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Several days Roger Ebert posted a followup to a statement he made 5 years ago, that videogames can never be art.

His recent article was, in particular, a response to a TED talk in which a woman from ThatGameCompany (creators of Flower) talked about why video games not only can be but already are art. She cites examples from a game-experience-installation called Waco, as well as Braid and Flower. Ebert essentially makes judgements of those three games based on the woman's short preview/discussion of them, without ever having played them (or any game, as far as I can tell).

At the time I was really annoyed, and I was among the people posting in the comment section that has, in a few days, reached 1800+ comments. By now I've stopped caring so much about Ebert himself. At this point he probably doesn't have the reflexive skills necessary to progress through most games even if he wanted to. I do think when a prominent critic denounces a medium I care about it is worth rebutting him, if only so that other people who are more on the fence who read his work can see the counterpoint, but he is unlikely to change his mind at this point.

However, since then I've been going over a thought experiment in my head, trying to find the ideal game with which one might persuade Mr. Ebert. Not so much because I expect him to play, simply because its an interesting puzzle in and off itself.

Lots of people have posted in the comments "OMG you need to play Shadow of the Colossus" or "Final Fantasy (x)" or "Heavy Rain," each of which may be a good game, but the problem is that most good games are designed foremost to appeal to gamers, who already have a basic vocabulary on how gaming works. My dad played Donkey Kong back in the day so he had a vague notion of how to work his way through Braid. My mom, on the other hand, was unable to even beat the first level. (She couldn't do the double-jump off the second Goomba). Most games are also designed to be "game" length (many, many hours for a non-gamer to spend completing).

The most obvious answer is Portal. Truth be told it's probably still more complex than a 70 year old man whose never touched a game can hope, but it's short, does a reasonably good job of introducing you to the complexity bit by bit, and is as far as I am concerned one of a few "perfect games." It's not necessarily the BEST game out there, but it's the only one I've played where there is not a single moment where I thought "you know, they could have made this part a little better." The puzzles are interesting but shouldn't stump you for more than 5 minutes. The dialogue is perfect, both funny, poignant and appropriate for a gaming scenario (rather than ramming cutscenes down your throat that have nothing to do with the gameplay).

Another issue I'm pondering is his statement "so far there's been no game equivalent to (insert great movie here)." On one hand I have not been affected by a game as strongly as I have been affected by the greatest movies, but I'm pretty positive you could find a movie that reasonably compared to a good game, which was good enough that would fall under Ebert's category of "art." A lot of the people listing Final Fantasy games tried to convey how good the plots were. I haven't actually played Final Fantasy so I don't know for sure, but the synopsis people left in the comments, frankly, sounded rather juvenile and if you watched all the cutscenes in a row, probably would not have impressed Ebert in movie terms.

So I'm trying to think of good movies that you'd actually consider equivalent to good games. Games that probably warrant the attention:

Shadow of the Colossus
Braid
Portal (the best comparison is Cube, unfortunately it wasn't all that great a movie. Which is mostly because trying to translate "Portal" into movie terms inherently ruins most of the experience. Still, I'm hopefully that there's a good example somewhere).
Myst
Heavy Rain (SHOULD be an easy one)
Bioshock
Uncharted (this one's really easy, but I'm not sure offhand whether Ebert considers Indiana Jones "art.")

Granted, games SHOULDN'T have to compete with movies on movies' terms. ("Flower" in particular is not competing with movies, it's competing with paintings). But in this hypothetical scenario, we are imagining games to recommend to a film critic, with the ability to say "if you liked X movie, you really should be able to appreciate X game."

What about the Matrix?

On the surface, it's just a cool action movie. But, I think the movie conveys a lot of things you'd usually expect in a work of art. It is aesthetically interesting, it evokes emotions, it has meanings that make you ponder deeper questions in the world in a philisophical and intellectual realm, etc.

Is it Casablanca? No. But, I see what you're going for. What's a movie that basically meets the bare minimum requirements to qualify as a work of art - that is also fairly universally considered art by a critic or expert in the field. I think Ebert would consider the Matrix to be that.

The specific issue is finding a good movie that has a corresponding game. Ebert already believes movies are art. The trick is providing a parallel to games for him to hypothetically follow.

Now, there are plenty of games that superficially resemble the Matrix, but not necessarily in the ways that matter. What would make a REALLY good comparison is a sort of 4th-wall breaking MMO, that includes a Morpheus-like character that somehow tries to get you to stop playing, wake up and smell the roses. Unfortunately, I don't think there's a way for that to a) be actually poignant instead of hypocritical, and b) actually be profitable.

Why should games be compared directly to movies? There are many forms of art without a narrative structure.

As for Mr. Ebert's claims that games cannot be art becuase they have goals, what about hedge mazes? I'm pretty sure that landscaping is considered art. Does a Victorian garden cease to be art the moment a period-authentic hedge maze is added?

Is a finely carved chess set not art because you can play a game with it?

Is the play Peter Pan not art because it calls for audience participation in the death of Tinkerbell? The audience has the goal of saving the beloved fairy, is the art lost when their applause brings her back to life?

What of the audience calls of "encore, encore!"? If they are successful in bringing a musician back to the stage, is there no longer art in his songs, because the audience "won" his continued performance?

There is so much more than video games where the audience is a participant in the art, and they have objectives. Murder mystery dinner parties, historical reenactments, amusement park rides and I'm sure much more.

There's a lot of reasons why Ebert is wrong, but I spent the last few days talking about them at length with various people. A lot of which was over the definition of art, of which there is substantial disagreement. At this point I'm not so worried about belaboring that point, although I am not opposed to other people using this thread to rant and/or debate about it.

One thing I have been thinking about is Scott McCloud's "Understanding Comics," which does an excellent job of breaking down the various artistic techniques that comics use, demonstrating them, and communicating why comics can and should be considered art, all within the form of a comic. By the end of the book, no matter what you thought about comics beforehand (if at all), I promise you will have not only a greater appreciation for them, but for art and life in general.

I think we are approaching the point where someone should do the same for video games - create a video game that can explain, to the average reasonably-open-minded grandmother, why video games are meaningful and what artistic principles they employ.

I would say he'd argue that Murder mystery dinner parties, historical reenactments, amusement park rides are not art.

But, I would say he hasn't played a video game since Donkey Kong. I mean, I rarely play games where I consider myself to have "won" them, or play to get a high score, unless it's multiplayer. Think of most FPS games. It's pretty much a forgone conclusion that you'll finish the game. You're not really "winning", it's more the experience you have going through it. It's no more winning than watching a movie, getting to the end of it, and shouting "I won, I made it to the end". Does the removal of the win bring games into the realm of art?

Anyhoo, I agree with Ebert's statement here:
"Why are gamers so intensely concerned, anyway, that games be defined as art? Bobby Fischer, Michael Jordan and Dick Butkus never said they thought their games were an art form. Nor did Shi Hua Chen, winner of the $500,000 World Series of Mah Jong in 2009. Why aren't gamers content to play their games and simply enjoy themselves? They have my blessing, not that they care."

Just because something might not be considered art, it doesn't take away from how frickin' awesome it might be. I wouldn't consider the Grand Canyon art, but seeing it fills me with more awe than just about anything man-made has ever done to me.

On what kinds of criteria are we assuming the critic to be judging for? Topic matter, depth of ideas, level of gameplay, mechanical perfection, etc?

For example, I would argue that Final Fantasy Tactics an impressively dark and complex plot, not to mention commentary on the nature of historically-recorded celebrity and heroism, but I feel like any non-gamer critic would take one look at the play-mechanic and just give up.

Similarly, I would not include Bioshock, just because it's an FPS, which I think any non-gamer movie critic would reject it out of hand for. I also don't think that Bioshock really contributes at all to the pool of ideas, but I'm operating on the assumption that, just as not all art speaks to the same qualities, neither would any game considered to be "art".

>>>Why are gamers so intensely concerned, anyway, that games be defined as art?

I do think this is worth answering. I am speaking as a gamer, a filmgoer, a storyteller, and an artist with training in visual arts, music, and yes, game design. This is reposted from another conversation:

Saying that something can NEVER be art is implying that people shouldn't TRY to communicate anything deep and meaningful using it. And frankly, I am NOT satisfied with that. Most jokes and movies and video games and paintings may be vaguely pretty things that don't particularly impact my life. But in each of these cases, I would prefer more pieces where the creator WAS trying to communicate something meaningful, elegant and poignant. If Johnathan Blow hadn't felt that video games should be art, would he have bothered to created Braid? If he had, would it have been as beautiful? Would I have gotten to play The Void, by Ice Pick studios, which is a work that explores both the nature of souls and the relationship of the artist, the muse, the art and the viewer? Would I have gotten to experience the gnawing horror of old age in "The Graveyard" and "Home?"

Each of the above are games created explicitly for the purpose of being art, and I consider each of them highly successful in their own ways. While you might argue that "Graveyard" and "Home" are merely "interactive art" as oppose to a game, there is nothing un-game-like about The Void and Braid, and much that is incredibly artistic. And I am thankful for that.

Ebert is trolling gamers. His arguments are purely semantic.

Joe Johnson said:

Anyhoo, I agree with Ebert's statement here:
"Why are gamers so intensely concerned, anyway, that games be defined as art? Bobby Fischer, Michael Jordan and Dick Butkus never said they thought their games were an art form. Nor did Shi Hua Chen, winner of the $500,000 World Series of Mah Jong in 2009. Why aren't gamers content to play their games and simply enjoy themselves? They have my blessing, not that they care."

Just because something might not be considered art, it doesn't take away from how frickin' awesome it might be. I wouldn't consider the Grand Canyon art, but seeing it fills me with more awe than just about anything man-made has ever done to me.

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I agree that "art" and "awesome" don't have to be linked at all, but his statement is fairly nonsensical (and possibly identifies Ebert's primary problem with his view). First of all, Fischer, Jordan, Butkus, and Chen didn't create chess, basketball, football, or Mah Jong, or even particularly contribute to the form and parameters of those games. Naturally their opinion (which is complete hearsay on the part of Ebert, by the way) on whether those specific games are art or not is germaine, but is not even remotely conclusive as to whether those games are art. Even assuming that they are not (which I would agree with), how do those four games not being art in any way determine the artistic nature of other games? It's an inane point.

Second of all, Ebert is one of those who made the claim "games are not art" in the first place. He began the discussion, or at least his part in it. So when gamers chime in with examples of what games they would consider to be art (and why) in response to his statement, his "why do you guys need to be validated" comment is just in bad faith.

I love Ebert as a movie critic, but the guy is completely out of his element when it comes to games.

I'm not sure if he's "truly" trolling, but yes, in practice he might as well be. As I said, I am interested in this more as a hypothetical puzzle solving exercise than an actual attempt to win him over. If he WAS interested in giving games a try, which one should you present him with?

I have mixed feelings about Bioshock, which I never actually played all the way through (because I don't care much for shooters). It has what is hands down the best introduction to a game I have ever played, up until the moment when you stick yourself with the Lightning plasmid. Up until then, I had been playing as myself. After that point, I was playing as this other random guy who apparently sticks himself with strange needles (without even being told to by Atlas), and then goes around shooting Grandmothers.

Yes, the Grandmothers were shooting back. If I had went to Rapture, I would have said "Hey, you want Adam? Um, okay, I guess," since I had no idea what it was or why it was important. And I probably would have gotten torn apart by crazy people shortly thereafter. Which would have made a bad game. If the game had established somehow that I WAS a violent killer who would respond to the slightest threat with guns and lightning, I would have been more okay with it. Instead I felt an abrupt disconnect with the game experience.

Personally, I'm still on the fence about the whole thing. I like hearing the arguments either way.

One problem that video games have is that there is currently no codified way of discussing them as art in the same way as paintings/poetry/books, etc. These fields have entire graduate study courses devoted to dissecting them. Video games have critics, but not, um, what, theorists? I think that over time, this will change. People like Ebert will be left behind. I wonder, when the first movies came out were they considered art? Or were they just viewed as curiosities? I have a feeling they were probably poo-poo'd, but now those same works are viewed as art.

As a gamer, I don't think I can take games that seriously as an art form as long as there are people pointing to the integrated story/gameplay in Braid and saying "This is an example that games are art" at the same time they always try to defend violence in, say, GTA4 by saying "Don't worry about it, it's only a game."

You can't have it both ways.

I don't think video games are art, but neither do I think red umbrellas in Central Park or elephant feces in the shape of the Virgin Mary is art.

I know art is subjective, but I still think full blown pictorial porn is closer to art than a video game.

Gusto said:

As a gamer, I don't think I can take games that seriously as an art form as long as there are people pointing to the integrated story/gameplay in Braid and saying "This is an example that games are art" at the same time they always try to defend violence in, say, GTA4 by saying "Don't worry about it, it's only a game."

You can't have it both ways.

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This of course means that movies are no longer a viable art form because of the defense of "It's only a movie"?

My take on it is that the entire argument has so much garbage on each side that it has morphed into something that is just moronic. I mean read the article posted Ebert doesn't even have a hard grip on what is art. He gives multiple definitions throughout the article that could easily be used to declare paintings to no longer be art. Fact is that what is and isn't art is a completely subjective opinion no matter how hard anybody tries to hammer a definition in.

Only fact about the entire debate is that Ebert is going to be left in the same ignoble pile as the art critics of old who decried movies as nothing but mindless drek.

Raemon777 said:

I'm not sure if he's "truly" trolling, but yes, in practice he might as well be. As I said, I am interested in this more as a hypothetical puzzle solving exercise than an actual attempt to win him over. If he WAS interested in giving games a try, which one should you present him with?

I have mixed feelings about Bioshock, which I never actually played all the way through (because I don't care much for shooters). It has what is hands down the best introduction to a game I have ever played, up until the moment when you stick yourself with the Lightning plasmid. Up until then, I had been playing as myself. After that point, I was playing as this other random guy who apparently sticks himself with strange needles (without even being told to by Atlas), and then goes around shooting Grandmothers.

Yes, the Grandmothers were shooting back. If I had went to Rapture, I would have said "Hey, you want Adam? Um, okay, I guess," since I had no idea what it was or why it was important. And I probably would have gotten torn apart by crazy people shortly thereafter. Which would have made a bad game. If the game had established somehow that I WAS a violent killer who would respond to the slightest threat with guns and lightning, I would have been more okay with it. Instead I felt an abrupt disconnect with the game experience.

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If you finish the game you do actually learn why the protagonist is doing what he's doing, though even then I found the game to be more about the setting and ambiance than the personal story.

And I don't put much stock in Ebert's arguments, here. I mean, I'm not going to look to him for a video game discussion, the same way I wouldn't open my mouth about nuclear physics.

As a gamer, I don't think I can take games that seriously as an art form as long as there are people pointing to the integrated story/gameplay in Braid and saying "This is an example that games are art" at the same time they always try to defend violence in, say, GTA4 by saying "Don't worry about it, it's only a game."

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Is this different from people who point to Citizen Kane and say "Art!" and then point to... I dunno, "Doom," (the movie) and say "don't worry about it, it's just entertainment." Doom actually isn't the best example, but I can't think offhand of a violent movie that was truly violent with no redeeming value whatsoever. I actually kinda liked Doom. "The Matrix" gets referenced the most, but that had plenty of good stuff to offer.

And actually, that's part of the point. My understanding is that GTA4 actually had a decent plot, was fun to play, and if it impacted any impressionable young people, that's the fault of retailers for selling to young people, not the fault of the game itself. Violent games and movies both often have plenty of worthwhile content that the frightened masses ignore. Depending on your definition of art it may or may not have been art, but there is nothing inherently terrible about it. "It's just entertainment" may be a bad argument, but it has no impact on the art-status of a medium.

>>>One problem that video games have is that there is currently no codified way of discussing them as art in the same way as paintings/poetry/books, etc. These fields have entire graduate study courses devoted to dissecting them. Video games have critics, but not, um, what, theorists?

While I'm not sure if there are graduate course studies dedicated to it yet (certain specialized schools might have that, dunno), there are plenty of people who study and discuss game design in depth. There may not be a single definitive book on the subject, but I think there are plenty of books out there that talk about it in various ways, and loads in individual articles on the internet.

In many art classes, you are taught early on that the principles of design are Balance, Unity, Balance, Proportion, Rhythm, and Emphasis (depending on your teacher they might include some additional things). You can apply these principles to visual art, to music, to dance, theatre, film, and game design, and a load of other things as well. You can easily analyze games in these terms, in addition to studying them for more subjective things like "meaning" and "emotional impact." You could come up with another word for something that was created deliberately to utilize these qualities, but I think the word "art" works just fine.

Dubyamn;373831][QUOTE=Gusto said:

As a gamer, I don't think I can take games that seriously as an art form as long as there are people pointing to the integrated story/gameplay in Braid and saying "This is an example that games are art" at the same time they always try to defend violence in, say, GTA4 by saying "Don't worry about it, it's only a game."

You can't have it both ways.

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This of course means that movies are no longer a viable art form because of the defense of "It's only a movie"?

My take on it is that the entire argument has so much garbage on each side that it has morphed into something that is just moronic. I mean read the article posted Ebert doesn't even have a hard grip on what is art. He gives multiple definitions throughout the article that could easily be used to declare paintings to no longer be art. Fact is that what is and isn't art is a completely subjective opinion no matter how hard anybody tries to hammer a definition in.

Only fact about the entire debate is that Ebert is going to be left in the same ignoble pile as the art critics of old who decried movies as nothing but mindless drek.[/QUOTE]

Right.

The video game world has masterpieces and dreck.
The movie world has masterpieces and dreck.
The ART WORLD has masterpieces and dreck.

The only reason anyone gets butthurt on any single one of these is because they consider themselves part of that camp.

There are people who will submit scribbles on a chalkboard to a modern art exhibit and people who bust their ass doing realistic or impressionist oil paintings will be furious. There are gamers who called No Country for Old Men "boring and retarded" and then went to go shoot Nazi zombies in COD:WaW on XBox Live while calling the opposing team ******s. And Ebert will continue to say there has been no evidence that suggests to him games are to be considered an art form.

Who's wrong depends on your perspective.

---------- Post added at 04:54 PM ---------- Previous post was at 04:51 PM ----------

That said, in my experience, gamers are the ones in those groups most likely to get butthurt.

If you finish the game you do actually learn why the protagonist is doing what he's doing, though even then I found the game to be more about the setting and ambiance than the personal story

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I did hear this recently. It does make me want to go back and play through it, but I don't really have the time and still probably wouldn't enjoy the gameplay as much as other artistic games I could be playing. I still say that if your design is perfect, there should never be a moment where the player feels pulled out of the immersion. If the player's avatar is supposed to be a person with a particular personality, you need to somehow imply that in game. Otherwise, you need to set up the game so that people can at least attempt different playstyles before being gradually sucked into the one necessary to beat the game.

What made Bioshock so frustrating for me was that the intro was SO incredibly immersive, making me feel that me, myself was actually there, that when I was unable to call out to the old lady with the gun and say "Okay, I surrender, take your Adam or whatever the hell and leave alone," I felt betrayed.

Ebert needs to watch/play MGS4.

Who's wrong depends on your perspective.

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I agree with this, but you were the one who said, specifically, that you can't take games seriously as an artform so long as some gamers are using bad, hypocritical arguments. It shouldn't matter what some gamers say, it should matter how you personally define art and whether games qualify.

Raemon777 said:

Who's wrong depends on your perspective.

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I agree with this, but you were the one who said, specifically, that you can't take games seriously as an artform so long as some gamers are using bad, hypocritical arguments. It shouldn't matter what some gamers say, it should matter how you personally define art and whether games qualify.

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Then in my opinion, they currently don't. Neither do movies. With a handful of exceptions.

Gusto;373873][QUOTE=Raemon777 said:

Who's wrong depends on your perspective.

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I agree with this, but you were the one who said, specifically, that you can't take games seriously as an artform so long as some gamers are using bad, hypocritical arguments. It shouldn't matter what some gamers say, it should matter how you personally define art and whether games qualify.

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Then in my opinion, they currently don't. Neither do movies. With a handful of exceptions.[/QUOTE]

Hold on, I'm confused as to what we are discussing here.

Are we discussing whether games, taken as a homogenous whole, are art, or whether individual games can be art?

Then in my opinion, they currently don't. Neither do movies. With a handful of exceptions.

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Okay, but then can you clarify how you DO define art and why games and movies do not qualify?

For the record, I have two different definitions of art. (Basically two different words that happen to be related and sound the same. The words are "art" and "Art™." Lower case art is objectively defined and extremely broad, and is essentially what Wikipedia says: "Art is the process or product of deliberately arranging elements in a way to affect the senses or emotions." Nearly everything in the world is art according this definition. A similar definition from Scott McCloud: "Art is anything created for purposes other than survival and reproduction." (Seriously, y'all should read "Understanding Comics," which explains this better than I can here.") Basically, anything created with the intent to accomplish something other than mere practicality. A car can get you from point a to point b. It can also look really cool and feel sleek and powerful. Cars that attempt to do so are, to some degree, works of art. All video games are. All movies are.

Art™ is the subjective version, which is basically "anything designed to and successful at dramatically impacting you on an emotional and/or aesthetic level." I actually still apply this pretty broadly, and am willing to accept things that impact other people even if they don't impact me.

Both art and Art™ can be studied, often in terms of the principles of design (balance, unity, etc), and those who HAVE studied basic artistic principles will usually produce things that are more likely to be Art™ for more people.

The thing is, the more you actively study artistic principles, the more you are likely to find things artistic. A decade ago I might have considered fl0w to be a somewhat fun game. Today I am aware of what kind of effort was put into it and how it achieves certain psychological effects, so I consider it Art™. Not quite as good Art™ as Braid or Portal, but it's not really trying to do the same things they are so that's not even a very fair comparison. (Edit: better comparison is the cell-stage in Spore, which is in some ways "better" but in some ways "worse,")

I always believe art (or Art) is design/made to inspire people emotionally, intellectually, or physically.

Can video game be art? I believe to be so. are ALL video game art? no.

I always believe art (or Art) is design/made to inspire people emotionally, intellectually, or physically.

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"Physically?" I'm curious what you mean by that. Can you give an example?

TeKeo;373885][QUOTE=Gusto;373873][QUOTE=Raemon777 said:

Who's wrong depends on your perspective.

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I agree with this, but you were the one who said, specifically, that you can't take games seriously as an artform so long as some gamers are using bad, hypocritical arguments. It shouldn't matter what some gamers say, it should matter how you personally define art and whether games qualify.

Click to expand...

Then in my opinion, they currently don't. Neither do movies. With a handful of exceptions.[/QUOTE]

Hold on, I'm confused as to what we are discussing here.

Are we discussing whether games, taken as a homogenous whole, are art, or whether individual games can be art?[/QUOTE]

Well individual games can be art but we obviously don't see a lot of them. I'd be more inclined to say that done properly, video game design can be an art, much along the same lines as engineering, for instance, can be considered an art, or there can be visionary architects, etc.

But I don't think we can discuss what defines art in this thread, because that as been debated for centuries. We need to step back and take it from a subjective viewpoint for now. For example, I wouldn't call Portal art, but I can very much appreciate what went into the design and creation of the game.

Ebert doesn't give a fuck, which is his right.

Are we discussing whether games, taken as a homogenous whole, are art, or whether individual games can be art?

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I think it's fair to discuss both. But for purposes of keeping some semblance of order here (as Gusto says, you can debate the definition of art forever and still not know for certain what it is and whether it matters), are people okay with my two different "art" words? (art and Art™?") that I defined above?

Gusto said:

I'd be more inclined to say that done properly, video game design can be an art, much along the same lines as engineering, for instance, can be considered an art, or there can be visionary architects, etc.

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This this this this and this.

When it comes to story I am generally inclined to say that at best a few games could be considered art, but more than likely none of them come close to telling stories as well as a movie or a good book does.

Same goes for graphics and the designs therein, graphics are cool, but I don't think they hold a candle to paintings or photography.

But when you look at the design of games, that's where the art is. One thing that defines a game as an artistic masterpiece is when you can design it with simple but well thought out rules and then more complicated rules appear as a result of those basic rules entertwining. The opposite example would be where a game has duct tape all over it to fix gaping holes in the design. Its hard for me to think of specific examples, but any time a strategy game has the enemy do something completely outside of the designers intention, but it completely makes sense, that is an artfully designed game. The AI's combat mechanics in Farcry 2 would be something I would consider artistic.

Raemon777 said:

I always believe art (or Art) is design/made to inspire people emotionally, intellectually, or physically.

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"Physically?" I'm curious what you mean by that. Can you give an example?

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Architectural buildings inspires other architect to build similar building cause it is artistic.

>>Same goes for graphics and the designs therein, graphics are cool, but I don't think they hold a candle to paintings or photography.

Oh I think graphics in computer games can be amazingly artistic in comparison to paintings or photography. But I agree that that by itself is not nearly as interesting as the art of game design, and saying the "graphics are artistic" is not the same as saying "the game is artistic."

But in addition to the game design itself, I think an important "art" worth discussing here is the overall emotional/intellectual/aesthetic impact of the game. Beautiful graphics can be effective not only as a beautiful thing unto themselves, but something that is essential to a greater experience that combines the music, the graphics and the mechanics into one cohesive whole. Myst is a good example of this.

I don't think games can affect most people in an emotional way any where near how much a normal/RL piece of art can. I think what (good) games excel at is challenging our brains, not sure if that's what you meant by intellectual. Aesthetically I guess I can see some games that pull that off, like Shadow of the Collosus. The problem with Aesthetics in games has always been that at some point the graphics become dated and it just doesn't look good anymore. Name 1 game from the Nintendo era that is Aesthetically artistic. I'm not sure I could.

Just thought of another design that is definitely artistic. Combat in Ninja Gaiden. The fact that combat guides have been written that read like hand to hand instruction manuals says something about the quality of the design.

The fact is, most "art" doesn't really impact me all that much emotionally. The feeling I get from the Mona Lisa is really not all that significant. Yes, if you seriously study the piece you can find a lot of things to appreciate, but the same can be said about even of the simplest games.

As for graphics: in the nintendo era, there was a) a lot of serious limitations on hardware, b) art for games had yet to become a serious endeavor. So no, I can't think of any games offhand that are visually-aesthetically pleasing (I don't think aesthetics have to be visual, but I'm honestly not 100% sure how to define aesthetics so I'm trying not to use the word too much. I know that it generally means "appreciation of beauty" but think there's more to it than that).

Now, we're at a point where graphics have immense capabilities. Games that go "for realism" will still be outclassed by newer titles over the next few decades, although eventually it will hit the maximum threshold of photoreal. But even in the meantime, there are plenty of games that maintain their beauty by using stylized graphics. WarCraft is one of the premier examples of this. While they've updated it somewhat, in general Ironforge is just as impressive to a person entering it for the first time now as someone who entered it for the first time 5 years ago.

It doesn't even have to be a big title. Robot Unicorn Attack has become one of my favorite games, possibly all time, because every time I play it I just feel so stupidly happy I can't even describe it. The visuals are not going to look dated in 20 years, they're going to look exactly as cartoony and silly as they do now. They will also be as "good," insofar as all the platforms have distinct, appealing silhouettes and harmonious vivid colors. The upbeat music is also an important part of the experience, and is already old enough to be retro, so it's not like it can really go out of style either.

Myst is close to twenty years old, and I still get chills when I start up a new game.

Joe Johnson said:

I would say he'd argue that Murder mystery dinner parties, historical reenactments, amusement park rides are not art.

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I'm sure that Walt Disney would disagree with him on at least one of those points, and I'd much rather go with a creator's view of art than with a critic's.

Music is art, drawing/painting is art, acting is art, writing is art. If Mr. Ebert doesn't think that art + art + art + art = art, then I don't think any video game could convince him otherwise.

I recently went to Disney World for the first time in my adult life, and was extreme impressed with the way the experience was put together. In particular, it used a lot of things very similar to level design, in terms of how you directed people to where you wanted them to go without feeling like you were railroading them on a fixed path. It actually had a kind of WoW quality to it. You enter a given "world" (i.e. Epcott, Magic Kingdom, etc), and are presented with an introductory ride that showcases all the major themes of the world. Then you get to explore different zones of the world, each of which had a subtheme, each of them culminating in a ride which then transitioned into a cinematic which transitioned into a gift shop (dungeon, cinematic, loot). Then at the end of the night you had an incredible fireworks display that brought all the disparate themes back together again in a climactic finish. I'm not sure whether this is neat or sad, but at the end of each section I actually flexed in anticipation of an achievement notice popping up saying "You just completed the Viking area!" and was mildly sad when it didn't happen.

There were things I could see that needed improving, but overall it was a very polished "emotioneering" experience that I would absolutely consider artistic.

Well, in a way, Ebert has a point.

Soliloquy said:

Well, in a way, Ebert has a point.

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Film and literature are not the only forms of art. Just because these two classic mediums are limited in their nature, not easily allowing for audience choices, does not mean that such a state should be the ideal for all art. Music can be like what Ebert considers "serious" film and literature, where it is presented to the audience in a fixed form, or it can be improvised, suited to the moment, made with the audience and yet remain art. Ebert's narrow definition of art cuts out much more than just video games. By arbitrarily ruling out anything with a goal or score, and anything that is not in a fixed form free of audience input, it rules out jazz and other forms of improvisational music, many forms of dancing (including most native/tribal rituals), figure skating, some styles of improv and stand-up comedy and a lot more. I don't care if he actually thinks of any of these as art, he's wrong. His prejudice is fairly clear later in the response where that quote came from:

"the nature of the medium prevents it from moving beyond craftsmanship to the stature of art. To my knowledge, no one in or out of the field has ever been able to cite a game worthy of comparison with the great dramatists, poets, filmmakers, novelists and composers... for most gamers, video games represent a loss of those precious hours we have available to make ourselves more cultured, civilized and empathetic. "

Video games, as a medium, are maybe 40 years old. How many films produced before 1930 were comparable to the great works of the stage that came before? I wonder how many critics said that movies would never match stage productions because the pre-recorded actors could never play to the audience, or hold their next line to wait for laughter to subside.

Furthermore, how does Eberts reasoning behind his criticism of video games match his conclusion? Why is jazz less of an art because it is not composed? Why is a bedtime story precluded from being art, simply because it is read aloud in a silly voice to suit the whims of a child? Why is the native dance of many cultures less of an art because it is done to the rhythm of the audience?

I reject Eberts elitist view of art, and his ignorant view of video games. Grim Fandango is worthy, in my opinion, of being put alongside the great works of film history, and it came out a dozen years ago. I certainly got more out of that game than I did out of watching "Shakespeare in Love", which Ebert named one of his top movies of 1998, the year Grim Fandago came out. I can barely remember a thing about the movie, but I remember the game, and the time I spent playing it with my sisters, very well. I've replayed the game, but have little desire to see the movie again. Grim Fandango is a work of art, and there are many other games that deserve recognition as such. Furthermore, in the coming decades I expect video games to progress beyond what they are now, just as films progressed beyond the black & white era. Compare a Marx Brothers comedy to something more modern. Many of the elements from the Marx Brothers are still around (some of the jokes, even) but movies have progressed a very long way as well, both technically and artistically. Games will continue to progress as well, if they're allowed to, and given the credit and recognition they deserve.

Everything I would want to say in support of games as art, I think figmentPez said well enough. I do wish to talk a bit about how I see Ebert and his point of view in this, not because I totally agree with it, but because I can understand where he is coming from.

Most art, at least the paintings and movies we consider "Art", are often about taking a second to look and reflect on what you are seeing, but games by nature being interactive are more about "doing" rather then seeing. When one plays a game, one is often not looking at the art and allowing it to effect them the whole time they watch, because they are trying to figure out how to solve the puzzle, or kill the bad guy, or jump the platform. Many bring up games like "Braid" which is a very emotional game, but forget that during a large chunk of it, you are not reflecting on the artistic narrative, but how to get that darn key sitting behind that wall so you can progress after jumping around for 30 minutes. It is not till the middle of the missions, or once you reach the end, that the real effects of it all start to hit you hard, the artistic quality of the narrative.

To give an idea, imagine the Mona Lisa, but at the bottom of the frame you have a bunch of buttons. Hitting the buttons causes a ball to drop that slowly reveals the art if you get them to land in the proper slots. Now, the Mona Lisa itself is still art, but those unwilling to work to see the art will claim it is not art, but only a blank canvas, because they can't simple walk up and reflect on it without effort to see what is behind that blank canvas.

This is where I disagree with Ebert. Games CAN be "Art", but they take more time to setup and reveal then paintings or movies, which means they don't work well for critics that are unwilling to play them to the climax. If Ebert took a second to play through all of Braid, he might find that it would give him more of an emotional impact then some movies, just because he earned that final reveal rather then allowed it to simply play out in front of him.

The issue is he does not have the patience to reach that point, he wants to walk into the gallery or the theater and watch, not interact, and thus he will never take the time to give games a fair chance. It is this reason I can never take him seriously when he talks about games, as smart of a man he is. http://www.halforums.com/forum/../member.php?451-figmentPez

My view on this is that Ebert is obviously biased. He's a movie critic and as such has invested his life in that particular art form. As a result, he will obviously want to keep that art form going as he sees tremendous value in it. He may also see video games as detracting from movies. The people who would normally be writing, acting, designing, etc. for movies are doing so for video games instead and that potentially weakens the medium. Also, people who would normally be spending money to go see movies are instead spending that money on games. Again, weakening the medium.

Plus, he's an old guy and doesn't "get" video games. I'll listen to him when he talks about movies as he obviously has superior training and insight, but when it comes to games, he has no basis to judge them. If he is not willing to give one a try or at least sit by and watch someone else play so that he can judge the story, I have no interest in what he says on the matter. He is not the final arbiter of art, we all are. We decide what is worthy of praise. He can have his opinions and rile up whomever he wants with them, but in the end, I don't really care.

Braid was a tough challenge, even for a platforming veteran. I'd be more inclined to point him towards HL2: Episode 2 with commentary turned on, or maybe an edited version of someone else playing through. I wonder if Ebert has ever talked with game creators. In the commentary for HL2:E2 Valve talks about when to take control away from the player for the most effect in cinematic sequences. They talk about how to get the player to look where they want. How to evoke emotion and make the player involved with the game world. It's really some great insight into how games are made, and why all the reasons that Ebert thinks games can't be art, are just difficulties to be overcome and opportunities to create a new form of art in a new medium.

If an old urinal can be art then anything can... games probably just have a harder time with it because they also have to consider gameplay, otherwise you might as well just make a GCI film instead.

I can't recall if it's been said on this thread, but the thing with games is that the gameplay, in many cases, IS the art.

Raemon777 said:

I can't recall if it's been said on this thread, but the thing with games is that the gameplay, in many cases, IS the art.

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And in many other cases, the gameplay is just an excuse to showcase the pretty art.

Ebert is wrong, it's a stupid discussion, there is no way he will be convinced because he's not actually interested in honestly examining games. Being a great critic and thinker on film does not mean he understands or wants to understand video games, and it's pretty clear that he does not. He's essentially trolling.

Yeah I mean, I couldn't be a good critic of indy rock because I don't listen to it, and I think it generally sucks. Same with football. I don't follow it, how could I argue if one player is better than another? Or if their performances could be seen as artistic?

I still think my video was funny :humph:.

Raemon777 said:

I can't recall if it's been said on this thread, but the thing with games is that the gameplay, in many cases, IS the art.

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Which is why is so much harder to make it work (and i was referring mostly to making it player friendly, which can lead to sacrificing immersion etc.).

WarCraft is one of the premier examples of this. While they've updated it somewhat, in general Ironforge is just as impressive to a person entering it for the first time now as someone who entered it for the first time 5 years ago.

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YOU GO TO HELL, YOU GO TO HELL AND YOU DIE!!!!!


Warcraft is the RTS, heretic.

I'd be right there with you (WarCraft II was one of my defining childhood games and I still have the opening paragraphs of the orcish racial history memorized) except that WarCraft III was such a disappointment to me that I just can't bring myself to care anymore. Playing/reading through WarCraft III, at the end I was like "seriously? was the writing that bad in WarCraft II and I didn't notice because I was like 10? And then I reread WarCraft II and nope, it really was that awesome and WarCraft III really was that bad).

Meh, except that it was a lamer remake of Starcraft's story i didn't think it was that bad... Arths was emo though.

Raemon777 said:

"seriously? was the writing that bad in WarCraft II and I didn't notice because I was like 10? And then I reread WarCraft II and nope, it really was that awesome and WarCraft III really was that bad).

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I have to disagree. WarCraft 2 was nothing but narrations and a few little paragraphs in the manual. WarCraft 3 was what really defined the game and allowed it to grow into a world worthy of becoming an MMO. I love WC2, but it was not that great when it came to the story, because it didn't really have a story, only backstory.

WarCraft III TRIED to do a lot of good things, and did a decent enough job at most of them to set a good stage for WoW. But as @Li3n points out... it was mostly a lamer remake of StarCraft. And yeah, I consider that a pretty bad thing. WarCraft II had an awesomely written backstory and a decent (although I admit not spectacular) mission briefings. StarCraft also had an awesomely written backstory, as well as a well written and well voice acted plot with pretty decent depth. Beyond the Dark Portal and Brood War both improved or at least maintained the quality of their predecessors. (I will note that StarCraft is probably the better comparison in terms of actual acting/writing in game. But WarCraft II did have a very good manual that laid out an interesting backstory, with humanized villains).

After that constant improvement, WarCraft III comes along, with years and years of buildup, an amazing teaser trailer, and all kinds of ideas that SHOULD have been awesome. And instead we get a bunch of lame, poorly acted characters reinacting a plot we had seen before. WarCraft III was my first major experience with overhype. I was so excited for that game, and it was just plain mediocre.

If Arthas had been a minor side character he could be excused for being a lame, emo version of Kerrigan/Anakin-Skywalker (War3 happened to come out about the same time as Attack of the Clones, and I was amused at the extent to which Arthas/Uther and Anakin/Obi-wan parallel each other). But he was the main focus of the story for half the game. I wanted to like Thrall, but he just never carried the weight that his character was supposed to, and the "orcs and human uniting, setting aside their hatreds" thing is barely dealt with at all until the last few missions. (And Thrall's penultimate climax-line being "You're no Oracle... you're the Prophet!" pretty much seals the deal. Grom's final moments, while good, barely begin to redeem that).

And Furion and Tyrande were just... blah.

There definitely was potential for something awesome there, and some moments in the game touched upon it. The one Arthas line I thought was really spectacular was when he says to Illidan "Are you certain of that, Demon Hunter? Are you certain your will is your own?" They could have went down that route to showcase a truly conflicted character, self-aware that he is on the path towards evil but unable to stop it. It's that potential that allows things like Grom's death scene and Arthas' burdened trudge towards the Frozen Throne to feel meaningful, but the game didn't really earn them at all.

The books "The Last Guardian" and "Lord of the Clans" gave a lot of the characters and storyline a lot of depth retroactively, but I wish it had been conveyed better in the actual game.

Soliloquy said:

I still think my video was funny :humph:.

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nah that was fucking hilarious. I generally read the forums when at work, and flash is disabled. I wish I had seen that quote from him at the beginning, because it invalidates his entire argument:

1) Movies and Literature are art
2) Movies and Literature are not interactive
3) Video Games are interactive

therefore

4) Video games are not art.

someone with only a cursory understanding of logic can tell you what's wrong with that argument.

Edit: Also, I can't stand how much people butcher the definition of Art. Here is what art is -

Art is what happens when someone masters the existing fundamental principles of a subject and begins to explore/create new ones.

All this "art is the imitation of nature" conceipts are a misunderstanding of this concept. Really what should be said is "art is the expression and definition of nature" where the term nature means the fundamental essence of something. Its very hard to put this into words, but if you have ever studied Taoism that is what is meant by nature.

The women he references said that Chess and Micheal Jordan aren't examples of art/artists, which is so completely and disturbingly incorrect.

Raemon777 said:

There definitely was potential for something awesome there, and some moments in the game touched upon it. The one Arthas line I thought was really spectacular was when he says to Illidan "Are you certain of that, Demon Hunter? Are you certain your will is your own?" They could have went down that route to showcase a truly conflicted character, self-aware that he is on the path towards evil but unable to stop it. It's that potential that allows things like Grom's death scene and Arthas' burdened trudge towards the Frozen Throne to feel meaningful, but the game didn't really earn them at all.

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I still don't agree. While I do agree that WC3 was not the penultimate in storytelling, the characters themselves were larger, more meaningful, then pretty much all the characters in WC2 minus the few that actually carried over and got the spotlight (Grom, for instance). Thrall, while you believe he never carried the weight he was suppoed to, has become a stable of the fanbase, so much more then most other characters. Most of us are actually disappointed that WoW made his character morally weak, even though his loss of influence may make a better character trait for the storyline as a whole (he was often called a Gary Stu). Arthas, as much as he was a rehash of the "hero falls to evil" story, still has a rather large fanbase, much more then can be said for people like Teron Gorefiend, or even Anduin Lothar.

I have been a "Loremaster" of WarCraft for a long time now, and you can find me frequenting all the message boards and discussing future lore with my fellows. More then anything I disagree with the idea that WC3 has a "weaker" story then WC2, because WC2 didn't really HAVE a story to compare with. Yes it has some well written back story, all the manuals have that, the WC3 manual included with it's long detailed history of every playable race. Yes it did have a sort of narrative based on the faction you played, but never a cohesive storyline between the two, and it was all spoken passively to you, rather then really making you feel a part of it. Do you really think the battle for Zul'dare, where some orc says "we want this island for the Warchief!" was better then Thrall breaking Grom out of prison? Do you really think going to a circle and a little elf popping out saying little quotes before you stick her in the corner was better then the destruction of the Elfgates and the torture of Sylvanas? I just find that hard to swallow. Grom's death, for instance, still holds way more emotional impact then the deaths of characters like Anduin Lothar, who pretty much just got punched in the face by an Ogre and the narration said "Lothar is dead, go kill those assholes."

It's not that I think WarCraft III has a "weaker story" than WarCraft 2. You are correct that in WarCraft 2, the "story" only barely existed. But when you compare the parts that did exist (i.e. the backstory), there is WarCraft 3, which has a "backstory" in the manual which listed a bunch of events in chronological order that told you what had happened before. And you have WarCraft 2, which had very personal accounts by Gul'Dan and Aegwynn that showed not only what had happened but who it had happened to and why we should care. One of the things that impresses me to this day is the extent to which I empathize with Gul'Dan when I'm reading his account of Horde history. As a fellow person who cares deeply about learning how things work and how to manipulate them (i.e. a nerd) I can see exactly why he would have such disdain for his simple, bloodthirsty people, to the point where he'd sacrifice entire nations for a chance to explore the infinite reaches of the cosmos. I'd like to think I'm a better person than him, but the fact is if I were raised in his circumstances there's a good chance I'd have turned out just like him. Whereas Arthas... is what exactly? Just angry because he's young and brash and brash young people are angry and stupid?

As far as actual presentation of the game, obviously there is no comparison. But you know what a good comparison is? StarCraft. And StarCraft had a great plot, a great execution of that plot, great characters who were not only interesting in concept but were actually fun to talk to and who I was actually sad for when they died or were betrayed. That was my benchmark for WarCraft III, and WarCraft III failed.

Grom had a great death scene, but that was the first and only time in the entire game when I cared about him in the slightest. The rest of the time I was like "why is this asshole who's chopping down all the trees and is clearly doing all the wrong things essentially our POV character?" - "Why is Medivh giving everyone random cryptic warnings that no sane person would ever listen to instead of actually explaining what is about to happen and why you would ever want to travel west and oh by the way DEMONS are about the WRECK you and they are actually RESPONSIBLE for the plague you're all so worried about." - "Why is our POV character for the humans an emo punk? Why is our POV character for the undead STILL an emo punk?"

That's the biggest issue with WarCraft III, that lack of good POV characters. Thrall and Jaina are the only solid characters you have to root for, and they are so rarely present that they barely count.

ScytheRexx said:

WarCraft 3 was what really defined the game and allowed it to grow into a world worthy of becoming an MMO.

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Then why the heck did they retcon half of WC3's backstory when WoW came out?!

Raemon777 said:

The books "The Last Guardian" and "Lord of the Clans" gave a lot of the characters and storyline a lot of depth retroactively, but I wish it had been conveyed better in the actual game.

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Both of those came out before WC3... Lord of teh Clans was even supposed to be an adventure game originally...

Whereas Arthas... is what exactly? Just angry because he's young and brash and brash young people are angry and stupid?

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IMO i tihnk they wanted him to be one of those guys that must have things their way or not at all... which are just as annoying as him IRL.

Both of those came out before WC3... Lord of teh Clans was even supposed to be an adventure game originally...

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Oh, huh. Forgot about that. I guess they were probably among the things that got me excited for WarCraft III. But it's largely irrelevant, because there still was no depth present in the actual game.

IMO i tihnk they wanted him to be one of those guys that must have things their way or not at all... which are just as annoying as him IRL.

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Yeah that was pretty much it. There's nothing wrong with that as a CHARACTER, but there is a lot wrong with it as a protagonist we are supposed to be identifying with for half the game.

Raemon777 said:

Oh, huh. Forgot about that. I guess they were probably among the things that got me excited for WarCraft III. But it's largely irrelevant, because there still was no depth present in the actual game.

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Sure, but you where overstating the problem by saying they felt like they should fix it... instead i tihnk they just assumed you already read the books.

Raemon777 said:

Yeah that was pretty much it. There's nothing wrong with that as a CHARACTER, but there is a lot wrong with it as a protagonist we are supposed to be identifying with for half the game.

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The problem is that such characters get boring fast... if i can't take that shit from a guy i know since kindergarten i certainly don't want it from a POV character in a game.

Ugh, Warcraft's hackneyed, cobbled together story is hardly an argument of video games as art.

I could staple H.P. Lovecraft to Warhammer (both 40K and original) codex's together and come out with similar stories.

instead i tihnk they just assumed you already read the books.

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Well, a) they shouldn't make that assumption, b) I HAD read the books (apparently beforehand... I know I read them as they came out), and they still didn't make the game any better.

Ugh, Warcraft's hackneyed, cobbled together story is hardly an argument of video games as art.

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What made WarCraft really great, originally, for me, was that that they took basic, archetypical ideas and fleshed them out really well. Gul'Dan is technically your generic evil mastermind, but his memoir made him a really interesting, believable character to me. The parts of WarCraft that ARE done well are still successful at this, but I agree that large chunks of WoW consist of "let's grab some random cultural idea (Cthulhu, Norse Mythology, etc) slap some tweaked names on it, add a mediocre backstory and call it a day. That's partly because WoW is a huge world that they need to continuously fill up with stuff to keep people playing. WarCraft III had a fairly concise plot that I think had the potential to be truly great art if they had just worked harder at the script.

I will not argue that StarCraft had a better story because I agree with it. I never argued that WarCraft 3 had a better story then StarCraft, I was arguing the claim that WarCraft 2 had a better story then WarCraft 3, which I find a little silly because there was not much of a story to compare. WarCraft 3 had it's good points and it's bad points, but at least it had characters that meant something, where we saw why they meant something rather then being told why they meant something.

Raemon777 said:

As a fellow person who cares deeply about learning how things work and how to manipulate them (i.e. a nerd) I can see exactly why he would have such disdain for his simple, bloodthirsty people, to the point where he'd sacrifice entire nations for a chance to explore the infinite reaches of the cosmos.

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I am trying to understand what you are saying. I may have to read it again and actually try to keep out my knowledge of Gul'dan, try to act like that is the first time I read him, but he was not someone just curious for the cosmos. He was the one that more then anyone used his people for his own goals. He was the one that corrupted them, he was the one that brought the warlocks, and the one that stopped the only chance to reverse the change. It was never about curiosity, it was about power.

That's the biggest issue with WarCraft III, that lack of good POV characters. Thrall and Jaina are the only solid characters you have to root for, and they are so rarely present that they barely count.

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I think the issue is you are trying to look at the PoV of the characters in the first place. The game itself was trying to simply tell a story as it happened, you were not supposed to empathize with Arthas as a hero, you were simply supposed to watch him go down his path to ruin, and then help me realize that path to push the story forward. Not every game is about empathizing, even WC2 you never really empathized with the orcs, and in StarCraft you never really empethized with the Zerg, at least I never did. It was just a silly fantasy story, and you watch it unfold.

Then why the heck did they retcon half of WC3's backstory when WoW came out?!

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You may have to point out that "half" that was retconned, as I don't really see it. Yes, some of the events as they happened, changed a bit, but not to the extent you are claiming. Really, the only game that has been totally discarded was WC1, with WC2 being retconned slightly in certain areas, like the assassination of Lothar. Otherwise the game gave us our heroes, the majority of our villains, the creeps we fight, etc... Without it, WoW would not have worked as well as it did.

I was arguing the claim that WarCraft 2 had a better story then WarCraft 3

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This wasn't actually a claim that I made. I said WarCraft 3 was disappointing, and I said WarCraft 2 had a better backstory. I realize it may have been a bit confusing and I apologize for that. The point I tried to make in my second post was that I was expecting something at least as good as what had come before (which included StarCraft) and that WarCraft III was disappointing because of it.

It was never about curiosity, it was about power.

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It was definitely about both, and what I think made it particularly interesting was that he sort of saw knowledge and power as the same thing. He does talk more about power than he does knowledge, but when does in the context of the power to explore the universe. "I cared nothing for the Horde or its petty politics. I cared nothing for this world over which we had complete dominion. I cared only for the chance to fathom the mysteries of Great Dark Beyond." While he is fascinated by power in general, the majority of the power he attains is only a means to an end, and that end is for a kind of power that is synonymous with knowledge.

Not every game is about empathizing, even WC2 you never really empathized with the orcs, and in StarCraft you never really empethized with the Zerg, at least I never did. It was just a silly fantasy story, and you watch it unfold.

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This may be a point we simply disagree on, but the reason WarCraft 2 appealed to me so much we because I empathized with Gul'Dan. No, he doesn't matter that much in the game itself. But the reason I bought the game in the first place was because I was reading the manual at a friend's house, and I loved his memoir. As for the zerg, what I particularly liked was how they made an effort to make these giant slug things into actual characters that made sense in the context of their alien biology. And then Kerrigan enters the picture, and while I actually do think she becomes a little boring after her zerg-ifi-cation, she still had been the victim of a lot of stuff and I was willing to root for her as she strives to reclaim power that she feels should have been hers all along, except that the Confederacy and Mengsk took it from her.

Do you NEED protagonists in an RTS game? Well, technically no. But it works a lot better if you have them. Stories matter more when they happen to people you care about.

One thing that definitely is an issue is that I simply didn't enjoy the gameplay of WarCraft III as much as I hoped I would. This isn't so much the game's fault - my tastes just happened to be changing at the time. However, this was combined with the game taking some steps backward in terms of graphics - the unit portraits were nowhere near as good as they were in StarCraft and the mouth animations sucked, which further ruined the appeal of the characters. The end result was that I had to wade through hours of gameplay I didn't care much about, hoping it would pay off in a storyline that I ultimately would appreciate in some way, but it never did.

ScytheRexx said:

Then why the heck did they retcon half of WC3's backstory when WoW came out?!

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You may have to point out that "half" that was retconned, as I don't really see it. Yes, some of the events as they happened, changed a bit, but not to the extent you are claiming. Really, the only game that has been totally discarded was WC1, with WC2 being retconned slightly in certain areas, like the assassination of Lothar. Otherwise the game gave us our heroes, the majority of our villains, the creeps we fight, etc... Without it, WoW would not have worked as well as it did.

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In wc3 the Eredar corrupted Sargeras, not the other way around... and there was other stuff. But i guess some of it was in the expansions...

Raemon777 said:

This wasn't actually a claim that I made. I said WarCraft 3 was disappointing, and I said WarCraft 2 had a better backstory. I realize it may have been a bit confusing and I apologize for that. The point I tried to make in my second post was that I was expecting something at least as good as what had come before (which included StarCraft) and that WarCraft III was disappointing because of it.

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Fair enough. I personally thought WarCraft 3 was the much better game then WarCraft 2, both in storyline and gameplay, even though the storyline itself was not as good as StarCraft. I am a person that judges such things based on the series rather then the company, so I never really was dissapointed that WC3 was not as good as SC, because I was not thinking of it as SC2, I was thinking of it as WC3, and improvement, and a good one, over WC2.

While he is fascinated by power in general, the majority of the power he attains is only a means to an end, and that end is for a kind of power that is synonymous with knowledge.

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There are other ways one can learn about the cosmos, the Draenei themselves having been one of the best to teach him, and at the time before the corruption they were friendly with the orcs. If he really hated his people, he could have probably lived with the Draenei directly, but that would not have given him the power he craved. Fact is you got it backwards. The knowledge he gained was a means to an end, that end being the kind that is synonymous with power and control. This is why he fought his way to become the apprentice to Ner'zhul, because Ner'zhul was respected and held great power over the orcs, a power that Gul'dan wanted to take from Ner'zhul the minute he saw the chance.

This may be a point we simply disagree on, but the reason WarCraft 2 appealed to me so much we because I empathized with Gul'Dan. No, he doesn't matter that much in the game itself. But the reason I bought the game in the first place was because I was reading the manual at a friend's house, and I loved his memoir. As for the zerg, what I particularly liked was how they made an effort to make these giant slug things into actual characters that made sense in the context of their alien biology. And then Kerrigan enters the picture, and while I actually do think she becomes a little boring after her zerg-ifi-cation, she still had been the victim of a lot of stuff and I was willing to root for her as she strives to reclaim power that she feels should have been hers all along, except that the Confederacy and Mengsk took it from her.

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I could empathize with either of them if in the end they were doing something that can be considered "Good" for everyone, but Gul'Dan, as I explained above, was all about power and did whatever he could to take it. Kerrigan, on the other hand, could have been a great conflicted character if they actually showed her conflicting between her rebirth and her former humanity, but that didn't go past her reveal mission in which she lets Raynor go. After that, it's "Queen Bitch of the Universe" and you really can no longer empathize with her while people are being murdered and betrayed. Even the Overmind was easier to empathize with, since it was only doing what it's creators engineered it to do, Kerrigan just did it because she wanted control.

At the least this seems like it will change with Kerrigan in SC2.

However, this was combined with the game taking some steps backward in terms of graphics - the unit portraits were nowhere near as good as they were in StarCraft and the mouth animations sucked, which further ruined the appeal of the characters. The end result was that I had to wade through hours of gameplay I didn't care much about, hoping it would pay off in a storyline that I ultimately would appreciate in some way, but it never did.

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That is fair, even though I disagree with the graphic claims. Not every game is going to appeal to us. I personally think WC3 was a much better game then WC2, and was on par with SC even though it was a different style of gameplay. That is just my opinion on it though.

In wc3 the Eredar corrupted Sargeras, not the other way around... and there was other stuff. But i guess some of it was in the expansions...

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So one line in the backstory, that was never played off in WC3 anyways, is "half" the game? Seems a bit much of a claim, don't you agree? Metzen already apologized for that blunder, even though he didn't have to since such information absolutely zero to do with the relevant gameplay. I even suggested a way he could fix the blunder with a single sentence if he really wanted, but it's such irrelevant information that why even worry about it?

ScytheRexx said:

In wc3 the Eredar corrupted Sargeras, not the other way around... and there was other stuff. But i guess some of it was in the expansions...

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So one line in the backstory, that was never played off in WC3 anyways, is "half" the game? Seems a bit much of a claim, don't you agree? Metzen already apologized for that blunder, even though he didn't have to since such information absolutely zero to do with the relevant gameplay. I even suggested a way he could fix the blunder with a single sentence if he really wanted, but it's such irrelevant information that why even worry about it?

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I'm pretty sure i said "half the backstory"...


And what does WC3 gameplay even have to do with WoW gameplay?! And either of those with the story?!

Let's go back: you said the world they made in WC3 was a great starting point for WoW, to which i asked why then they changed stuff willy nilly (like how many Dreadlords are now no longer dead?! Or even Illidan for that matter).

Even the Overmind was easier to empathize with, since it was only doing what it's creators engineered it to do, Kerrigan just did it because she wanted control.

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I'm pretty sure they didn't create him to kill them...

Plus, Kerrigan lets Raynor live for no logical reason while still under the Overminds control, so there's still something there underneath all that "taking revenge on the universe for shitting on her all her life + zerg hormone induced levels of evil".

That is fair, even though I disagree with the graphic claims.

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2D graphics at the time of SC1 where further along then 3D was at the time of WC3... they did a pretty good job with what they had, but it's so stylized that it doesn't feel as well made.

There are other ways one can learn about the cosmos.

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Oh I'm not remotely trying to justify Gul'Dan's behavior. He's a douchebag. But you're still judging this in terms of more recent (and very retconned) content. Everything we knew about the Draenei at the time was what Gul'Dan told us about them, and they're treated as some weak race barely worth a mention. There is no mention that Gul'Dan actively corrupted the orcs, but rather that he just took advantage of their natural bloodlust. He states that the final destruction of the Draenei came after "centuries of violence," and the Shadow Council's original job was to prevent the orcs from destroying themselves.

In context, Gul'Dan appeared to be a (relatively) sane, rational person in a world of bloodthirsty warmongers. Was he evil? Of course. But as a nerdy kid in a world of jocks, he also was in some ways the closest POV character I had in WarCraft at the time, and I could totally understand where he was coming from.

The knowledge he gained was a means to an end, that end being the kind that is synonymous with power and control

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Really, I think you're still being influenced too much by more recent retcons. The original memoir makes it pretty clear that the power he ultimately wants had less to do with control over people and more to do with control over the universe itself. It definitely IS power he's after (he talks about it a lot) and he is fascinated enough by it in all its forms to enjoy manipulating the horde, but ultimately everything he does to the Horde, he does to reach the Tomb of Sargeras, with the intent to become a god. While I am pretty sure he would also have used his godlike power to openly subjugate the orcs (as a sort of petty payback for forcing him to work in secrecy), his original motivations were, as mentioned earlier, to "fathom the mysteries of the Great Dark" and to "stand unscathed within the dying hearts of burning suns."

Those motivations are things I totally get, even if I wouldn't be willing to, you know, launch a genocidal war in order to attain them. But the fact is that I ALSO really get his overall obsession with power too, in a purely academic, nerdy way. I would use it to help the world rather than harm it, but I am fascinated by the dynamics of how people's beliefs change and how those beliefs impact their actions. I love subverting things, manipulating something that was supposed to be for one purpose and turning into something else, and it's all the more fun if you can do it without people noticing. (I usually fail at the last part simply because I like having an audience, so I end up telling people what I'm doing before I actually finish doing it). My favorite characters (both heroes and villains, although it usually ends up being villains) are the manipulative masterminds. And if I had grown up in a world of bloodthirsty murderers (which is what we were led to believe the Horde was at the time) I'm not sure I'd have had much a conscience to encourage me to invoke said interest for the greater good.

Kerrigan, on the other hand, could have been a great conflicted character if they actually showed her conflicting between her rebirth and her former humanity, but that didn't go past her reveal mission in which she lets Raynor go. After that, it's "Queen Bitch of the Universe" and you really can no longer empathize with her while people are being murdered and betrayed. Even the Overmind was easier to empathize with, since it was only doing what it's creators engineered it to do, Kerrigan just did it because she wanted control.

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I actually do agree with this. I was a little disappointed when she immediately said "I'm a zerg now, and I like what I am. Deal with it" within minutes of getting reborn. I cut her some slack because she HAD just been betrayed for the second time by humans, and Jim was pretty much the only human she had reason to care about (and she lets him go). But she gets progressively more boring and one-note-megalomaniacal as the game progresses. By contrast, I did appreciate that the Overmind felt it had a sacred mission to become perfect, and assimilating the Protoss was the way to do it. I'm hoping (but not optimistic) that in Heart of the Swarm we get some more good Zerg characters.

2D graphics at the time of SC1 where further along then 3D was at the time of WC3... they did a pretty good job with what they had, but it's so stylized that it doesn't feel as well made.

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This, although it's really not an issue of being "stylized." Just bad. A cartoon can be stylized and still be smooth and beautiful. The WarCraft III portraits were just clunky and ugly. Even worse, the graphics settings for the portraits were the same as for the rest of the game, so if your computer couldn't handle higher res graphics for massive armies, you had to deal with REALLY crappy portraits.

At the least this seems like it will change with Kerrigan in SC2.

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Is there a particular source you have for this? I'm interested if we had any info on that.

I could give two figs what Ebert thinks. He'll be dead soon enough, and soon enough the only people left alive will be those who grew up with games as an art medium.

Frank said:

Ugh, Warcraft's hackneyed, cobbled together story is hardly an argument of video games as art.

I could staple H.P. Lovecraft to Warhammer (both 40K and original) codex's together and come out with similar stories.

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yeah, referring to warcraft's story as art only goes to reinforce arguments that gamers have no idea what art is. Not that the story isn't good, but its kind of like Disney, they take every archetype they can get their hands on and slap them together with as much duct tape and bubble gum as they can. It ends up being the crack cocaine version of the Fantasy Genre, but that's not what art is. Story simply is not where you are going to find art in a game, with rare exceptions like Portal or Super Columbine Massacre RPG!. For the most part video game stories are on the same level as expanded universe novels. Not to say I don't like them, the Horus Heresy series is awesome, but comparing it to Confederacy of Dunces, The Good Earth or....well any literature, is just putting on a giant "I read at a 4th grade level" sign, which sadly I think more gamers wear than they are willing to appreciate.

Now, there's nothing wrong with those stories. They're fun, and have a relatively low level of difficulty. I mean, Altered Carbon is a kick ass book. And I mean KICK ASS! But its not literature, its not art, just like 300 (with the exception of cinematography) or Taken or all the millions of other media out there that are exceptionally entertaining but fail to challenge the audience or become more than the sum of its parts.

Not to say I don't like them, the Horus Heresy series is awesome, but comparing it to Confederacy of Dunces, The Good Earth or....well any literature, is just putting on a giant "I read at a 4th grade level" sign, which sadly I think more gamers wear than they are willing to appreciate.

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I haven't read the whole Horus Heresy, but the first one (by Dan Abnett) I thought was very good. In particular the way it simultaneously accomplishes and subverts the Jesus story. At first I was expecting it to humanize Horus, and it ends up doing the opposite, which in the end I found rather refreshing. It showcases him as an epic, largely than life figure, that other humans could only barely relate to. When he cries out "My Emperor, why have you abandoned me!?" towards the end I was particularly moved and blurted "woah" out loud (I was frustratingly on a plane next to a pair of orthodox Jews and I wasn't sure if they were the greatest people to start discussing Christ Figure allegories with). I found it all the more poignant because on one hand it's showcasing a very Jesus moment , yet you also know Horus ends up being the anti-christ of his universe.

I really like how Dan Abnett creates a world where morality is completely different than it is in ours, so at the end, when the characters reflect on the lessons they have learned, it doesn't feel like "And this, kids, was the moral of the story!" Instead you have to think for yourself about what happened and whether the characters are reliable narrators or not and whether the ways they changed was for good or for ill. I think a Christian, an atheist and a Jew reading through Horus Rising would each get something different out of it, but each interpretation is would be equally valid.

In general I find Expanded Universe fiction fairly bad, because it is mostly written by bad authors, but Dan Abnett, Jeff Grubb and Matthew Stover manage to write novels that make whatever universe they're shilling out for way more deep than it has any right to be.

@Li3n said:

I'm pretty sure i said "half the backstory"...

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And that would still be incorrect.

And what does WC3 gameplay even have to do with WoW gameplay?! And either of those with the story?!

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What I mean is the only story points that matter are those we play. Backstory is just that, backstory, you never experience it, so it can be altered and changed as Blizzard sees fit to better mesh with the real meat of the story, the playable space.

Let's go back: you said the world they made in WC3 was a great starting point for WoW, to which i asked why then they changed stuff willy nilly (like how many Dreadlords are now no longer dead?! Or even Illidan for that matter).

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The Dreadlords are a bad example, since we have known for a long time that demons are not easy to kill and keep dead. The Dreadlords are even more difficult, they are the ones that created "Necromancy" in the first place. Illidan was never a retcon, and I guess you never actually paid attention to the mission to realize that. Arthas says during the mission, and you can check out the sound files under the World Editor if you don't believe me, "You are a pitiful creature Illidan, you don't even deserve death. I banish you from this world, and know this, that if you return, I will be waiting." He never killed Illidan, only wounded him, and left him to be dragged off back to Outland.

I'm pretty sure they didn't create him to kill them...

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Information we learn in SC2 actually hints that they did. I won't spoil it though.

As for Raemon777, I admit I am probably always going to be blinded now from what I know of Gul'dan. It will be hard for me to read that paragraph and not see a hungry power mad person, and not just a guy looking for knowledge and using dark methods to do it. So I will end the discussion on our favorite old warlock.

This, although it's really not an issue of being "stylized." Just bad. A cartoon can be stylized and still be smooth and beautiful. The WarCraft III portraits were just clunky and ugly. Even worse, the graphics settings for the portraits were the same as for the rest of the game, so if your computer couldn't handle higher res graphics for massive armies, you had to deal with REALLY crappy portraits.

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I can understand not liking the portraits, but do you really think they would work with SC style portraits? I would rather have what we had then the clash of styles caused by that. I may disagree about the graphics being "bad" but I do agree they were not exactly technically superior to most games out at the time. I never really cared for that as long as I felt the style and art were cohesive. I think WC3 did a fine job with that.

Is there a particular source you have for this? I'm interested if we had any info on that.

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You sure you want to be spoiled? Let's just say an old Dark Templar friend of ours has learned that the Queen of Blades will be integral to the salvation of the galaxy. Whether that means she will be have a turn of face, or simply will unknowingly cause the downfall of the Xel'Naga and herself, will remain to be seen.

This thread has convinced me: video games can never be art.

I guess I'd rather not be spoiled. Is it something from the opening cinematic or is it from over halfway through the game?

I can understand not liking the portraits, but do you really think they would work with SC style portraits?

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I'd have much preferred something with the quality of StarCraft portraits, but not the style. I can't find any good examples right now, but Blizzard has a lot of artwork out there that looks very smooth and polished while still fitting the WarCraft style.

This thread has convinced me: video games can never be art.

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And how was that?

I'd have much preferred something with the quality of StarCraft portraits, but not the style. I can't find any good examples right now, but Blizzard has a lot of artwork out there that looks very smooth and polished while still fitting the WarCraft style.

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Well, I am not one to argue that something can't be BETTER, I know the portraits could always have been better, I just disagree that the quality was so bad they needed to be better. I think they worked out fine, and I don't think my opinion will change on that. I do think SC2 has some of the best portraits I have seen, and even notice with the terran that the lips sync up pretty well when they talk.

Raemon777 said:

I guess I'd rather not be spoiled. Is it something from the opening cinematic or is it from over halfway through the game?

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It is a scene you probably saw back when the Single Player was being shown off over a year ago, but we now know it's place in the game timeline, and a much longer more detailed version of it that has a crucial revelation of future events. It is actually the scene that activates protoss missions that you will get to play during the campaign, which will be in the form of memories.

I feel I have taken part in a rather large derailment of this thread, so I am going to stop speaking about other items. I will post the video in the SC2 Beta thread, if you wish to see it.

I think the thread has accomplished it's original goal, and as thread creator I now give official license for it to be derailed as the conversation deems fit. (That said, StarCraft II discussion can certainly go in the StarCraft II thread).

I do think SC2 has some of the best portraits I have seen, and even notice with the terran that the lips sync up pretty well when they talk.

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I guess I haven't played enough RTSs to know how well it usually works, but I figured if StarCraft came out something like 5 years prior to WarCraft III, the quality of the portraits there should have been pretty commonplace in RTS games by that point. The fact that the lip syncing in War3 was so bad was really distracting for me, and just don't get why it was such a step backwards. If the script in general hadn't been bad too I would have cut them some more slack, but as it was, it was just an overall bad experience.

Raemon777 said:

I guess I haven't played enough RTSs to know how well it usually works, but I figured if StarCraft came out something like 5 years prior to WarCraft III, the quality of the portraits there should have been pretty commonplace in RTS games by that point. The fact that the lip syncing in War3 was so bad was really distracting for me, and just don't get why it was such a step backwards.

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Be aware that SC2 is the first game they even have lip syncing. The old SC portraits were just either static or bobbing their lips, just like WC3. The only difference is that SC used pre-rendered shots that cycled, while WC3 used portraits rendered in the game engine, and had more animation cycles. Neither looked like the person talking was actually saying the words that you heard.

I do realize that, but somehow in StarCraft it actually manages to look plausible, whereas WarCraft III looked totally random. I think it had a lot to do with Warcraft 3 having much simpler faces that didn't properly open and close their mouths.

I do realize that, but somehow in StarCraft it actually manages to look plausible, whereas WarCraft III looked totally random. I think it had a lot to do with Warcraft 3 having much simpler faces that didn't properly open and close their mouths.

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Ah, so this is about "plausibility"? That makes this a whole other discussion. Portraits in SC2 were designed to be basically the unit in question looking through a view screen. It made sense as the commander that you would be in communication with the units you are commanding, and that all communication would be pushed through that medium. In that regard, the idea behind portraits themselves become more plausible, but in WarCraft 3 there was no reason for the units head to pop in a little box and start gumming at you, they just put it in for familiarity. If would look awkward if they seemed like they were in some sort of viewfinder.

As for them having "simpler faces" that didn't open and close their mouths, did we play the same game? The WarCraft 3 portraits were known for being overly expressive, to almost a comic level. Here is Jimmy doing all of his animations sets. Notice how static is mostly feels, barely showing an expression during the talk cycle.



If this was WC3, like the Arch-Mage, he would be screaming around when he talks and doing head twirls. I would post a GIF, but sadly I can't find one in motion on the net.

Okay, went and found a WarCraft III video and looked up some old starcraft ones for reference





I see some strengths and weaknesses of both of them. You're right that in many ways the WarCraft ones are more expressive. I think the main difference is that WarCraft 3 tended to err on the side of having the characters move their mouths more, rather than less, and StarCraft did the opposite. This resulted in StarCraft characters looking like they were mumbling when the sync was off, whereas WarCraft characters looked like they were just completely out of sync. I can see why they made the choice they did, although a lot of characters open their mouths WAY too wide. (This is something that ONLY works if you are doing an actual lip sync).

I'm still annoyed with the overall low quality of the portaits. In some cases it was only a slight step down if you were playing on max settings (which I was unable to do), but certain key characters (Medivh in particular) had really atrocious faces.



Jaina's actually wasn't bad, looking at that clip, but Medivh... shudder.

ScytheRexx;376587][QUOTE=@Li3n said:

I'm pretty sure i said "half the backstory"...

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And that would still be incorrect.[/QUOTE]

Sure, if you stick to exactly 50% maybe it doesn;'t get there, but they did change a lot...

And what does WC3 gameplay even have to do with WoW gameplay?! And either of those with the story?!

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What I mean is the only story points that matter are those we play. Backstory is just that, backstory, you never experience it, so it can be altered and changed as Blizzard sees fit to better mesh with the real meat of the story, the playable space.

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Which justifies anything... hey, look, the Eredar are now Night Elves that took too much LSD and started a cult based on this Sargeras guy that was actually the nether-pizza delivery guy...

Let's go back: you said the world they made in WC3 was a great starting point for WoW, to which i asked why then they changed stuff willy nilly (like how many Dreadlords are now no longer dead?! Or even Illidan for that matter).

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The Dreadlords are a bad example, since we have known for a long time that demons are not easy to kill and keep dead. The Dreadlords are even more difficult, they are the ones that created "Necromancy" in the first place. Illidan was never a retcon, and I guess you never actually paid attention to the mission to realize that. Arthas says during the mission, and you can check out the sound files under the World Editor if you don't believe me, "You are a pitiful creature Illidan, you don't even deserve death. I banish you from this world, and know this, that if you return, I will be waiting." He never killed Illidan, only wounded him, and left him to be dragged off back to Outland.

I'm pretty sure they didn't create him to kill them...

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Information we learn in SC2 actually hints that they did. I won't spoil it though.

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Yeah, another retcon...

Is there a particular source you have for this? I'm interested if we had any info on that.

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You sure you want to be spoiled? Let's just say an old Dark Templar friend of ours has learned that the Queen of Blades will be integral to the salvation of the galaxy. Whether that means she will be have a turn of face, or simply will unknowingly cause the downfall of the Xel'Naga and herself, will remain to be seen.

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[/QUOTE]

It's not really a spoiler if the vid is on gametrailers... but where else where they gonna go with Duran anyway... (and imo it's gonna be more of a type of thing, which is what they did with the Lich King too... )

This, although it's really not an issue of being "stylized." Just bad. A cartoon can be stylized and still be smooth and beautiful. The WarCraft III portraits were just clunky and ugly. Even worse, the graphics settings for the portraits were the same as for the rest of the game, so if your computer couldn't handle higher res graphics for massive armies, you had to deal with REALLY crappy portraits.

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Not with that graphic engine they weren't going to be...

Not with that graphic engine they weren't going to be...

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I'm not sure I follow. (This sounds like it is supposed to be a glib retort to one particular sentence, but I can't figure out which sentence.)

http://gamevideos.1up.com/video/id/29092

I thought this was a funny take on the argument.

I need to catch up on this thread though. I don't know if this was brought up.

@Li3n said:

Sure, if you stick to exactly 50% maybe it doesn;'t get there, but they did change a lot...

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They have changed story points, like Garona for instance, thought "a lot" would be up to interpretation. You have only pointed out one, and it was a rather frivolous change. If you wish to exaggerate to try and make a point, at least have more proof to back up that exaggeration. My point still stands that WC3 was great in it's purpose, a way to flesh out Azeroth and get it ready for WoW. Do you argue that it didn't serve that purpose?

Which justifies anything... hey, look, the Eredar are now Night Elves that took too much LSD and started a cult based on this Sargeras guy that was actually the nether-pizza delivery guy...

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I notice you like to work in extremes. There is such a thing as moderation. It is one thing to change the origin of Garona to be that of a half-draenei, it is another to say she is the drug addicted cousin of Preisdent Obama sent back from the future to stop the Necrons from absorbing the Eye of Zeus. If you can't see that, then I don't really know what to tell you.

Yeah, another retcon...

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Another example of a retcon that will prove to improve the story at the loss of outdated, and rather poorly written back story, going back to the fact that all that matters is the gamespace, not the stuff written in a little manual.

but where else where they gonna go with Duran anyway... (and imo it's gonna be more of a

Spoiler

"kill her and the swarm will join Duran&co"

type of thing, which is what they did with the Lich King too... )

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I see you have not read any of the novels. I do agree with the theory that her being in charge of the swarm will be part of the salvation, but I think it will play out a lot different then the whole Lich King storyline. It will be interesting to see what they do with Duran, but he is not being promoted as the new threat. The Xel'Naga are, and the creatures created by Duran are an abomination to the Xel'Naga design. I will explain why in a spoiler tag.

I don't know who the fuck Duran is anymore. IT DID NOT MOVE ME!

Steven Soderburgin said:

This thread has convinced me: video games can never be art.

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I think I am convinced that a game's Story can't be art, but I still think design can. Even with games like Portal and Super Columbine its not the story that's art, its the whole package.

I think some games' stories can be art, but just because a game has a story does not mean it is art. There are some games with amazing stories, and then there are games with stories lacking effort that happen to have some memorable moments--but even those may be based on what you're doing gameplay-wise, such as an epic boss fight.

Then there are games that should've just been anime instead of games, like Metal Gear Solid IV and Xenosaga.

I think Portal is art insofar as I believe almost all creations are art. Very good art, in that respect (this applies to the story as well as the gameplay). For the most part I would NOT say that the story itself is is "High Ar"t (i.e. art that is actually poignant), EXCEPT for the "companion cube" level. The fact that they get you to interact with a cube that you know for a fact is just a cube (the game does not even pretend otherwise) and yet it STILL produces a moment of trepidation when you must throw it into the incernator... I think that very much warrants an High Art label, both in story as well as game mechanics (in fact the entire level is a pretty perfect example of story and game mechanics coming together).

The rest of it is certainly good, and perhaps mind expanding, but I would understand those who didn't feel it was particularly valuable.

Raemon777 said:

I think Portal is art insofar as I believe almost all creations are art. Very good art, in that respect (this applies to the story as well as the gameplay). For the most part I would NOT say that the story itself is is "High Ar"t (i.e. art that is actually poignant), EXCEPT for the "companion cube" level. The fact that they get you to interact with a cube that you know for a fact is just a cube (the game does not even pretend otherwise) and yet it STILL produces a moment of trepidation when you must throw it into the incernator... I think that very much warrants an High Art label, both in story as well as game mechanics (in fact the entire level is a pretty perfect example of story and game mechanics coming together).

The rest of it is certainly good, and perhaps mind expanding, but I would understand those who didn't feel it was particularly valuable.

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I had much more of a reaction to GLaDOS than I did to the companion cube. When it came time to part with that box with hearts on it, I only hesitated because I wasn't sure what the game wanted me to do. I, however, hated GLaDOS. I was sick of that lying manipulative machine. Sick of the faked compassion, sick of the lies, sick of that damn voice trying to act human. Listening to "Still Alive" over the ending credits made my stomach churn. It took me a while to be able to like that song, because GLaDOS was the one singing it. Not many other games have managed to get me to actually react to the villain on an emotional level, most movies don't even do that.

ScytheRexx said:

They have changed story points, like Garona for instance, thought "a lot" would be up to interpretation. You have only pointed out one, and it was a rather frivolous change. If you wish to exaggerate to try and make a point, at least have more proof to back up that exaggeration.

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That's the one i remembered best... because how pointless it is (the Draenei splitting off before Sargeras would have been the same thing).

But hey, how about Muradin Bronzebeard... last i heard he was alive now. And remember, just because a retcon is done well it doesn't mean it's not a retcon anymore...

As for exagerations, sure, i might not bother to be 100% accurate with the minutia, but imo the actual points stand anyway. They changed the story with little regard to what came before, so "WC3 as great setup" is something even they don't think it is.

My point still stands that WC3 was great in it's purpose, a way to flesh out Azeroth and get it ready for WoW. Do you argue that it didn't serve that purpose?

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First of all, that's a BS purpose for a game, which amounts to marketing instead of making a game that stands on it's own.

Second, i'm arguing that they didn't do that, once WoW got started they just modified whatever suited them because WC3's story didn't start off with WoW in mind.

I notice you like to work in extremes. There is such a thing as moderation. It is one thing to change the origin of Garona to be that of a half-draenei, it is another to say she is the drug addicted cousin of Preisdent Obama sent back from the future to stop the Necrons from absorbing the Eye of Zeus. If you can't see that, then I don't really know what to tell you.

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But they're both justifiable by they way of thinking you where talking about, the only difference being what you like or don't like.

Another example of a retcon that will prove to improve the story at the loss of outdated, and rather poorly written back story, going back to the fact that all that matters is the gamespace, not the stuff written in a little manual.

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Then why even bother with the manual... or any backstory at all... look, demons trying to take over... why? just because.

I see you have not read any of the novels. I do agree with the theory that her being in charge of the swarm will be part of the salvation, but I think it will play out a lot different then the whole Lich King storyline. It will be interesting to see what they do with Duran, but he is not being promoted as the new threat. The Xel'Naga are, and the creatures created by Duran are an abomination to the Xel'Naga design. I will explain why in a spoiler tag.

Spoiler

The protoss and the zerg are part of the Xel'Naga lifecycle. When they are getting ready to die, they create two races, one of purity of form, and another with purity of essence, that are designed to mature and over time assimilate, allowing the Xel'Naga to be reborn inside the newly evolved shells, a strange form of reincarnation that is as natural to them as breathing. This is supposed to happen naturally between the two seed races, but Duran is forcing the merger, which is causing abberations to be born and breaking the rebirth cycle, and thus an enemy to the Xel'Naga.

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Dude, that's just backstory, has no worth. All that matters is what happens in the gamespace. :laugh:

Seriously, this is Blizzard we're talking about, they'll find a way to make it mirror another story they did, one way or the other.

Raemon777 said:

Not with that graphic engine they weren't going to be...

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I'm not sure I follow. (This sounds like it is supposed to be a glib retort to one particular sentence, but I can't figure out which sentence.)

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Not really, it was about most of your post, they had to make do with that graphic engine so they stylized the game to make it last longer, but the portraits ended up being weird looking as a close-up isn't the same as the top-down view.

---------- Post added at 06:29 AM ---------- Previous post was at 06:22 AM ----------

Damn, i knew i missed this last night:

The Dreadlords are a bad example, since we have known for a long time that demons are not easy to kill and keep dead. The Dreadlords are even more difficult, they are the ones that created "Necromancy" in the first place. Illidan was never a retcon, and I guess you never actually paid attention to the mission to realize that. Arthas says during the mission, and you can check out the sound files under the World Editor if you don't believe me, "You are a pitiful creature Illidan, you don't even deserve death. I banish you from this world, and know this, that if you return, I will be waiting." He never killed Illidan, only wounded him, and left him to be dragged off back to Outland.

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Dude, the Dreadlords being hard to kill is still a retcon, probably because Mal'Ganis is too cool a name to let it go to waste...

As for Illidan, are you sure that they included that line from the start, as they did add more stuff to FT in patches... i for one don't remember it from my playthrough.

I will humor you one more time Li3n, but this will be the last time I reply to these posts. I think you are reaching, and I would like you to stick to the real reason you are angry, the dislike of retcons, rather then trying to make it out like WC3 didn't serve it's purpose.

Blizzard already confirmed a long time ago that WC3 and WoW development started at the same time, and WC3, as much as you might disagree or argue "but they must not like it because of this one sentence retcon in a 7 page backstory!", it will not make it any less true.

As for exagerations, sure, i might not bother to be 100% accurate with the minutia, but imo the actual points stand anyway. They changed the story with little regard to what came before, so "WC3 as great setup" is something even they don't think it is.

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So I guess WC2 was not a good setup to WC3, and WC1 was not a good setup to WC2? Retcons happened between the three RTS games that affected way more then the Draenei/Eredar blunder or the fact a dwarf we never saw "die" is suddenly alive.

Once again, you work in extremes, and thus you weaken whatever point you try to make. Argue that retcons are bad, people will agree with you because even I would rather not see retcons. However, I do think retcons can occur should they be done about story points that are either in the background, cryptic anyways, or just plain suck.

Second, i'm arguing that they didn't do that, once WoW got started they just modified whatever suited them because WC3's story didn't start off with WoW in mind.

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Like I said at the beginning of this, they did. Blizzard already admitted they started WC3 and WoW around the same time. One was being specifically designed to lead into the other. Whether you agree with that is irrelevant, as it is fact.

But they're both justifiable by they way of thinking you where talking about, the only difference being what you like or don't like.

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Sorry, but it is not so black and white. Nice try though.

Then why even bother with the manual... or any backstory at all... look, demons trying to take over... why? just because.

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Because some of us appreciate getting an idea of what came before, whether to catch up with information or simply to get a better idea of the story we are about to see. However, that does not mean a sentence or two in that long winded backstory can't change. If retcons never happened since WC1, the humans would be worshiping God right now, and that would be rather boring.

Seriously, this is Blizzard we're talking about, they'll find a way to make it mirror another story they did, one way or the other.

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Ah so this really is your real issue, you can come out and say the story itself it not original, that is fine since it isn't. It would suit you better then arguing that rather then whatever you are arguing now, since you obviously are arguing it for the sake of arguing.

As for Illidan, are you sure that they included that line from the start, as they did add more stuff to FT in patches... i for one don't remember it from my playthrough.

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Go to World Builder, look up the sound files for the final mission, listen. Those sound files were there since I beat The Frozen Throne years ago, and caused much discussion over his fate. We came to the conclusion that he was alive, and that conclusion was confirmed in the RPG that came out not longer after, and was further cemented in WoW when it mentioned him being alive before Burning Crusade was even a twinkle in the distance.

We really should simplify this:

Your original statement that it good enough as a set-up was unfair to WC3, as if to say that if it wasn't for WoW it wouldn't be worth anything and that it's only purpose was to set up WoW. And even if it was they didn't consider it good enough not to change... so your argument is about as good as me saying they changed half the stuff (when it probalby less).



And not to leave stuff hanging: