The theory is that creativity and emotional richness comes from life experience; as the earliest adopters of what we hope will be the predominant entertainment medium of the 21st century, I've always felt it's on us, as audiences, to do more, demand more. Of course, if we're saying that "games are art," then that means they reflect the life experience of their "artists" -- and many game developers can be as narrow-minded as their audience is, with few creative influences to speak of other than, say, tabletop RPGs and Star Wars.
Not that there's anything wrong with tabletop RPGs or Star Wars (down, comic book fans, down!), but if game developers make games based on their own interests, and if game consumers buy games based on their own interests, it's better for everyone if those interests are diverse -- or else what we think of as gaming remains an insular niche.
You've heard this from me before, of course. Now, veteran developer and former Maxis guy Chris Hecker is adding a new dimension to the conversation with some thoughts he shared in an address at the IGDA Leadership Forum, which my colleague Chris Remo recently covered at Gamasutra.
Hecker also fears games ending up in (or remaining in?) a "cultural ghetto," and summarily suggests that generally, those who make games don't ever seem to consider it an act of self-expression:
"I had to write this book when my girlfriend dumped me," a novelist might say.
"That doesn't show up often in game development bios," Hecker pointed out. Developers rarely discuss what they were trying to convey or express with a particular game, outside the confines of the game's own entertainment value.
"Should we care about 'why'? I think the answer is yes. We should care," said Hecker.
Of course, when looking at any other entertainment medium, there exist plenty of soulless products made simply in accordance with the algorithm of the market's current tastes -- they have no higher aim but to provide basic entertainment. Well, maybe one higher aim: to sell copies.
But that paradigm is dominant in games; even our designers who qualify as deep thinkers and masters of the craft earn their stripes by interpreting ideas like accessibility, engagement and the nebulous "fun" through design. They are refining the art of hooking us players with mechanics -- they are not at all thinking about expressing themselves or telling a story, the way creators of anything else that qualifies as art would.
I actually touched on this early last year, in an Aberrant Gamer column about what makes a good actor: honest performance that draws on the individual's life experience with the goal of self-expression, as opposed to the manipulative act of simply imitating emotions with the goal of affecting audience members.
The game industry is full of brilliant designers -- when I see how Blizzard's gotten millions and millions of people around the world to spend hours and hours running around and grinding in World of Warcraft (even people who recognize that they're bored!), or when I see how Ubisoft is making necessary communication with the player an artistic part of the environment in Splinter Cell Conviction, my jaw drops. Whoever came up with that subtle red-crescent health system that dominates in first-person shooters should get some kind of award.
But in terms of expressive ability, it's still lacking, don't you think? I recommend reading Remo's whole writeup on Hecker's talk -- I think it's an important addition to a topic that always interests me.
This week, the tireless Remo is at the Montreal International Games Summit, and while we're talking about the goal of "fun," I might as well point you to his writeup of Tiger Style's Randy Smith, who says "games don't need to be fun; they need to be engaging." Randy Smith worked on System Shock 2 and Thief and now makes stuff like Spider: The Secret of Bryce Manor instead, and the perspective of folks that make leaps like that is always interesting.
16 comments:
I love how hard it is to get a gamer to explore content outside of a game in order to help it, which is all some of us seem to be asking now.
The escapist-stemmed 'fun argument' is something that annoys me to no end. Not because it doesn't have a place (or even use), but because gamers have fallen into establishing useless dogma for it. We keep games in the cultural ghetto more than anyone. Pointing fingers at marketing, developers, and paid critics very rarely has effective use.
Will be giving the Remo articles a look-see, thanks.
~sLs~
Maybe games don't NEED to be fun, maybe they can get by on just being engaging, but I'd argue that's just developers serving up less, and consumers settling for it. I believe we're genuinely so used to games being merely engaging these days that when we return to something that's actually a whole big bag of genuine FUN, it can be amazingly refreshing and make you wonder how we've got in this situation. If you want a case in point, load up Mario 64 or Galaxy and spend a few minutes in those worlds again. Genuinely, go do it. Just navigating the environment with Mario is wonderfully tactile fun - you won't run anywhere when you can triple jump or slide jump instead. Fun permeates every aspect of those games. It's such a joy. When I loaded Galaxy up a couple of weekends ago for the first time since I played it at launch, it was like the sun came back out - I concluded too many games these days are content to just engage the player and divert them with conquerable tasks. That's a poor substitute for genuine fun and enjoyment. Randy Smith's philosophy might be a truism currently, but it doesn't mean it has to be that way, and I for one am looking harder now for the fun in both the games I play and the games I develop.
Everytime you touch the subject I remember a Side Quest of the N64's Goemon's Great Adventure. In that Side Quest, you take the role of an operator on a Help-Line.
The troubled young boy that calls you, asks about becoming part of the videogame industry. You answer your way out and when he asks about what he can do NOW to prepare himself, you answer "experience a lot of things, because all that life experience will help you to creat a good videogame".
Interesting something like that is on a Side Quest. And that reminds me... Both Ueda and Kojima have stated that they don't create "art". I think they do, but they think they don't. So... what is art for them?? Would you mind asking them if you ever have the chance?? What is art for the eastern developers... ?
I think that as more and more people become more literate about games and game playing, this kind of breathless hand-wringing about meaning, "art", narrative and legitimization will silently disappear.
While it's true that most large-scale commercial games are ugly, tacky and juvenile, attempting to shoehorn the narrative techniques (or goals) of film and cinema into games is not the solution.
People should continue to explore what is possible with games, of course, while at the same time analyzing - and playing! - what has come before. There is probably not an unexplored continent just over the horizon, but that's not something to despair over; the one we've got is pretty fucking solid.
I wonder how many time we developers need to hear this before anything happens. Not that it shouldn't be repeated - it's such an important principle to absorb - but, well, as a high concept it's been repeated more often than evoked.
Then again, I'm probably in the minority to have so many supporters of game diversity & artistic self-respect all on the same RSS reader.
I responded on GameSetWatch's writeup on the same talk, and my perspective is that videogames' inevitable & unstoppable pop culture presence will, gradually, keep producing young'uns that intuitively understand games' presence alongside the other artistic media they enjoy. That the emotion and memory and experience that may stick with them from an Oscar-winning movie or energetic indie band is no less relevant than the same feelings they get from this visceral boss battle or that eureka puzzle solution.
Because, to be honest? Creating games with a "why" in mind is not much of a revelation to me. What it essentially means to me is, "when you're creating a game, treat it as if you were creating in any other artistic medium. Treat it like you would when creating a film or a song or a play: put a little thought and self-respect into it, even if it's meant to be frivolous. Use the artistic process that's been going around for a handful of millenia now."
That's how I thought of game creation when I was young, and it wasn't until recently that I got a more intimate look at game studios and their processes that, as I understand it, developers who approach their works as artists is kind of a minority.
The answer to how we can get games on the same playing field as other artistic mediums should start with developers treating themselves like modern-day artists, shouldn't it? A writer or director or musician worth shit doesn't need to be told the value of exploring diversity in their craft; at least not until they find that sustainable niche they want to stick with for the rest of their career.
And while there's so much more to it I could go on about, I think that's the crux of the situation. When a lot of developers make games, they don't feel anything personal in the process; they don't feel like artists, even though their job is no less creative than one. If games' final products are going to contain any lasting cultural relevance, their creators have to be aware of propping themselves up next to their own favorite musicians, actors, novelists, comedians, concept artists; whatever.
It requires an effort for the developers as much as the audience to recognize the position and lavish the same respect society has for other media creators - but if it has to start somewhere, I'd say developers go first.
Oops, forgot to make this clear: part of being literate about games is being able to see past the presentation and representation that makes, say, Halo 3 an ugly, tacky and juvenile game. Once you're able to do that, you are able to realize that it can be ugly, tacky, juvenile, competitive, exhilarating and dramatic all at the same time.
I promise, there are many game developers who want to express themselves and explore deeper issues in games, but for a variety of reasons, it comes across less often, especially in big-budget games.
First, the structure of game design makes this a little difficult, as making a good game with a large team begins with a good design document, which is generally a less passionate piece of work than a novel or script. There can still be strong expression through the game mechanics and the implementation, but it's a speedbump that can cool the sort of immediate passion that drives some authors to pour themselves directly onto the page.
Furthermore, the size of a game's team is a challenge to overcome. A novel can be a work of singular expression because it has a single author - but today, a game of any size beyond an indie work is almost exclusively the domain of large teams. Even with a strong creative lead, you have dozens, even hundreds of people adding their own voices and perspectives to your vision for the game. Even getting every content creator on the same page with a concept is hard, and getting them to express the same concepts is nearly impossible.
Even when individual content creators are possessed with an expressive urge, their contribution may get lost in the mix, or reigned in to preserve the consistency of the game's tone, or simply be there and not be in pieces that the player notices.
But most importantly, the fact that games are an interactive medium means that the creator(s)' desire to express themselves must always take a back seat to the player's desire to express themselves in playing it. At best, the creator finds a way to convince the player to feel the way they wish the player to feel.
Truly expressing yourself in an interactive medium requires more than putting your message in a cutscene or scripted dialogue. It requires the player to experience and internalize your expression. Expressing yourself well in a game means getting the player to think they came up with the thoughts and emotions on their own. A precious few games achieve this, and even then only with some of their players.
I really like what Randy Smith said about games needing to be engaging rather than needing to be fun.
I mean, honestly, can anyone say that Silent Hill is a 'fun' experience? It's not even a pleasant one! But there's something so compelling about it, so captivating, that its narrative is one of the most lauded in the videogame community.
Sometimes I wonder if the problem is that games simply aren't written well enough. There's plenty of stunning visual beauty and even game design that plays to the emotions, but it often comes packaged with a cliche-ridden storyline and forgettable characters.
I just played Mirror's Edge, so that has been on my mind.
The problem with game development, in general, is the economic model in which it's encased. It's hard to avoid having to do all of those soulless, cynical, boardroom-type things like "gauging user interest" or whatever when the game you're trying to make will need a major motion picture-level budget in order to see the light of day. I think a lot of the problem, as well, lies with the fact that the distribution/performance arm of the gaming industry (the console manufacturers) have way too much power. Imagine if the theater chains were the guys who really pulled all the strings in Hollywood. That's what we're dealing with in games right now.
The amount of money needed to put out a major console release, combined with the fact that the console manufacturers are the absolute bottleneck (in every sense) of the industry, leads to an entirely anti-innovative atmosphere for the creative people actually putting together the games.
I think there's also a problem of where game designers are coming from, as far as creative backgrounds. Programming, in particular, seems to be very focused on practical problem-solving, as opposed to radical innovation (or rather, when there is innovation in programming, it's to solve a problem more elegantly, simply, etc). Creative works in other fields, on the other hand, often involve creating problems, creating complexities, in other words, creating something "unnecessary." I'm just not sure that many people who design games are ever thinking along those lines, or that the process, as it's now known, is at all hospitable to anybody who thinks in that way.
@Fred Zeleny
"Even with a strong creative lead, you have dozens, even hundreds of people adding their own voices and perspectives to your vision for the game."
See, movies(yeah, more trans-medial examples) had that same problems back in the days until a bunch of crazy French critics from the Cahiers du Cinéma decided to put emphasis on the authors.
Now, the problem is that we are lacking both critics and authors. Well, that's not really true. We have critics (and Micheal Abbott will shine a light on a few of them soon: http://tinyurl.com/abbottcritic1 ) but we have to search for them on small blogs on the four corners of the net. Not that much of a problem for people with time on their hands but most gamers are just fed with reviews that just serve an whole different (and commercial) purpose. By now I sound like a broken record, but I still want my video game equivalent of Cahiers du Cinéma. Hopefully, that's what Kill Screen is out to be.
As for the authors, we have quite a few indie devs that fills the bill but, as Hecker says, kind of lacking in the 'mainstream' industry. From the top of my head, movies had Hitchcock, Hawks, and Welles. We have a lot less. I can think of Suda 51, Molyneux(somewhat), and maybe Kojima. I'm sure that there are a lot more but the industry seems shy to show them. It's probably the way the 'business' works but it pretty much goes back to my first point; we need critics to shine the light on those authors that are asking themselves "Why am I making this game ? What does it try to say ?"
Of course now, we could go on and ask; what makes a video game author ? That is an whole other set of questions we ought to ask as fans, critics, journalists, and passionates.
I so wished I could have went to the MIGS but damn those tickets were like 300$. I'm a university student, I'm poor :(
This has been a constant point of discussion and eventual contention, to the point where I'm afraid that many gamers simply get tired of talking about the problem despite that fact that it hasn't gone away.
My argument is simply that even though purely escapist games have their place, gaming shouldn't be 100% escapism.
I think this post and the articles it links hit the main source of the problem - the lack of variety among the people making games and their inspirations. People like Fumito Ueda or Jordan Mechner (Prince of Persia) who have experience and aspirations in game creations outside of pure fun are too rare in this industry.
I think the question we have to ask is "how do we get game creators thinking about this, how do we get a wider range of creative minds into gaming?" I think working on that will also help other issues like racial and sexual representation in games.
I don't know, maybe one day games will hit the point of photography where creating photo-real games will be so easy as to inspire true creativity as the last frontier.
@Bruno:
If we're looking at film for examples, then the key is John Cassavetes. Hitchcock is great and everything, but as a model, he doesn't explain how game developers can realistically bridge the divide between art and commerce.
I hope we get something beyond Cahiers du Cinema, something less conservative, less a mime of other creative traditions. Because if all the creative people of the games industry do is mimic stuff from 50 or 60 years ago in film/literature/whatever else, they just stunt progress in a different way.
My argument is simply that even though purely escapist games have their place, gaming shouldn't be 100% escapism.
Or rather that, if games are going to be "100% escapism," it shouldn't be because the industry itself has decided that this will be the case, or been set up such that other ideas of what games can be aren't represented.
@Bruno Dion
I firmly reject the auteur theory as applied to games. It may be effective in films (I'll leave that for the film folks to decide), but most games have two major differences from movies that make it difficult for a single person to truly claim authorship over the experience.
Firstly, it can be hard in a large game to point to who could be the single auteur. Is it the Lead Designer? Is the the Writer? A few teams have a single Creative Director, but those are usually the teams that include the largest number of direct content creators (level designers, quest designers, world artists, etc), meaning they have the most disparate voices to try to unify.
Secondly, even the strongest singular vision in a game's design is going to have less voice in the audience's experience than they would in a film or novel, for the simple fact that a game is interactive, and allows - even requires - the player's own experience and vision to be incorporated into the experience. The difference between a passive medium and an interactive one cannot be understated, and it magnifies the legitimacy of post-structuralist interpretations: namely, that what the author intends to convey is secondary to what the audience perceives in the piece.
That said, I definitely agree with the second part of your comment - much of the mainstream industry is interested in making games as a product to create profit, rather than as an art to be explored or a craft to be refined. In this, film and games are very similar, indeed. However, I'm encouraged to see more publishers and distributors realizing that art and profit need not be mutually exclusive, and embracing "arthouse" games from smaller or braver creators.
I feel that some gamers, like other members of geek niche's, tend to get so wrapped up in the one thing, they forget to explore other mediums, let alone learn anything about the world around them.
I remember a dude who's thoughts on WWII were based purely on playing Battlefield 1942. Had he read a book or watched a doco on the subject? Nope... did he ever watch the news? Nope. Does he know anything besides games and occasional movies? Not really. Its like the joke that game developers have only ever watched two things - Aliens and a Star Wars.
Being at Uni, working and traveling has definitely given me some life experience, but it was also my personal choice to explore all sorts of mediums western comics, manga, anime, films, documentaries, music and heaven forbid... books, that gave me a wider range of interests and perspectives, which does in turn affect my gaming choices.
I think there are a lot of "intellectual" gamers out there who do want more from their games, however, there are still are large number of gamers who just use games for recreation, or get so wrapped up in the medium itself, all they need are bigger explosions and prettier terrain.
I think its up to the consumers, and not just the games industry to change their attitudes towards gaming, implementing a more "artistic" approach to the development process.
@Ardinal
I think its up to the consumers, and not just the games industry to change their attitudes towards gaming, implementing a more "artistic" approach to the development process.
I think the problem with this idea is that it farms out creative innovation to the "free market," which is wholly unsuited to that task. I can't think of a single other creative medium where the sensibilities of the audience are meant to be the primary driving force toward innovation. Not even incredibly expensive media like film and architecture adhere entirely to this kind of model.
We need creators in the games industry who will stretch the boundaries, who will try things that have never been done in hopes that the audience will respond well (thereby expanding the audience's idea of what gaming can be and allowing for even further innovation in the future). The audience can't be expected to change its attitudes out of thin air. They have to be given examples which prompt them to change their attitudes. And certainly this has happened a number of times in the history of gaming. But what I fear is that, as the industry becomes more and more, well, industrial, more about enormous budgets and meeting consumer demands and gauging consumer interest, you know, all of that boardroom stuff, the less possible it will be for non-formulaic experiences to emerge in mainstream avenues, especially on the consoles.
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