Games As People; As Places; As Art

I’m not prompted to grasp her hand, yet I am compelled to do so all the same. The game’s logic is astonishingly simple: protect her from harm using a wooden club, and bond with her by sitting together on a couch.  

These were my initial thoughts as I played through Ico for the first time, many years ago. Director Fumito Ueda and developer Team Ico effectively translated many expressive behavioural qualities into digital code, and allowed me to feel the connection between protagonists Ico and Yorda.

It is my belief that video games have long since become an entertainment medium entrenched in values which define it as art. Certainly, Ico is but one example of how a game can act as conduit for players to tap into the realm of the expressive; of the meaningful; of what holds greater than ordinary significance in our lives. What follows is a brief list of two games which I feel function as art. 

Okami

A while back, fellow blogger Brandon spoke briefly about how visual aesthetic plays an important role in determining artistic merit in video games. One of the examples he used to argue this point was PS2 and Wii game Okami, which I agree is brilliant in its visual style.

Visual style in video games is itself the equivalent to gamers as paintings are to observers: they can be windows which allow a person’s mind to reflect on the beauty found in ordinary and everyday things. Okami often felt overwhelmingly calming, and its serenity was rooted in part in the way the grass swayed, the way the trees blossomed, and in the way that the world reacted to the colour which your character literally brought back to the world.

Mass Effect 2

People as places as people

Moving beyond visual aesthetic, I find that video games also serve as effective tools for enabling players to contemplate the significance of personal relationships in their lives.

In a retrospective I read last week at Eurogamer, the author explored several reasons why he enjoyed Mass Effect 2 so much. One notable point he mentioned was that the game was effective in conveying an intimacy between its characters and the player.

While playing through the entire Mass Effect series, I felt constantly in awe by how relatable each of my party members were. Moreover, I found myself identifying qualities in my friends and family which I grafted onto my party members in-game. In this way, Mass Effect allowed me to explore what it was that attracted me to the people in my life.

Final Thoughts

More broadly, I feel as though games are often effective at grabbing hold of players’ imaginations, enabling them to contemplate natural and human qualities which they feel strongly for. In my attempts to very briefly cover the topic of art and games, I touched on three personal favourites, and utilized them to elaborate on how art has bled into video games.

Moving forward, I would be interested to see how you , the viewer, have used video games to think more deeply about what it is that you are attracted to in everyday life.