Are Video Games Art?

My issue is that some games are trying too hard to be art, like artsy game that is boring on the gameplay side........ GRIS

I LOVE THE BUTTERFCKER AD!!!!

I love the channel and you're awesome Michael. But goddamn your eyes are dead while reading that Butterfinger copy slathered and butter finger swag. I get it though, do what you gotta do my man.

The term "art" itself is a value judgement

Wow the sponsor really fucked with this video. There are so much better examples of agency in videogames than one of the most linear jrpg franchises. Other parts of the video were great tho lol

Deltarune explores the idea of players turning narrative characters into puppets on strings. That the main character stripped of his agency for the player's enjoyment. Then have that reflected in one of the antagonists.

Art is known for being difficult to define, which means what counts as art is incredibly biased. It is common for people to say something is not actually art because it is bad art, and people to say it is bad art because they don't like it.

Not only are video games art, but the creative process of playing a video game is art. Making art in real life is likewise play

Like all is it art questions, the answer is that it depends. Aesthetic choices were always being made, but that is only ever the possibility of art. Video games are a medium in which art can occur. Serious consideration is due. But it would be ridiculous to assert that the application of paint to a surface makes something art. Perhaps this is recursive, but as DuChamp demonstrated with works like The Fountain, and a point I see in the video,, it is the interaction with something as art that makes it art. My touchstone for this in video games is the music of Koji Kondo. He didn't have to treat it like a score, but he did and made cross-culturally relevant art. Everybody knows Mario's music.

Yes they could. I played Video Games more than once and they proved to be artistic and highly visual.

Sick hat

Some

The art world is, and always has been, elitist. ISTM that this is the lens through which critics like Ebert and Kroll are viewing games, though perhaps unconsciously.

Viceo Games are the 5th dimension of art. To complex for simpletons to understand so they put an orange on the floor in the middle of the room snd sell the experience for millions so they don't have to pay taxes.

Why stick to AAA gaming checklists? You sabotage a great argument.

Play What Remains of Edith Finch. If you don't see any art by the end, then the world knows you have no empathy or soul.

Yes video games are definitely art.

Another shout out to Oviedo Marketplace yoooo I used to work in front of the movie theater there. Kinda wonder if I was ever around when Michael came to watch movies 🤣

Was this sponsored by Final Fantasy?

Commented and liked the video! Love what u do

I USED TO GO TO THE OVIEDO MARKETPLACE ALL THE TIME! It was further away from where I lived, but that place was incredible ♥️

I can't believe there are dusty old critics and journalists who think this is still open for debate. Games are art. Not always good art, but no medium is on average higher quality than any other. Games today incorporate all the artisitc elements movies do: writing, acting, music, animation, sound design, visual effects. And then there's core game design underneath all that.

Not every game has a wealth of artistic merit, but films aren't disqualified from being art just because the Transformers movies exist.

Sorry but thats not a butterfinger. They sold the name and the recipe changed a few years ago. New one tastes like crap.

If im gonna support child slave labor it’s gotta at least taste good.

I could change my mind as I consider it further, but at this stage, I'll suggest that videogames are Art, but not yet in the same way as film. It's a matter of scale.

Gaming is popular, but more so on the level of a subculture than as an element of larger culture.

Everyone, no matter their age or other identity traits, has seen a film.
Everyone of my generation or older has read a novel. The same can be said of music.

We may not all watch the same films, read the same stories, or enjoy the same musicians, but we are all familiar with these mediums. The same isn't true of videogames. Its serious study should coincide with the diversity of its engagement and production.

Art can be recognized and created by a wide variety of people no matter their geography, culture, sex, gender, age or et cetera. Perhaps videogames will be, but they are not yet.

Video games in my eyes are 100% art.

FF16 has one of THE WORST slavery allegories I've ever seen. A group of people have an innate magical ability that makes them useful tools to... normal people? So the answer is not systemic change but make those people non-existent??? Like you don't see the issue there???

3 billion people are having a snack at any given time.

My dudes, how could you make an entire video about agency and how games comment on it without talking about Undertale? (Also, if you're gonna stick to the Square catalog because it's sponsored, why not Nier: Automata?)

One of the first videos I had to stop. This is REALLY clumsy ad for FF7R. Like, there are and have been far more personal and artistic games than FF7R. How much did Squenix pay you from their NFT fund to do this drivel?

Why not both? (Being both fun AND a powerful work of art) I'd say video games could similarly allow you to experience perspectives outside your own like books or movies...but, even more interactive!
To the point that it'd be relatively easy to associate those simulated experiences with those of your own (outside the game).
Weirdly enough, in retrospect, I can name two games in which my experiences with them could be considered factors in my current stance regarding what's going on in Gaza (That the Right-Wing Government of Israel is carrying out a genocide against the Palestinian people, and that's a bad thing.)

More specifically, that keeping the Palestinian people in an open-air prison is also bad. And that targeting civilians to try to get them to "turn on Hamas" is stupid and highly likely to backfire. (Not that Hamas is in any way good, both them and the Right-Wing Government of Israel are the bad guys in that conflict.)

In (what's known in the US) as "Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor", you and your friends have to do all you can to survive...even though the Japanese SDF (with the assistance of Angels) are using military force to prevent anyone from entering or leaving the area "Quarantining" the area so aggressively that anyone who gets "too close" to the blockade is shot to death. And emergency supplies are only rarely air dropped in. So people absolutely swarm the containers (like a particular something else that's happening irl). There's also how fast polite society and it's rules and customs get thrown away in the face of...dealing with literal demons. Oh, look. The military's basically treating everyone within the quarantine zone as though they are demons themselves. (Like the IDF behaving as though all Palestinian civilians are part of Hama). Not to mention cutting the electrical power to the entire area (The Right-Wing Israeli Government also did this...but, with the water as well). Basically...forcing people to "live" in an open-air prison's cruel and inhumane.

As for that second game... Well, that's the opening of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. I'm sure most reading this already know. You get captured by Imperial soldiers (for whatever reason) and are about to be excecated alongside Stormcloak soldiers when...a mother[fudge]ing dragon interrupts it and you have a choice on who to follow to escape. Do you follow the Imperial Soldier? Or the Stormcloak one? I'm not sure about you, but, I'm sure as heck NOT going to join the same side as the people who LITERALLY tried to KILL ME! (Except...that's the rather weak tissue-paper like excuse The Right-Wing government of Israel's going with for their current actions of carpet bombing everything in Gaza... What!?) I wouldn't be surprise if this's the sort of "logic" The Empire's going with. But... That ended up with me joining the Stormcloaks! (Oh look, like how more Palestinians are joining Hamas in reaction. *facepalm*)

I'm the one tracing instead of going, hahaha 😆 😂 😅 🙃 🤪

Always have been. No point in even watching the video, the debate on this subject is a false premise. Not all games are "good art", but "bad art" of any kind has always had its place in the culture.

Papers, Please is profound in its expression of the banality of evil, the alienation brought upon by bureaucracy, and the ethics of border control/immigration. I don't think Kafka himself could do better

💚💚💚💚💚💚💚💚💚

RDR2, Last of us, any of the MGS games, Death stranding. Demon's souls, Sekiro, Dark Souls 1-3, Elden Ring, Pokemon. all high art.

yes

Those fools never played Outer Wilds.

They are a tool of a capitalist system to both monetized and pacify a frustrated generation. As a tool, they can be as artistic made as a musical instrument or paint brush or a fine leather flog. eat the rich 😉

Yes.

This debate is an “old man yells at cloud” moment. Someone says an Andy Warhol can of soup is art, but a meticulously rendered world isn’t.

Edit: By the way, this reeks of sponsored content. Business is business, but still stinks.

Only Michael or Henry will understand this comment

Why do you want to be Art? What legitimacy are you looking for? From whom?

Yes. Yes they are. Problem solved.

Oh, yeah, games can most definitely be art. Ever start up a sandbox rpg, go to a location at the right time of day or night, look up and just stare in awe? I remember doing that looking at the night sky in Morrowind, or look over the Capital City in Oblivion, or admire how real the water looks in AC Odyssey. If there's ever a moment in a video game that makes you go, "woah...", guess what: you're looking at art.

Guys, get on the Patreon, I don't think I can take seeing Michael in another weird brand hat.

I was half-expecting a C. Thi Nguyen citation. Must’ve missed it lol

This wasn't boaring but this was clearly 'payed content' rather than a show that was sponsored.
I would be happier if at the start of the show, Burns just said, "hey Square is paying us to make a show about them and we need to get payed..."

On one hand, super happy to see Wisecrack doing pieces on games. On the other, the sponsorship mess is insane lol

As a game designer, the answer is yes.

Around the world at this moment, billions of people are believing a claim that they can't substantiate