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--- "Writing is fifty years behind painting." ---
Artfag (2010-09-27 12:18 ID:gr82mqjd )
Prove me wrong. \n\n
Bookworm (2010-09-30 22:58 ID:6F/PazPh )
No \n\n
Bookworm (2010-10-06 17:03 ID:+alQHDLG )
What the fuck is that even supposed to mean? Behind? What? \n\n
Bookworm (2010-10-06 18:37 ID:vqetET/l )
They say a picture is worth a thousand words, but the exact nature of those words vary from person to person (and also between art history majors vs everyone else). \n\n
Artfag (2010-11-04 14:51 ID:gr82mqjd )
"Writers don't own their words. Since when do words belong to anybody? 'Your very own words,' indeed! And who are you?" \n\n
Bookworm (2010-11-05 19:40 ID:L6zVXfX4 )
http://com.nicovideo.jp/motion/co237481 \n\n
Couch Potato (2010-11-08 07:28 ID:5L7Mewrc )
Film is the superior medium because it encompass all other media. \n\n
Bookworm (2010-11-21 08:30 ID:DDEmCRUR )
Art and writing are mutual.
Prove me wrong. \n\n
Bookworm (2010-12-07 07:06 ID:zcrpoxle )
>>8
Laws notwithstanding. \n\n
Bookworm (2015-09-23 15:59 ID:7OhsyPXT )
This is similar to talking about textboards vs imageboards \n\n
Bookworm (2015-11-26 14:51 ID:L5h8Da9J )
... and humans were created by a flying spaghetti monster.
Prove me wrong!! \n\n
Bookworm (2016-02-21 04:17 ID:XFUkexwg )
I am completely correct.
Prove me wrong. \n\n
Bookworm (2016-06-07 12:01 ID:JS+CdjLh )
>>7
Video games do that and more. \n\n
Bookworm (2016-07-05 00:56 ID:2ccpFmXu )
So books in the 2060s will be either totally indecipherable or commercial rot? \n\n Western culture had a good run, I guess. \n\n
Bookworm (2016-07-25 18:13 ID:kiS4xuWQ )
So... books in 50 years will be: \n\n > >Badoop
>fhgfhdhfdflhdglsadgfqwhuodghdzlfh
>AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA em em em DA!
>ping
>The endI'm glad literature is still behind \n\n
Bookworm (2016-08-07 07:06 ID:2ccpFmXu )
Futurist literature was already there in the 1920s.
Excessive Haste, a play by Verlaine. \n\n Scene I \n\n The curtain rises: a gentleman and a lady are seen locked in a close embrace. \n\n Scene II \n\n A second gentleman approaches noiselessly and shoots them both dead. The corpses remain in close contact, faces down. The killer draws near them, raises the man's head and starts back. He then raises the woman's head and shows even greater astonishment. \n\n 2nd gentleman: "My God! I've shot the wrong couple!" \n\n fin. \n\n
Bookworm (2017-03-13 14:24 ID:JS+CdjLh )
>>7
But the video game encompasses film and more. \n\n
Bookworm (2017-05-08 03:33 ID:0RUflnh1 )
Leck mich am Arsch \n\n
Bookworm (2019-01-05 22:26 ID:2n0ZmfgR )
painting is gay \n\n
Bookworm (2019-02-17 08:30 ID:jDJU8oLl )
Here we go in a flung festoon,
Half-way up to the jealous moon!
Don't you envy our pranceful bands?
Don't you wish you had extra hands?
Would n't you like if your tails were -- so --
Curved in the shape of a Cupid's bow?
Now you're angry, but -- never mind,
Brother, thy tail hangs down behind!
Here we sit in a branchy row,
Thinking of beautiful things we know;
Dreaming of deeds that we mean to do,
All complete, in a minute or two --
Something noble and grand and good,
Won by merely wishing we could.
Now we're going to -- never mind,
Brother, thy tail hangs down behind!
All the talk we ever have heard
Uttered by bat or beast or bird --
Hide or fin or scale or feather --
Jabber it quickly and all together!
Excellent! Wonderful! Once again!
Now we are talking just like men.
Let 's pretend we are... never mind,
Brother, thy tail hangs down behind!
This is the way of the Monkey-kind.
Then join our leaping lines that scumfish through the pines,
That rocket by where, light and high, the wild-grape swings,
By the rubbish in our wake, and the noble noise we make,
Be sure, be sure, we're going to do some splendid things!
What of the hunting, hunter bold?
Brother, the watch was long and cold.
What of the quarry ye went to kill?
Brother, he crops in the jungle still.
Where is the power that made your pride?
Brother, it ebbs from my flank and side.
Where is the haste that ye hurry by?
Brother, I go to my lair -- to die.
Bookworm (2019-11-21 02:17 ID:tNXPOuBb )
Literature is the only medium besides music that has been in a healthy state for a long time now. \n\n Animation, film and games all gave in to the temptation of commercialization only a few decades in to their existence, becoming trend-driven and losing the ability to have the staying power that works in older mediums can. Once a work in any of these mediums passes the 40 year mark they hit their expiration date and slowly fade out of culture. \n\n Painting and comics on the other hand have both pigeonholed themselves into niche markets where the patrons have very strong opinions on what the medium should be allowed to do, causing both mediums to stagnate heavily. \n\n
Bookworm (2025-04-15 16:36 ID:946o3p1b )
>>26
You need healthy philosophy in order to create healthy art
Do we have that? \n\n
Bookworm (2025-09-16 04:33 ID:JoPKAPAX )
>>22
Bizarrely, this is a legitimate attitude held by many people. They believe that if some medium can engage more senses, more modes of engagement, then it must be superior.
Yet, in the entire history of video games, there have been so few legitimately artistic works. The most common examples given do nothing but show that people don't have a clue how games can be an artistic medium. \n\n
Bookworm (2025-09-19 20:28 ID:SROjfRhT )
>>26
Off the top of my head Fritz the Cat is a notable exception and I'm not sure why that is \n\n
Bookworm (2025-09-19 20:29 ID:SROjfRhT )
> >29Then you agree with him; the potential is there, even if very few have even started to attempt to utilize it \n\n
Bookworm (2025-09-20 09:11 ID:JoPKAPAX )
>>31
I do not agree with >>22 because his implication is that games can be a 'better' medium because they are more complex, which is silly.
I do believe games have an untapped potential for artistry, but it's being squandered not only in AAA titles, but even major indie developers don't really think about what they are doing. Consider how games slapped with the label 'art game' are synonymous with a lack of gameplay, i.e ignoring the fundamentally distinguishing factor of the medium. Not to say that games must only express through their mechanics, but I do think this is the unrecognized frontier of expression.
The one game I always give as an example of what I am thinking of is Factorio. It is the ultimate hedonic treadmill; any Factorio player can attest that there is never a moment where you have nothing to do. Every milestone steps to another straightaway in a continuous and exponential progress, and even the 'end' of reaching a rocket is just another thing to automate. There is no finality. The player experiences an insatiable hunger for progress, conquest, and expansion.
The ingenious thing is that this statement lies solely in the mechanics of the game, without any explicit suggestion. It transmits pure experience. The music and graphics of course aid this expression, but are not the primary means.
Compare this to a game often called an art game, Journey. People believe it's an art game because they identify that it has 'art game like' graphics and sound, typical modes of expression. Also the common whimsy and gentleness art games are obliged to have. The gameplay did nothing significant though. Did Journey really do something significant? Did it even do anything, or did people simply believe they had to be affected by it, because the critics said so?
A game I recently played that I think has good artistic potential is The Zachtronics Solitaire Collection. The mechanics are intended to express certain ideas. Sawayama is a sort of commentary and response to the issues with Klondike games. Cluj is intended to be unfair and restrictive, and usually requires the player to 'cheat' the system to win. My favourite of the series, Fortunes Foundation, is the crowning jewel of the collection for being extraordrinarily inventive but well designed. To me, these are like a game form of a small collection of sonatas.
Perhaps I haven't played enough good games, but I deign to see better examples than the two I have given here. A game that understands the real implications of interactability on expression. \n\n
Bookworm (2025-09-21 00:15 ID:uq+rP7EP )
The notion that games should be an "artistic medium" is part of why gaming is shit nowadays. \n\n
Bookworm (2025-10-03 13:33 ID:iWCnF5tm )
>>32
I agree with your analysis of the 'art game' label, developers not thinking enough and Journey's lack of novelty. But I believe Factorio or TZSC really reflect what brilliant and obsessive engineers, not creative artists, think of as art. Take this with a grain of salt as I have played neither, but it seems clear to me that they display an artistic sensibility and worldview which are very restricted, very mechanistic. In fact, if this was my desired esthetic experience, I would probably choose to study something like chess or electronics design instead of playing those games. They have more in common with (modernist) buildings than with art.
I am not at all saying that they are bad games, but surely they can't be held as the central examples of 'games as art'.
More broadly, IMO the people equating 'art game' with 'no gameplay' are not being completely stupid. A complex interactive system with a thin coat of paint on top is simulation software, not art, even if it is an extremely fun simulation. Hence "dumb down the gameplay system, now it's more like traditional forms and we don't feel weird calling it art".
So what would an actual art game with strong complex gameplay look like? Maybe like all the classic games that are strong both in terms of breadth of content and system complexity. In this view, there are probably many art games already. Or interactive fiction with realistic simulated character psychology (Tokimeki Memorial?). \n\n TL;DR: Roger Ebert was right. Video games can never be art. \n\n
Bookworm (2025-10-04 09:13 ID:JoPKAPAX )
>>34 \n\n > >I am not at all saying that they are bad games, but surely they can't be held as the central examples of 'games as art'.I agree, I wish I had better examples. Maybe I haven't played enough different games. I've played good games, but few where I can identify anything like what I'm getting at. My example with Factorio is about my idea of games using the interactive dimension to express something; normally it is just used to implement the gameplay, which is furthermore, more often a simulation of power gain and achievement.
TZSC was probably a bad example, it was just on my mind because it's the only game I've played lately. I played games since I was a wee kid, now I'm in my twenties and am deeply disenfranchised with everything about them. Moreover, because I view the reward cycle as a harmful thing. Is there any other medium capable of psychologically harming the audience so deeply as video games? You could make a flimsy case for others, but the effect of games is so direct and sometimes even intended.
I would not take the words of a film critic seriously on this matter, but the statement is at least valid. I've not seen anything that I feel really proves him wrong. There may yet be some potential we have failed to see and use. I wonder if I must experiment to uncover this, as in to make games myself. For better or worse, games are important for a generation that plays a lot. \n\n
Bookworm (2025-10-16 00:40 ID:OUxel4gN )
Film as a medium is respected despite kids movies and cheap mass-market slop existing. There’s expectation that cinema (or whatever you call art in film) is produced as an art form and not as a cheap product to sell to the lowest common denominator.
Games, on the other hand, do not yet have this precedent. They are treated like toys and their users like children - and treated so by the creators, the consumers, and the general public. Artform games surely exist, in fact there is a flourishing scene among indie developers- but it’s a drop in the ocean.
Like some others in this thread, I think games have the potential to be the best vehicle for art. IMO there are few works of literature that wouldn’t benefit from BGM and visuals like an ADV style VN, to say the very least. Is cultural recognition of games as an art form important? I don’t really think so, but it would help more people access the media they like.
TLDR I think games are a great art form but there’s a perception issue because of a childish community that prevents most analysis being taken seriously.
Bookworm (2025-12-05 18:19 ID:L7mGXPNv )
In response to the earlier posts that were searching for "art games" that covey beauty through both gameplay and aesthetic: \n\n World of Goo is an art game in gameplay and aesthetic. Also Minecraft.
Canabalt is a fun endless runner game with a nice aesthetic, graphics, music. It was on display in an art museum. https://www.moma.org/collection/works/164922 \n\n >>33
Overall I agree with this, but with a twist. Not every game needs to try to be art. The original Super Mario Bros and even Pac-Man are artistic and beautiful in their own ways. Certainly a game like Super Metroid is artistic.
Game developers can try to make their games artistic, and it would be interesting to see how they can create a "proper art game" (that fits the expectations of the posters earlier in this thread). But standard, good video games are art in their own way. Video games are almost their own genre of art. \n\n
Bookworm (2025-12-05 18:38 ID:L7mGXPNv )
This article is very relevant. Discusses how games are art and what museum curators looked for when choosing games for the collection.
https://www.moma.org/magazine/articles/798 \n\n
Bookworm (2025-12-06 15:19 ID:5STGbAdx )
I wish I could find the thing I read years ago because it probably put the point more eloquently, but back when "are videogames art" was a much more hotly debated topic there was an article that tl;dr-ed down to "of course they are, but the entire argument is a load of wank anyway". \n\n It pretty much pointed out that at the end of the day any "is *** art" argument comes down to whether you can get the right authorities to say it is, that it's therefore a question that's mainly of concern to elitists who want to feel elite about themselves, and that people saying "videogames are not art" had that stance because saying otherwise would be to invite gamers into their Special Elite Cultured Peoples' Club and that was too icky to them to contemplate. \n\n I'd also point out that this is still the "Literature" board and the "Games" one is over there, but I suppose what little of value there is to discuss about the OP has already been discussed. If "behind" is meant to imply there should be weird avant-garde stuff, e e cummings' first published stuff came out in 1917 (and if cummings isn't weird enough for you see >>19 ). If the point is that painting moved on from being nobles wanting their portrait immortalized when that was displaced by photography, the prevalence of science fiction, fantasy, and adjacent categories shows that writing doesn't bind itself to pure representation of reality either. \n\n The fact that the OP straight up put "Artfag" in their name field tells me this was a troll thread to begin with, but whether it was or not whoever originated the quote in the first place was/is a shithead. \n\n
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