Video Games Are Already Art

By Tommy Leung on 04/28/2010 in Games

Refuting Roger Ebert’s “Video Games Can Never Be Art” from an Entirely Different Angle

Not long ago, Roger Ebert wrote a blog post titled, Video games can never be art. I was actually busy making a game so I never got around to responding to it. I just rolled my eyes and went back to work. Someone has to make these things that can never be art.

Roger Ebert and I sit on opposite ends of the ‘video games as art’ debate. He adamantly believes that video games are not art and cannot be art. I don’t just think video games can be art, I believe they are art. I’ve long believed that video games are art and have even put it into writing. My favorite example for making the case being the Mass Effect series.

I am biased. I grew up with games. I love games; all of it, from the actual games to the industry of games. I make games for a living. There’s no denying it, I am biased.

That doesn’t mean Ebert is objective. We all know who he is. He is biased in the opposite direction. He is biased to film.

Whenever Ebert claims that video games cannot be or are not an art form, a fire spreads through the games industry. For one reason or another, we really want Ebert to tell us that video games are an art form. As if Ebert is the gatekeeper to what is art.

Continued at Associated Content

By Tommy Leung