As a series the Matrix was quite deep in its philosophy. It certainly wasn't anywhere near the greatest movie ever but it can hardly be thrown out there as just another action movie. It was a lot deeper than a lot of movies.

Yeah those movies are great, they sold a lot bcuz they where good, maybe I would call them art, I can make a parallel with games here, those movies are like games like FF and MGS, they are blockbusters, but they are that becausse they are really good, good story, good music, etc..., saying this, I think blockbusters are not only games like Halo, GTA4, etc... there are some that are really good in the artistic way.

But its still a shame that games like Okami and Shadow of the Colossus, whinch In my opinnion are better than GTA at least in depth and artistic direction, dont sell like other games, that being bad, sell millions.

Blockbusters don't become blockbusters by innovating, the become blockbusters by giving people what they want, which is usually something they've already played. Iron Man the movie isn't innovative, it's a very safe and predictable super hero movie. Gears of war didn't innovate anything. It just did what had been done very well.

Blockbusters become blockbusters by taking something that was once innovative and repackaging it over and over again. The original Metal Gear on MSX, and eventually NES was something very innovative. During a time when everything was about blasting the crap out of everything that moves, Kojima envisioned a game where shooting everything leads to your certain doom. Patience, and a steady hand led to victory rather than quick reflexes and an itchy trigger finger. It was very different for it's time. Metal Gear Solid made it popular for a new generation, and added a level of cinematics not previously seen. It was a blockbuster building on it's own previous innovation. MGS4 is a huge budget blockbuster that promises more of the same. A nice safe predictable stealth game that re-uses what already has been proven to work. Though I wouldn't call MGS trite, it does try to be more artistic than most, but it's still a nice safe bet of a game.

Games like Halo, and the more recent Zelda's aren't big because they innovative, they are big because they do exactly what's been done before but bigger. Now Zelda certainly innovated in the past, on more than one occasion, but "Twilight Princess" just took what people liked and made it into a nice safe predictable package, that was highly polished and fun. That's the blockbuster way.

Now heres a question, was SMG a traditional blockbuster?

It was made on a largish budget (for a Wii game), in a similar style to previous Mario games but with some extremely significant innovations.

Also I should throw in that blockbuster and art aren't mutually exclusive, but they are usually at a conflict. A movie like "American Beauty" can do well commercially and still be loved by critics. However in investing millions of dollars the desire to play it safe and give people what they want becomes the overwhelming drive. And playing it safe stifles innovation. Shadow of the Colossus wasn't a budget title, but it was still artistic (though did poor commercially).

The problem here is that ine games industry misinterpreted the concept of "art" in videogames.

 As the technical specs were improving on each generation we were witnesses of improvements on graphics and sounds for all games. But this turned out to be the origin of the confusion of what a game should have to be considered as art. Thanks to the "Movie Model" of game business that has been running till now, a game that is graphically impressive, with an awesome orchestrated soundtrack, an a storyline that would make <<post favorite writter here>> get jealous, is "artistic" and what does not meet this criteria is Common Rushed Abnormal Piece (CRAP). It is understandable cause the media is a bunch of idiots that are incompetent to analyze a game completely. They don't understand why games that are not blockbuster are getting so popular no matter the time and some that are blockbusters are being forgotten by time.

Before a Sony or Microsoft fanboy attack me, I don't mean that games on PS3 and Xbox360 are not artistic, because there are examples of true art in some of them (I won't tell which games). What I'm sayin is that gamers have been deceived from what art is.

 From Wikipedia

 If we can apply that to gaming, what does a game need to have in order to be considered art?

 In my opinion it's related to two things: skill, passion and freedom

 skill is not related to how vissually impressive a 2D/3D model is or how great it sounds on 5.1/7.1 surround or how well written is a story. No, skill is the ability to surpass obstacles or limitations in order to achieve the desired goal, and in order to surpass these obstacles, you need to be creative. When a game developer trully understands their limitations in what games can they make, they can work around them in order to deliver the experience to the player. you find more creativity in independent developers because they can't make a game like the "Big Companies" so rather than emulating them, they work in what they can do best. This is why many independent games show more skill of the developers than some big budget blockbusters. you see how they were able to get through their limitations in money and technology.

Passion can't be explained, but what can be said about it is that how much effort and dedication you see from the developerd in order to make the game that they see it's their masterpiece. When you play these games, you can feel that passion from the developer (not the emos from the games characters, that's not what I'm talking about) and the emotions that they want you to feel. When you play a game like Defend your Castle or Gormetry Wars, you can feel something that many big budget games don't have... is the passion. Many games are made in order to obtain money, not to deliver the experience to the gamer. I think of Miyamoto (Nintendo), Kojima(Metal Gear), Inafune(Mega Man, Lost Planet), Suda 51(K7, NMH), Mikami (Resident Evil) and IGA (Castlevania) to be developers with a lot of passion, and there are more (I can't remember all the names you know ). Because in their games you can see it and feel it while you play, that passion to make a game.

Freedom is not about specs (the common belief that more powerful specs is more freedom is BS), is not about budget. Freedom is the free of pressures when they develop the game. When you have no time limit and no limits in what your boss or publisher tell you what the game "should" have. The possibilities are endless. Megaman 2 is more remembered because Inafune and developers had total freedom making it, and in result is the best Megaman ever created (Inafune-san admits it).

 Combine all three and you have a game that is art, it could be a blockbuster or independent, big or low in budget. Super poligons or Flash animations

Very well said bloodwalker, and I agree with most of what you said.

Though I don't think skill and creativity are essentially the act of overcoming inherent limitations, though they are necessary to do so. I believe skill and creativity come from being able to fully realize your vision, which may require overcoming some limitation. But being freed from limitation I don't think stifles creativity. I do think how good a model looks is based on skill, but how the model looks is also based on vision and creativity. It doesn't have to be high poly, with detailed texture to look good. It just has to look like what the creator wants it to look like.

I believe a team or director CAN have a budget, and all the best tools and still create art. Shadow of the colossus wasn't about overcoming the limitations of what they had available, their skill came from crafting a beautiful vision. 

there different businesses and u can't really compare the 2

Actually, you can. That's kind of the entire reason why there's a broad-sweeping market comparison model which accounts for the effects of all markets upon each other and upon the world around us. It's called "economics". And you most certainly can compare the two directly, as they both fall into the same overall market: entertainment.

It's normal in entertainment markets of all kinds for the more "high-brow" (ie. unappreciated by the market's audience at large) productions to be the ones which cost little compared to the "low-brow" (ie. appreciated by the market's audience at large) products and sell poorly, but be highly regarded by the elite of the industry to be pinnacles of entertainment. We do see this in the video games industry, when games with quirky aesthetics are given high ratings but sell poorly. What we also see in the games industry is a heavy number of critics who rate games which don't have high-brow appeal just as highly as the elite critics rank the actual high-brow games.

@The_vagabond7

What I meant is the freedom to do your vision. Some developers can't do it because the publisher won't allow it and won't distribute the game. It's a shame but that's how the industry goes.

When the developer has the freedom to do the game like they want to make it, no matter the console specs, they can achieve their vision and do a great game.

and I agree with you about skill and creativity.

It doesn't matter if you have the best tools or not, if your budget is high or not. when you have a vision, anything is possible. 2DBoy (makers of world of goo) can make art as much art as EA