This question can be posed of any artistic industry. For example, a films success can be measured either by the money that it makes or by awards that it wins. My thought is that as the game industry matures, more will be required of videogames vis a vis storyline, character development, etc. It would be really nice if we got to a point where artistic vision wasn't sacrificed for easy sales, but as long as an industry is selling games to such a wide demographic (say ages 7-40) it must be quite difficult to create a game that is both intelligent and accessible.

Ceci n'est pas l'art

I think a few games could be art. Art is how a picture makes you feel right? What is it about, how does it "make you think".

Standing in Hyrule Field for the first time or watching the Last Colossus fall...makes you feel something. Catch those moments in a screenshot and put it in a picture frame. Would look like art to me. Get a static image of Travis Touchdown taking a dump...what does it mean? No different than someone saying "what does that circle inside the rectangle mean".

Almost all games are good, just like how art house films take up the absolute minority of the market.

Depends on the game. Can Be one, the other, or BOTH.

The two are not necessarily mutually exclusive.

On this site, though? They're definitely economic goods.

I think their art...everylast one of them.

movies and paintings and books are designed to inspire a reaction in the person who is looking at them, and video games are no exeption.

Video games can isnpire all sorts of emotions and feelings, the same way the above mentioned 'traditional' art forms can.

So IMO video games are art.

And in seriousness

I'v been to Paris, Iv seen the Mona Lisa it was a let down.

Super Mario Bros. has never let me down.

So yes I just said Super Mario Bros. > Mona Lisa

Of course games are art. Sequels, like movies, are another question all together.

Yeah. It could also be that video games are primarily commercial art. Still, games are games. Would the person that created the game of Chess be considered a great artist? Is the game of Go a work of art?

Poker, Monopoly, Risk, Bridge and Golf... we have a wide-range of games already created to inspect and look for the scholarly criticism, theories and analyses of recurring forms.

It would be interesting to see if video games could be critiqued by an academic social commentator who also plays them but I have yet to see that happen. Nowadays you can call anything art. But can you say that video games are art (with a straight face) and be taken seriously by the academic establishment? Aye, there's the rub.

I hate to agree but yea. 2 hrs in line, too many tourists and the sistine chapel, well its a pretty big painting but ehh