Khuutra said:
Forgive my intrusion. Shigesato Itoi is an accomplished novelist who is also the creative force behind the Mother series. He is an excellent writer whose primary storytelling tool lies in the building of theme rather than straight-up characterization, though this is more apparent in Mother 2 (EarthBound) than it is Mother 3. I would put his works up against anything that I've come across in my studies as a literature student. Mr. Itoi's work benefits not only from the quality of his writing but his understanding of video games as a unique medium that communicate themselves very differently than do more passive entertainment forms like cinema. Another writer and designer in games who I consider essentially peerless is Chris Avellone, who was the designer and primary writer for Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords, which outside of perhaps Itoi's work has the best writing in the history of the medium. The world he creates, the characters that he brings forth, are peerless - Kreia, in particular, is probably the single greatest video game character ever written, bar none. I would argue that Mr. Fumito Ueda should also stand here, but you seem to be aware of his works, so I will simply reiterate that he understands that the power of gaming's ability to communicate a narrative has almost nothing to do with telling you a story. I know that convincing you as to the (rarely and preciously) realized potential of the medium is unrealistic, but might we not at least agree that the criteria of what defines a game as art is very different from the criteria we use for literature, and even more different from cinema? |
Not at all. I know their work and do appreciate it. Rather ironically I'm actually behind some (I mean it would be terrible if they all did) videogames moving much further into Art.
But while I would defend Ueda, for example, I am also painfully aware of the limitations of what he's achieved so far versus the highest standards of literature. Shigesato Itoi I would probably be biased towards simply because of his input (voice work if I remember correctly) into My Neighbour Totoro - a gem of a film and in some ways a great example of the heights videogames have yet to approach IMHO.
Art is Art, I don't think the criteria differs so much as elements to understand of the medium - i.e. prose in literature, cinematography in film, etc.
I'm just annoyed that Twestern came out huffing and puffing that there's no reason to doubt videogames abilities in this area when, sadly, on the evidence there is every reason to doubt there ability.
The potential is there, but its almost entirely unrealised at this point, and its just plain silly to argue otherwise.
Many videogames, probably correctly, seek nothing but to entertain as a game, a smaller percentage look a little beyond that, but only in the most faltering way. A tiny few shine brightly vs their peers. But they represt the first baby steps.
Hell, I'd argue that the best films still lag miles behind the best literature - which might be expected given how long we've had written literature vs films. Videogames are so recent they're in many ways still where cinema was when it was about amazing people just with what it was, not what you could potentially do with it.
Try to be reasonable... its easier than you think...
