| steven787 said: but don't help a more mature and sophisticated direction for the art of storytelling through games. |
And that's where there's a disconnect for me and games being an artistic medium. Storytelling "through" a game, as opposed to use gameplay as the means of provoking emotional. I brought this up in another thread, even games that I feel have a (relatively) decent story still often feel like a different experience then how you play the game. Cutscenes and such might have some potential for emotional arc, but the gameplay is always intended to just be fun. And deeply moving things typically aren't fun.
I brought this up in the BioShock demo, I liked the city and the chance to explore it, untill I got to fight something.
There's nothing wrong with it's combat system persay, it's that it feels completey different than when i was taking in the details. It's fast and fun, as opposed to eerie and haunting. I'm shooting lighting from fingertips to electricute people who dove into water after setting them on fire just like Roy Mustang. The entire plasmid thing just seemed added to to engross the "core" gamer demographic with "Look, it's not all looking around, you also get cool powers and can kill people in all kinds of crazy fun ways!". I find it an admission from the developers that they felt the game's cinematic aspects were not enough to sell it in the numbers they wanted, and needed a hook. And you get a game that's "Deep and disturbing" and "fun and cool" which to me just clashes with on or another.
Until a game devolper has the bravery to intentionally make thier game something other than fun, you won't see many outside the gaming demographic who respect gaming as an art medium, and deserably so in my opinion. Eternal Darkness did do such a thing in a minor way. The bulk of the gameplay was traditonal puzzle solving and monster fighting, but the insanity effects were there to confuse and disorient you. Telling you your controller is unplugged, or that your game was being deleted, or trying to trick you into thinking your TV's video mode changed. They weren't intended to be fun, they were meant to annoy and possibly upset as part of the game's themes of sanity and reality. However these things only happen when your Sanity bar is low, so in that sense, it's a traditional gameplay mechanic. Merely a side effect of one of your health bars getting low. Now if these had been constant through-out the game in an attempt to drive a player over the edge, that would be interesting. I don't think this would meet my abstract concept of artistic gaming, but it might be another step there.
That's all just me though, and for the record, there's absolutely nothing wrong with games being made so you have fun, just like there's nothing wrong with watching a fun movie. I'm just trying to highlight my difference in belief about a game that could be considered artistic, and a fun game with decent storytelling aspects.
EDIT: I decided to actually just read the spoilers from Games Radar (I won't spoil anything so don't worry) but I have to say this just seems to echo's Bod's sentiment of games set in the sci-fi and fantasy realms and how it is a poor setting for serious artistic expression. A couple of the plot twists I actually mostly called in playing the demo, but I won't say anything else.
