Maybe we should stop caring about what others think
By Romination 2 Comments
Recently (today), there's been an outbreak in the old debate of whether or not games are art. Why? A famous person with an opinion we value on something else said they can't be. Sound the alarms, someone disagrees with something that a lot of gamers think? How dare he! How could he see something like this
and not think it's art!? What an ass.
Oh, wait...
I suppose I should get my opinions on the article in question out of the way. I think it's an article written by a man who doesn't know the medium he's talking about. How simply he scoffs off Flower because there is no points system. How easily he laughs at Braid because he can't rewind time, making it thus impossible to relate. The way he throws jabs about how she mentions games are measured in profit and market success on the back end. His view is narrow. Yes, he's had a lifetime of experience, but it's a lifetime of experience criticizing film- a medium which can easily fall prey to the same criticism he throws at games (like that profit thing I mentioned). His view is dated. Points? Winners? He's still thinking I'm going out to the local videocade on my rad new roller-blades to play some of that gnarly Ms. Pac-Man (dude)! Games aren't so easily measured in such ways anymore. There was a time when someone, feigning interest, actually had a legitimate question when they asked 'are you winning?', but not anymore. They'll come in while Lucas Kane is cleaning up the blood from the guy he murdered in the bathroom and you'll just stare: there isn't an answer. His view is, finally, unclear. What does he feel art is? He never defines it. He never once says 'this is what I feel art is'. He concedes art can be made by many people (like a game) but that's about as clear as he seems to get. While he can throw up any violent or sexist game and smugly ask someone to say why THAT'S art, it's easy to do the same thing to him.
But that's not the point (though I have digressed).
See, gaming has come a long way in 25 years (the NES launch). Where once gaming was seen as a loner, nerd hobby or something that weird kids who later shoot up a school do, it's come out of that closet and into the limelight as a massive global market, a socially acceptable hobby, and relevant enough to be featured on Jeopardy and get movies made about them that have pretty decent grosses (the circle is complete, Ebert!). There's a cable channel dedicated to gamers (...or was. G4 has since changed a lot as well). In other words, gaming has proven itself as a thing that is here to stay. So maybe we shouldn't care.
Not to say the recent Rapelay scandal should go excused-that's negligent journalism (for not checking all the facts about this game-like that it's not commercially available outside of Japan, or that it's 3 years old) and sensationalism (tits and 'hurting the children') more than anything. People do need to know that not every game is like that. A bad article or news story that actively effects what some people will think of the industry needs to be exposed as an outlier and, likely, incorrect. But we don't have a reason to go out and start annoying everyone within earshot about the artistic merits of Bioshock or the deeper implications found in No Russian. Maybe we should take a note from The Dude. The Dude abides.
We need to mellow out a bit. Gaming isn't going to be set back, attacked further, or seen as a social pariah because a man who's forte is gilm doesn't think they can be art. It's his opinion. His opinion on a medium foreign to him. So what? No damage has been done, unless your feelings are easily hurt. Let people have their opinion, but don't go out of the way to find it and attack them for it. Maybe we should just abide more. We need to steer the public's opinion of games to more loving in a less loud way, or we'll hurt ourselves by being seen as loud, abrasive individuals who can't deal with being accepted.
And that really seems to be the biggest question I have: Why do gamers seem to feel the urge to be validated so highly? I never once stopped and asked for someone to come praise my medium as art and pat me on the back for doing a good job for playing it. What's the point? People will come around to accept it. There's a likely reason they haven't yet: age difference. The people in charge now, in the newsrooms and the politics, they were probably about 20 when games came out. They saw them as silly little trinkets weak-minded simpletons and smelly people lost fortunes to because they knew games as Pong and Pac-Man. Rock had a similar problem- the older generation hated it, younger loved it. See what I said there?
Older generation.
Sure, Grandma Hardcore loves games, but she's not a state senator running for games to be taxed and more heavily censored. But the older generation will move on and get replaced by us. As time has proven again and again. And then things will be the way you want them. The validation I don't understand the need for will be found, and there will be much rejoicing.
Besides, we just wind up looking like fools otherwise. We seem so desperate to gain approval and turn people towards what we think that it's almost akin to the religious zealot we turn away from our doorsteps for being annoying. Gamers get that annoying. Shoving Mario Galaxy down someone's throat and yelling "ZOMG ITZ ART!!!11!/1" isn't going to win any favours, and it's going to make you look like an idiot, make people who play games seem desperate, and lose you that girlfriend who didn't care in the first place.
So relax, duders. Unless it hurts the hobby, it's no concern of ours. Through patience and steady, thought out efforts will we be able to finally have National Dragon Warrior Day (like Japan already has). Until then, don't let Ebert get you down. You've got friends. Go blow the head off some poor sap in Halo and shed a tear as the beauty spills out onto your canvas of choice.
...Dear God, I'm long winded.