really.

Sorry, I neglected to mention Jedi Knight. The reason that I find it preferable is though – although I’m sure Scientologists don’t always take their religion seriously anymore than other religious groups’ members, at large, do – is that, well, that’s it in a nutshell really. Star Wars fans may talk of a canon of films – which may or may not include the games, books, and various spinoffs; I’m not hugely well-versed in this, so I’m not going to open that canon of worms – but they’re referring to a canon of literature rather than a canon of holy texts. Really, the religion boils down to the key messages of the Star Wars films. It doesn’t at all mean that members believe Darth Vader actually existed.

(At any rate, that would contradict their fandom; how can you be an anal fanboy who knows who actually played Darth Vader’s body, and yet also see him as being a person that actually existed a long, long time ago?)

209. Interaction (again)
I was talking about videogames and art, was I? Yeah, true. At first glance, that was very undisciplined of me. But the reason I kept ranting on is because, well, there’s certain similarities, thematically. Basically, as I’ve postulated before, it all comes down to the response, the audience, the members, whatever they’re called in the relevant discourse. In that sense, inhabiting the Bible’s vision of how the world was created can be taken on a literal or a metaphorical level by a reader, and of course there are many different tiny beliefs and disbeliefs within that. Similar, then, to how an artist constructs their work of art, yet the audience is left to make up their own minds as to what it’s about (and whether it works, and whether it’s, you know, any good or not. Hee hee).

Jumping ahead of myself, though. That’s the conclusion before the argument! I’m being silly.

Basically, here’s the kick-off point; Roger Ebert’s dismissal of videogames as not being an artform. I should qualify, despite what I said before, that Ebert is – in what I’m about to quote, at least – quite diplomatic and well-reasoned on the matter, and largely avoids being patronising and irritating. So points for that.

Anyway. Ebert says he’s willing to believe that games can be artistically driven, in the sense that they can have aesthetics to them, that they can be “visually wonderful”, “elegant”, “sophisticated” and more. That’s lovely to hear, honest. But that rather leaves a gaping question here; if they can be all of those things, including, you know, the ability to actually look good (as art comes down to, subjectively)... what is art, according to him, and why don’t videogames fit in?

Luckily he provides a reason for this. “There is a structural reason for that: Video games by their nature require player choices, which is the opposite of the strategy of serious film and literature, which requires authorial control.”

That’s a nice reason. Pretty well thought out, too.

Unfortunately I do, of course, disagree.

I’ve talked about interactivity before, but I should reiterate a bit for those who haven’t backread (I mean, there’s a hell of a lot of backreading, I wouldn’t blame you if you didn’t). Interactivity is not something that’s entirely alien and non-existent in art. I mean, you could cite very simplistic examples – wearing 3D goggles in a film cinema is one, as are those cinemas where they spray you with water when something happens on screen (you know, those ones ridiculously referred to as “4D”. God, I want to hit them). That’s interaction. The audience is involved on a non-emotional level. The person who created the film deliberately constructed those scenes with the audience in mind. There’s a physicality to it, and the filmmaker is deliberately banking on the response. Whereas, say, most filmmakers won’t really give too much of a toss about critical reception and the audience during their films, these guys are. It’s deliberately geared to the audience.

Film isn’t art either? Well, I mean, that’s a bit rubbish of you, but even if you are going to argue that, then I think you’re off the mark anyway. Let’s turn to music, and here’s a nice little example; John Cage (yes, I know I keep citing him, but he’s a good example!). He walks towards the piano, sits down, and doesn’t play anything. The audience gets restless, the audience boos, they insult, they... oh, hang on. They... are involved. The whole point of the exercise was to actually make the audience the musical piece. It’s breaking the fourth wall to such a degree that we’re deliberately looking at the opposite side of the fourth wall. We’re looking at ourselves, and not even on a conceptual level. It’s not, “Wow, that summarises life”, it’s “my god, I bet I’ve been that disruptive at concerts too.”

Music isn’t art? Well, you’re treading on seriously shitty ground here, but even if I was going to agree with you... art, as art, as that basic thing called art... contains this too. An example? Stelarc. The audience logs online and manipulates his body, and other people watch this happening. Not only is the audience involved, but that is interactivity. That’s interaction. I can’t honestly see how you could argue that it isn’t. And then there’s shock art, a movement that deliberately involves the audience. Mike Parr chopping off his arm isn’t just doing it as an aesthetic exercise; he’s doing it to get the audience sickened, to revolt them. Because the audience is part of it. The audience is part of the art. It’s almost like watching a commentary track to a film; there’s two layers there. Except in this case, the audience is part of the art, whereas the commentary isn’t part of the film. If you catch my drift.

210. Player Choices
Of course, Ebert himself didn’t actually say the word “interactivity”; what he said was “player choices”. That’s slightly different, of course, and “player choices” implies more freedom on the audience’s part than “interactivity”. In terms of gaming, interactivity is simply the idea of picking up a controller and pressing a button; player choices comes down to in-game decisions the player makes based on the context of what’s happening at the time (something to do with the plot, whether to change your character’s stats, which piece of dialogue to say...).

Unfortunately, I think Ebert is overstating the level of choice, or freedom, a player actually has in your average game. Let’s be honest; very little. True, player choice is increasingly becoming a trend in videogames now, but if we’re to take it back to the earliest videogames, there was next to no choice beyond “go right or left?” (which is no more complex than someone looking at a painting and looking at the top or the bottom of the painting first). What player choice is there in Snake, in Space Invaders? I mean, there’s interactivity, but player choice? Little. Very, very, very little. Even when the next generation of games popped up – Super Mario Bros being a prime example – there wasn’t much choice. Go down these levels. Beat some enemies. Win. Even today, there’s more often an illusion of choice. I mean, Grand Theft Auto offers you numerous opportunities and ways to do a mission, but you have to do it. And, crucially, unlike the “choices” we have in real life, there’s no “I don’t want to do this!” option. We can’t suddenly throw our guns down, take an illegal passport and start a new, un-mafia-like life in Switzerland. There’s simply no capability for that.

Why not? Well... basically, because the game is about what it’s about. Ebert refers to there being no authorial control, but really, that’s just rather unfair. You’ll notice that the games that offer the least choice to the player now are, ironically enough, those based on films; and on the flipside, since games are less driven by plot (it’s not as important, and anyway is impossible to maintain properly with the player involved), game-to-film adaptations tend to be crud too. But the director of a videogame is sometimes referred to in the same position as the director of certain films. Hideo Kojima is seen as the creative vision of Metal Gear Solid, and that’s not because he programmes what the X button will do, in the same way that Alfred Hitchcock hardly sat behind every camera for every shot and moved them. Both are concerned with such matters, but that’s what creative heads do. They drive the team. They drive the focus. They, in essence, create the world.

211. Life, the Universe, and Everything
On 3dmm.com – and I apologise for singling out someone here, but it’s only to use their point as a topic of debate – Andres made the following comment:

“I don’t even see what the point of trying to make ‘art’ out of a videogame is. Who the fuck wants to play someone’s meticulous point about life?”

One response was, “every Metal Gear Solid fan on Earth”. Which is a good example, actually, but I’ll get back to that in a second.

The problem with the assumption made above is that art is always made to be about the artist’s view on life, on the world as we know it. I don’t particularly agree with this. Firstly, I’m reasonably sceptical over how much the artist’s view on life comes into, say, surrealism as an art form; The Persistence of Memory (Dali’s clock-melting painting) has things to say about life, but crucially, the image came to him in a dream, not in a “maybe I can represent it thus!”. I’m not denying that there’s meaning to it, but the meaning can often come after the image – and of course, the thing about the image constructed without an immediate meaning in mind is that the audience is more likely to come up with their own meaning (or even, not even do that and simply like it because it looks good). But more importantly, I don’t see why art always has to make a point about our lives. It’s creativity. Why can’t art actually construct something completely at odds with our own lives? The idea of the tree in The Persistence of Memory being “life” seems almost a cop-out to me, as if we have to equate it to our own terms to appreciate it. Understand it, yes. Appreciate it, no. I’m not saying that trying to work out the meaning of an artwork isn’t right – indeed, that’s what the audience often does – but I don’t think art should necessarily be triumphed for its meaning first and its aesthetic qualities second.

Basically; art is about creating something, constructing something, that the audience can live in. Not that they have to, mind you, but that it’s possible. Even if they don’t identify with it exactly, they can engage with it, if you see what I mean. Sometimes the most alien and unlike of things are the most fascinating and engaging. So that’s where the creativity comes in. And in that sense, creating worlds (and I don’t even mean planets, for that matter) through artistry can occur in paintings, music, film, and, yes, videogames. It’s about constructing a world for your audience to inhabit, even for a brief time.

212. Response
What’s the difference between that and actually building something? The difference between art and architecture, for instance? Well, it’s hard to say, but essentially the difference is quite simple. A house is built to be lived in. A painting of a house cannot literally be lived in, only metaphorically. The same goes for a house constructed in virtual reality. I mean, to make what must seem the most obvious point in the world, let’s take Star Wars, and the battle on the icy planet Hoth; what the audience sees and experiences is a war with giant machines taking place on an icy planet. What’s actually happening is of course that some models have been moved around and a camera’s been pointed at them. Had Lucas – somehow – actually constructed a real base on a real planet called Hoth and really had big giant machines fight each other in a real war, that wouldn’t be art, because it’d be real. Again, that sounds simplistic, but it’s amazing how often that’s forgotten. Art is taking things that are and turning them into what they’re not, in a sense.

So the audience response will dictate how that art affects them. Art is emotional and creative, and arguably more the former for the audience and the latter for the artist. In that sense, the audience response comes down to how much they believe in the world presented before them, how much they engage with it, how much they interpret and inhabit it. And just to clarify; the believability of a world created does not mean “the realism”. I’ve seen this referred to before, and it’s bullshit. By rights, many people believe in God, but we can’t exactly call the notion of God “realistic” (purely because we’ve not personally seen him). And that’s the similarity to my ramblings on religion before, by the way; it comes down how much the audience chooses to engage (and sometimes that’s not even exactly a choice, because sometimes it depends on the mood, patience and basically context of the audience in question).

The thing is, and this is an important qualifier on “player choice”; I didn’t actually know until I researched this that The Persistence of Memory actually MEANT something, and to throw it onto an open pitch, I bet a lot of people don’t know the reason for Andy Warhol’s famous soup can painting, or what exactly meat pies are made from. I’d also warrant a guess that most people don’t actually care. That’s not an issue, either; they’re still responding to the artwork (/meat pie...) in question, but just not on an intellectual level. It’s not provoking any thoughts for them, much as me eating a meat pie and not really thinking much about how the animals are processed, which animals they are, and the distribution in between. So it’s worth pointing out that whilst it may not engage with certain people, that doesn’t mean it’s not art!

213. Dual Ways (and Shocks)
To bring it back to videogames, take, as I mentioned in relation to 3dmm.com before, Metal Gear Solid. As I noted in my last entry – in the Phrasebook thing – there have been criticisms revolving around the fact that there’s lots of endless cut-scenes and near-incomprehensible dialogue towards the end. And yet these criticisms are worthless, because you don’t need to experience them at all. You can skip them with the press of a button (or two, actually). And that’s where the biggest player choice comes in, and this is identical to art as a whole; the choosing of how involved you’ll get in the game. Just as choosing not to go overseas, ever, in your entire life, is fairly limiting but really your choice (hell, I haven’t been overseas of my own whim yet), the same goes for how much of the videogame’s experience you’re going to, well, experience. Because – as someone clever who I’ve forgotten once said (probably a fictional character) – not choosing to do anything, or not choosing to do something even, is still a choice.

And on that level, you can play Metal Gear Solid in two broad ways. You can skip all the cut-scenes, skip all the dialogue, skip all the artistic direction, and simply play it. I’ve done this, when all I’ve wanted is to play it – because it’s a fun game! It’s really fun, genuinely. That’s one way of playing it. The other is to take the time to pay attention to the plot, the dialogue, the characters, and even the world presented to you. Hey look – you can see rain on the screen at the start of MGS2! You can see buildings in the distance from the top of the tanker! It’s a choice of how to experience, not a choice of what the game will bend over its back to allow you to do.

Which is no different from film. One could watch 2001 and enjoy it for its imagery and plot, without giving the slightest toss about the themes of it, or debating about its intellectual basis. And why not?

The key thing I’m getting at is that how the player chooses to play the game isn’t the indicator of whether something’s art. The art is the product in the first place; the response is everything after purchase. And the only difference is that videogaming is more capable of second-guessing the player, of providing options for them. That’s just a factor of its medium. It doesn’t mean it’s not art. And anyway, I’ve already cited examples of artists who allow interactivity.

214. Ebert and Elitism
Besides, this doesn’t seem to be an issue that concerned the British Academy of Film and Arts in 2007 when they offered Will Wright – a man only really known for his direction of games – fellowship. I mean, The Sims 2 is fairly full of choices, but his next big project is Spore, a game that looks to be the most freedom-based game yet due to its insanely broad concept. It’s one that’s definitely about creating worlds. Look it up, if you don’t know about it already.

So that contradicts Ebert’s “no one in or out of the field has ever been able to cite a game worthy of comparison with the great dramatists, poets, filmmakers, novelists and composers.” To be fair, he added a “to my knowledge”, so... here you go, Ebert, if you ever (god knows how) happen to read this!

Of course, another reason as to why no-one in or out of “the field” – whatever that actually means (sounds pretty elitist and cliquey to me) – is simply that, if videogames aren’t considered art by most yet, then you’re not going to get many people who do believe they are inducted into art circles so that they can argue that they are. It’s a vicious cycle, really, and one that will take a few decades at least to die down.

Incidentally, I should quickly qualify my “it’s just a factor of its medium” thing. Whilst this doesn’t directly disagree with what Ebert says, I should say that, as a film critic, he’s got the short end of the stick. If we’re to assume, chronologically, that books as art (art being boiled down to its simplest meaning of “creativity and response”) preceded films as art... well, what’s the key, most obvious difference between the two? That’s right, film can show images. So it seems akin, to me, of a book fan accusing films of not being literature because you can see what’s happening and there’s no prose. Or accusing animation of not being art like paintings, because you can’t see the brush strokes.

215. Summary (for those who can’t be arsed reading it all)
Actually, that there is the best summation I’ve come out with so far as to what art is; it’s creativity and response. It’s not intellectualism; intellectual debating over the meaning is just a response, in the same way that saying “that looks pretty” is a response. And that’s why, indeed, I’m arguing for videogames as art in the first place. It may seem I’m doing it for pretentious reasons, but that couldn’t be further from the truth; I’m doing it as an all-inclusive gesture (and also because I genuinely believe it, of course!). I hate snobbery, elitism, “higher-class”, whatever the hell it’s calling itself these days. And therefore the idea of creativity being involved in the construction of something, response being involved in the release of it, and yet that being dismissed as not art because... oh, I don’t know why it’s not considered art. Presumably because they don’t engage with it. “I don’t play videogames so it’s not art”, or “I don’t like that installation, so it’s not art”. Bollocks. It’s like saying “I don’t like Special K, so it’s not a cereal.”

216. Give me a High (Five) Culture!
And that brings me to the last thing I should say about Ebert’s mini-response. The thing is, although he quite nicely talks of videogames as being potentially sophisticated... he then goes on to say this:

“But for most gamers, video games represent a loss of those precious hours we have available to make ourselves more cultured, civilized and empathetic.”

I don’t actually think he meant to write “gamers” there, surely? I mean, the majority of gamers wouldn’t give a toss if they’re not civilising themselves, and it’s a bit rich and idiotic to assume that they should be. But – as I said before – the same goes for films, too, Ebert. I have no doubt that someone could watch Citizen Kane and not think of it in terms of its cultural concerns, its innovations, and simply just find it enjoyable and move on – and even no more enjoyable than, say, Die Hard! I said it of Metal Gear Solid before, but let’s take on, as a film, Invasion of the Bodysnatchers. One could watch this film as an allegory for the 50s; Communism, even anti-feminism, blah, blah, blah. And one could also just take it as a sci-fi film and enjoy (or not) it on those terms. That doesn’t detract from what it is. What Ebert seems to be saying here is that time is wasted whether you’re watching a film or not, if you’re not thinking about it. Thinking about it in terms of cultural concerns, in terms of themes, everything intellectual like that. Which is a rubbish thing to think, and particularly rubbish when he’s assuming that you can’t do that with videogames on the whole.

So. Shall I shut up now? Probably. Have I completely covered everything this time? Oh, probably not. Ah well. Give us a couple of decades and this whole rant will be useless anyway. People will look back and go, “Wait, videogames weren’t considered art...?!”

That’s assuming people look back and actually read my blog, of course. Which is highly doubtful. :)

217. Blogs of Nothing
Speaking of blogs... I, most of the time, don’t give a toss whether anyone reads this or not. Hey, Jack Bz reads it and likes it, and that’s good enough for me (look at how depressed I got when he wasn’t around all those posts ago. Yeesh, I’m clingy). I mean, I write tons and tons and post it up here, and yet – as my newly installed counter will indicate quite clearly (which I installed out of interest, not out of desperation, I might add!) – barely anyone reads it. I’m fine with that, really.

And yet... today, I looked at Blogspot’s Blogs of Note. And oh, though I may be lambasted for this – I’m criticising Blogspot whilst using Blogspot? For shame! – I am a bit annoyed at the blogs that have been chosen. As in, they’re just... there. They’re usually notable because they are the blogs of famous/important (well, sort of famous and sort of important) people, or because they revolve around some sort of theme, or... well, I don’t know. I haven’t seen much worthwhile in there, to be honest. Where’s Lawrence Miles’ blog? Controversial though it may be, it’s hardly more incriminating than the Angry John Sellers blog. And where’s Liam’s blog? Or Jack Bz’s? And yes, to be selfish, where’s mine? I wouldn’t mind, if the ones we’re offered weren’t so dull.

To single out one, perhaps unfairly: Angry John Sellers. http://angryjohnsellers.blogspot.com/

There’s a style here, and that style amounts to “Say something about life, then add something I’m angry about”. Um, points for style, but none for content. The idea wears thin quickly, especially when he starts to list things like “Dirty shoes”. Um... yes.

So basically, here’s my counter to that:

WHY I’M ANGRY TODAY
http://angryjohnsellers.blogspot.com/

(Kudos to Jack Bz for coming up with that joke, which I just stole from him. But he said he’ll use it himself, so he’ll steal it back. Or something)

Anyway. I’m over it now, but I was momentarily annoyed. Frankly, if I didn’t have an audience – small though that audience may be – already, I’d be punching the wall. As is, I’m very mellow, very Jack Johnson, at the moment.

Oh god, not Jack Johnson.

So, here’s some blogs you should read:

http://naffarmpit.blogspot.com/ (Warning: Doctor Who content)
http://jack-bz.blogspot.com/ (Warning: he’s better than me)

As for Lawrence Miles... um... find him yourself. I’m sort of wary of being linked to him, even just in the capacity of “Hey, did I mention this writer called Lawrence Miles who’s worth reading?” Yeah. He’s that dangerous.