It's Our Fault That Games Aren't Considered Art

Art or not, games are much more than the just sums of their parts. Any idiot can write a review that simply describes a game‘sfunctionality and tells you that it is technically superior to similar games that have come before it. A good writer can take the same game and evoke for the reader the experience of playing without directly explaning the minutiae of the control scheme, for instance. They can place the game into the pantheon of the medium and the wider culture it‘sa part of and explain its impact, if any. This is the heart of good criticism, I feel.

Of course, this is easier for some games than others. The more derivative, generic and mediocre a game is, the harder it is to find something interesting to say about it. But the goal or the critic should always be to find that interesting angle, that evocative turn of phrase, that description of the game as experience rather than object. Anyone who is content merely describing a game and its most objectively measurable qualities (?killer graphics,? ?tight controls?) should stop writing game criticism and start writing instruction booklets or press releases.

This gets into what I consider a fundamental split of all game evaluation into two distinct types: game reviews and game critiques (Never mind that almost all outlets call every game evaluation a review, just bear with me here). In my mind, game reviews are mainly commercial tools, meant to help consumers decide whether or not a game is worth their money and time. Game critiques, on the other hand, are more concerned with the totality of a game‘sdesign and what a game does to advance the state of the medium or even society as a whole. The former considers mainly whether a game is fun, the latter whether it is worthwhile. —kyleorlIt’s Our Fault That Games Aren’t Considered Art (VGM Watch)

I’m a bit puzzled by this: “A critic’s writing should betray deep feelings of ownership for the industry they love and study and write about.” That’s a bit like saying drama critics should be chummy with the actors and directors whose work they evaluate. But if the author here means a game critique shouldn’t be a negative, whiny rant, then I say amen.

There’s a lot that could happen in between fanatical raves and petulant rants.

Maybe it’s the word “industry” that troubles me. If you replaced it with “genre” I’d feel better.

Of course, novelists and dramatists and poets want to make money, too, but there are fewer technical enablers and middlemen in the “literature industry,” so in literary genres, it’s easier to maintain the soul-nurturing myth of the solitary author.

3 thoughts on “It's Our Fault That Games Aren't Considered Art

  1. Kyle, I corrected the name of your site. Sorry about the typo.

    Yes, I think if that sentence had referred to “medium” I might not have stumbled over it as I read along. But your phrasing made me think, and that forced me to articulate a thought that was tickling at the back of my brain. So that’s a good thing.

    I would say that the difference bewteen “review” and “critique” is a question of the writing task. That is, one writes a review in order to meet the needs of readers who are trying to decide whether to buy a game (or book, or theater ticket), and one writes a critique for an audience that has already had the experience and wants help understanding it in more detail.

    So the fanatical-petulant scale is on a different axis from the review-critique scale. While a review can still be useful if it includes ranting or raving, one is less likely to find that kind of strong emotion in a useful critique.

  2. I didn’t mean that critics should feel chummy with the developers. I meant they should feel that they are an important part of the video game industry in as much as they affect people’s opinions and guide intelligent thought on the direction of the industry. Perhaps “medium” is a better word than “industry” in that sentence.

    Also, in the next paragraph after you stop quoting, I say that most pieces are between “review” and “critique” — beween “fanatical rave” and “petulant rant.”

Leave a Reply to Dennis G. Jerz Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *