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Indie dev Andrew Allanson claims that gamers can’t appreciate art because they didn’t like his game

I don't think ICO, Journey, Gris, Braid, Machinarium, Ori and the Blind Forest and a load of others have much "Marvel movie" appeal to them yet they're all successful "artsy" games.

Games can be art, but they can also be bad games too.

Two of the worst games I've ever played were Tulpa and Back to Bed. Utter shite both of them from a gameplay perspective. But both trying very hard to be artistic statements.

Then on the other hand you have masterpieces like The Witness or RiME.

By the way, I get bad vibes from that Grid game, is it any good? RiME did the 5 stages of grief thing pretty well, with solid gameplay and layers of art.

Edit: fucking predictive text. I'm not referring to Codemasters' seminal racing classic of driving laps around emotional tracks of loss and depression trying for the fastest lap of acceptance. I meant Gris.
 
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Geki-D

Banned
Games can be art, but they can also be bad games too.

Two of the worst art games I've ever played were Tulpa and Back to Bed. Utter shite both of them from a gameplay perspective. But both trying very hard to be statements.

Then on the other hand you have masterpieces like The Witness or Rime.

By the way, I get bad vibes from that Grid game, is it any good? Rime did the 5 stages of grief thing pretty well, with solid gameplay and layers of art.

Edit: fucking predictive text. I'm not referring to Codemasters' seminal racing classic. I meant Gris.
Sure, arty games can be good and bad. I'm not saying they're automatically either. I was just responding to someone who was saying that games to appeal to gamers have to be full of s'plosions and action to sell because anything deeper is pointless. But there are plenty of games that aren't like that that have done well.

I haven't played Gris, guy in the video in this thread sells it though. Also heard a lot of other people say good stuff about it.
 
Sure, arty games can be good and bad. I'm not saying they're automatically either. I was just responding to someone who was saying that games to appeal to gamers have to be full of s'plosions and action to sell because anything deeper is pointless. But there are plenty of games that aren't like that that have done well.

I haven't played Gris, guy in the video in this thread sells it though. Also heard a lot of other people say good stuff about it.

Sure, I was just adding to your previous comments. I agree with you. Currently playing through Machinarium on my phone and want to try Journey on the Epic store. When art games get it right they tend to be my favourites. Except Rocket League. That game ignites pure joy and nothing can ruin it. Unless Allanson here did a postmodern version that played like shit and had a back story about suicide and that was all cocks and balls and called Phallic League or summink.
 
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Sakura

Member
I never really understood the video games as art argument. Games are just a medium. You can do whatever you want with them. You can have games like Tetris, to games that are essentially interactive movies or novels. There is no reason they can't be art, and at the same time not all video games are works of art.
In regards to this Andrew Allanson fellow, I don't understand what he is saying. He made a game people don't like, therefore video games can't be art. If you write a shitty book that nobody likes, does that mean literature isn't art?
With all that being said, I don't understand this obsession with art anyway. What does it mean to be art? A painting of a can of soup is considered art. Many works of art don't mean anything to me, they don't make me feel anything nor do they make me think. But they're still art. So why does it matter if games are art or not? What is the benefit really? Do people just want to be able to call themselves artists?
 

ROMhack

Member
I'll give him credit for trying but it's foolish to expect commercial success from any niche gaming experience. The amount of people who want deep, challenging thematic experiences is incredibly small. That also includes critics who don't have the same lofty standards as traditional film/theatre/book critics.

Belgian studio Tale of Tales found this out when Sunset failed. I think that was a wake up call for most developers.

Edit: Not defending the game, I haven't played it.
 
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ThatGamingDude

I am a virgin
I would be upset with the general populace, too, if I made a game and the main character had a striking resemblance to myself and unbeknownst to players is in similar personality, and people shit on that character and that social group.

It's funny he says "Oh this dude starts out as a douche and becomes great at the end." Life imitates art, right?
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The issue isn't that "Gamer's don't appreciate art," or that "Vidya gaymes can't be art," but really the reason why you're doing the art in the first place.
If you're an ass hat doing art purely for the fame and glory, you're not doing art for self expression which is a core concept, you're doing art for profit. That's why those people will get offended that you don't like their shit; it's not meeting their true end goal of recognition, whether they realize that's their actual goal or not.

Most artists I have met (And dated long term, for that matter...) have never done art purely for the fame/glory, and it sure as hell wasn't for the money. They did it because they loved creating art, and would take criticism just fine, short of berating or attacking them outright (Which is universal).

Age or what generation you're from has nothing to do with it; people are just shitty in general, and he's an extra shitty one.

His game looks like an Earthbound/Undertale rip off with Scott Pilgrim art and an unoriginal Scott Pilgrim-esque story, and done incredibly poorly.
 
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SweetShark

Member
I would be upset with the general populace, too, if I made a game and the main character had a striking resemblance to myself and unbeknownst to players is in similar personality, and people shit on that character and that social group.

It's funny he says "Oh this dude starts out as a douche and becomes great at the end." Life imitates art, right?
-=-=-=-=-
The issue isn't that "Gamer's don't appreciate art," or that "Vidya gaymes can't be art," but really the reason why you're doing the art in the first place.
If you're an ass hat doing art purely for the fame and glory, you're not doing art for self expression which is a core concept, you're doing art for profit. That's why those people will get offended that you don't like their shit; it's not meeting their true end goal of recognition, whether they realize that's their actual goal or not.

Most artists I have met (And dated long term, for that matter...) have never done art purely for the fame/glory, and it sure as hell wasn't for the money. They did it because they loved creating art, and would take criticism just fine, short of berating or attacking them outright (Which is universal).

Age or what generation you're from has nothing to do with it; people are just shitty in general, and he's an extra shitty one.

His game looks like an Earthbound/Undertale rip off with Scott Pilgrim art and an unoriginal Scott Pilgrim-esque story, and done incredibly poorly.

Also the Persona like Calendar which you could train and talk with others before the End of the World was too much to swallow...
 

brian0057

Banned
Video games are not art.
If you "artistic endeavor" is a boring piece of sh*t to play, then it doesn't matter.

"The game is fun. If it's not fun, why bother?"
- Reggie Fils-Aimé.
 

#Phonepunk#

Banned
I went to art school. For something to be art only requires a framing of it as art. This is how Duchamp put a signed toilet in an art gallery and called it a Found Object. The act of placement in the gallery is what transformed it from a everyday object into art.

But he was talking fine art, as in, it is the Art Community which has the power to designate it as art. If the clown who made this game wants to submit his game to a legit art gallery to be appraised as art, he is free to do so. Art is not a status given to a work by the general public and entertaining such a myth only normalizes people mislabeling trash and consumer products as art. IMO this is the major issue today, too many clueless people calling crap art
 
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ThatGamingDude

I am a virgin
IMO this is the major issue today, too many clueless people calling crap art
That's always been there with art hahaha

Times don't change the stupidity of the human condition, just the intelligence of physical things around them.

This artist/developer is, painting us a grand portrait of that

 

#Phonepunk#

Banned
god that pathetic self portrait of him with his cat. i can only imagine this game is just a grand masturbatory exercise in self pity.
 
You know in the world of art, you know how they have "shit artists" who think they're misunderstood but in fact they're just shit?

This is the gaming equivalent of that.
 
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