Video Games as Art

For the final project in my Game Studies class, I decided to write about the controversy over whether video games constitute art. (My paper can be downloaded here.) I decided to write about this subject because I had read arguments about this before—particularly when Roger Ebert first made it clear that he thought video games could not be art. This controversy always puzzled me. I have been playing video games since I could hold a controller, and it seems so obvious to me that of course video games can be art. At least the ones which intend to be artful.

Through my research, I’ve come to realize what I already knew: I hate art culture. Arguments over what is art and what is not just become so petty. Arguments can appear rational at first, but after a little digging, any argument from either side will likely boil down to something completely irrational. Art is something which will never be clearly defined. It is not like science, where everyone who participates comes to an agreement on explicit definitions of terms to be used in the literature and research; everyone in art culture just picks their favorite definition, and if a dispute arises, no one within a 10-foot radius is safe from the foamy saliva that flings from the mouths of either side as they scream right past one another.

So I don’t really care any more. I’m just going to let video games be video games and let the children scream it out.