The Player

Can video games be considered works of art, wonders Ciara O’Brien

CAN VIDEO games ever be art? According to one US movie critic, maybe. Described as the most powerful pundit in America by Forbes, Roger Ebert’s opinion could be said to have some sway. In April, Ebert decried the video game as an art form.

“One obvious difference between art and games is that you can win a game. It has rules, points, objectives, and an outcome,” he wrote.

He dismissed immersive games, arguing that these become a representation of “a story, a novel, a play, dance, a film”. “Those are things you cannot win; you can only experience them.”

There were plenty of people who disagreed. The post triggered a deluge of comments – thousands, in fact – and mostly disagreeing with him. But the main problem with Ebert’s opinion was not that he was dismissing games, it was that he was dismissing games without having ever played one. It’s something he’s reconsidered.

“My error in the first place was to think I could make a convincing argument on purely theoretical grounds,” he wrote last week. “What I was saying is that video games could not in principle be art. That was a foolish position to take, particularly as it seemed to apply to the entire unseen future of games. This was pointed out to me maybe hundreds of times. How could I disagree? It is quite possible a game could someday be great art.”

Art is a tricky thing to define. The notion of what constitutes art is constantly evolving. For example, there are many people who consider “modern art” a waste of time. Others will pay thousands for a dissected animal in formaldehyde. It’s also difficult to predict what will be viewed as art in the future, something Ebert admitted himself in his April post.

“Perhaps it is foolish of me to say ‘never’ . . . Let me just say that no video gamer now living will survive long enough to experience the medium as an art form,” Ebert wrote.

One thing is clear: regardless of whether they may or may not be considered art in the future, video games have become a part of our culture. Children’s movies come with video game tie-ins. Game launches have become big events, attracting public interest and devotion that would once have been reserved for movie premieres. Pacman even made it on to a Google doodle when it celebrated its 30th anniversary. Who knows how intertwined games will be with our future.

theplayer@irishtimes.com