[ SECRET POST #2799 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #2799 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 03 pages, 058 secrets from Secret Submission Post #400.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

I don't why people consider video games art. I understand that art is nebulous concept. Gaming is literally in the title and most are narrow down to improving a skill within the game rather than observation and analyzing. Like unless you consider football an art, I don't get how you consider video games an art. I'll concede that there's art in games but it's weirdly juxtaposed with the actual gaming portion via cut scenes and dialog.

[(Anonymous)]

In this case, it's because I think SO:TL uses the interactive medium of gameplay to comment on its own medium on broad societal influences in an absolutely BRILLIANT way.

Film is considered art, but there's things like Transformers that exist. Same with books and Twilight. And it disappoints me that people will dismiss the artistic merits of video games out of hand because it's interactive.

SO:TL is extremely story-driven and, unlike football, has a message that the developers are trying to get across. I think it does a stupendous job, for example, of critiquing American military interventionism. There's a wonderful little moment in the game, for example, right after Walker has helped to destroy Dubai's water supply where he's walking past some NPCs trying to save as much of it as possible. One of the characters will shout "Keep on walking -- fucking Americans!" I though this was brilliant -- because in one little scene, it showed that the people who get fucked over by these policies don't know and don't care about so-called good intentions. They don't care that Walker is Delta and he's fighting against the 33rd and it was a trap by the CIA. To them, Walker's just yet another "fucking American" who came in and made the situation WORSE. And it reflects how often and how easily our own media often depicts Middle-Easterners as a homogenous group of either good or evil regardless of their intentions or actual allegiances.

And that's just one, tiny moment in the game.

[(Anonymous)]

But what about the actual gaming portion? How does that integrate with story portion?

[(Anonymous)]

The actual gameplay mechanics are pretty standard. They remind me of Uncharted a lot. But this actually makes sense because it fits into the kind of atmosphere the game is trying to create -- that of a generic shooter, so that when it shows consequences, it's all the more shocking and unexpected. There are some very interesting thing done with gameplay, though -- for example, the exploding headshots and the fact that executions become incredibly brutal throughout the game as your player character gets more and more unhinged.

Add to that the fact that ammo is incredibly scarce in this game and that executions give you ammo and it's another way for the developers to show just how deranged he's become. The scarcity of ammo also reinforces your vulnerability and helps to create a much more survival-horror like atmosphere.

There are some gameplay portions that deliberately fuck with you, though. Such as when you fight an armored enemy and the screen begins flashing (repeatedly going black) every time you shoot at him. He then teleports and is replaced with a mannequin -- it's incredibly unnerving.

Or there's a point in the game where you'll redo a section that you did in the opening scene and it's amazing how different your emotions are based on how this scene is contextualized (not to mention the bit of meta commentary they throw in there).

There's a beautiful integration between these two aspects that you very rarely see in games -- what you as a player and doing it and WHY you are doing it is constantly being commented on by the game itself.

[diet_poison]

Why are you comparing video games to football? I mean, I guess if you are talking about what the player is doing, yeah. The player isn't the artist. But people who make video games are making art - you can argue about whether it's good art or bad art, but it's art. All games include at least a basic visual that was created by someone, and they often also include music and story writing, two other basic categories of art. They are art, whether you like them or not. Even deciding how gameplay is going to work in a game is contributing to the overall work and how it's presented. It's interactive art, but I think that still qualifies as art.

[dethtoll]

Video games aren't all Pac-Man and Counterstrike, you know.

[(Anonymous)]

Can art not be interactive? Can art not be experiential? Can art not be expressed through skill?

When playing a well-made game, you are completely immersed. The gaming portion connects you physically and viscerally to the story and the world, resulting in some very mentally and emotionally intense/powerful experiences. That's how a game can still be art: through its impact.

[(Anonymous)]

On my definition, yes on the first two, but no on the last.

[(Anonymous)]

If art isn't expressed through skill, then what do you think of any art that requires skill to be made in the first place. An unskilled artist can't make a photorealistic painting after all...

[(Anonymous)]

Made through skill sure, but not experienced through skill.

[(Anonymous)]

The experienced through skill part is what makes it a game.

[(Anonymous)]

That seems arbitrary, though.

Books, for example, do take skill to read. You have to practice reading and expand your vocabulary to gain the ability to understand what the author might be saying for example.

I'd say that's just as much skill based as playing a video game is.

Unless you mean competitive? In which case I'd agree. The online multiplayer of Call of Duty isn't art, in my opinion. But the single player campaign of a video game most definitely can be.

[(Anonymous)]

I couldn't help but notice that you didn't comment on that second part of that post.

[(Anonymous)]

Yep.

[(Anonymous)]

I read in a forum once that games are the only art form where the second-person actually works as intended.

A book can say "you do this" all it wants, but you're always aware you're not. But in a game, if that person lying helpless on the floor needs to die for you to move on, you have to walk the character over and actually kill them. YOU did it. or you decided that saving the world wasn't worth slaughtering someone who can't fight back. And because you're the one doing it, the connection to the events becomes way more immediate and powerful.

It was an interesting discussion.

[(Anonymous)]

Wonderfully said. I think you put it much better than I did.

Games that excel at creating that connection are both beautiful and intense. The reason why it's so hard for many people to go the "evil" route in games where it's an option is because, as you've noted, it feels like you're actually the one committing those acts. To that end, I think games are a fantastic medium for exploring ethics and morality.