Are games an art?

Some errors in your text.

I say it depends on the game. Some are art, some are a can of baked beans that some dude tries to sell as art.

Yes.

Absolutely. Games like COD in particular have "art teams" specifically used to create visual appeal.

I did a presentation about whether or not video games are art. I argued that video games have characteristics of other artistic representations such as a musical, a painting, a movie, or even a book. Some examples are Civ4, Journey having their soundtracks nominated for a Grammy (Civ4's Baba Yetu actually won), how realistic Crysis 3 looks, how in awe you can be while playing Journey, how shocking and not far from reality the war story of Spec Ops: The Lines tells, and how emotionally attached the players can get with Clementine in The Walking Dead.

Game is a form of art, the one that integrates many aspects of other representations. It can be artistically appealing and aesthetically attractive. I think it's fair to say video games are a modern form of art and we the players are its patrons.

this wiki page is also quite helpful :)

Play Journey.

"I am well aware that to many of you this might seem just an obvious statement,..."

^this, look at the forum you are in :P

Bastion <3

Yes.

related:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IAs4Dy-lh8E
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2bAN9pPeiE

More importantly, are pancakes an ultimate form of art? Or are they just the limit the art has to breach yet?

limbo,bastion,the binding of isaac and a lot of more indies, that are a real art not only in the visual soma are because of his amazing soundtrack(to the moon, thomas was alone) others ftom they visual aspect(limbo) an other are a just art in all the ways posibles(bioshcok) yes, i know my english sucks :p

Great soundtrack and nice graphical style are important part of a game, if you're going to call it art.

Also atmosphere, lore, story and such things are important.

If drawing a picture or making a sculpture is called art, why would making a 3d (or 2d) world filled with music, detail, design and usually a plot, not be called an art?

not this again

these threads are like bloody minefields

Just look at Muramasa: the Demon Blade, Odin Sphere, Journey, Bastion or Limbo, these sure are the proof that videogames are art.

Of course games can be a form of art. Of course, many games are also not!

Very practical art, art in which you really have to cooperate with the machine. But art.

Sure it's art. It's commercial art - much like advertising, or mainstream fashion. The confines of the medium are incredibly heavy as well - you have graphical limitations, economical limitations, time constraints, and more you have to integrate your work with dozens of other people, and try and make the final product look cohesive. While all mediums have inherent limitations, the ones found in video games are particularly invasive. Anyway it's a bit of a non-debate. 99% of games are made to sustain a company and to make waves in a market, so they can only be considered commercial art, which tbh is quite different from fine art.

If you've ever taken an art philosophy class, a better question might be whether video games are craft rather than art. There's a definite argument there that they can be much of both.

Is this a question?

My girlfriend is doing her honours in Visual Art. We've had this conversation more often than I can count, and her answer is usually "no", with a bit of "hmmm, maybe, sometimes" thrown in.

Her reasoning, and all her fellow classmates' as well, is "because it isn't" which is followed up by "look, you don't study art, so you wouldn't know". (As an FYI, I study accounting and finance).

My 'spanner in the works' comes in when I ask them if movies are considered Art. That sends them into a furious debate that can last hours with no definitive outcome. Furthermore, introducing books into that debate will lead to more people arguing that books are Art and fewer arguing that they aren't.

My logic is then this: paintings and books are more readily accepted as Art simply because of how long they have been around. Movies and games are starting to become accepted as Art as they spend more time in our culture (on a sidenote, they will become accepted much faster due to how advanced technology and communication is in today's age).

So yes, games can be considered Art. Are they the ultimate form of Art though?

Well, that's a lot easier to answer: Art is subjective. Every artist will tell you this, and all of my girlfriend's art buddies agree - art has to have some sort of personal meaning to the person viewing it; a meaning that is different to everyone else.

In this regard, video games create the ultimate subjective experience. Every game - even CoD - has you control someone and make them do something (often, games introduce choices, further immersing our subjective selves into the Art) and we have to decide why or what or how based on our subjective opinions. Whether we do this consciously (ie: Bastion's endings etc) or without thought (ie: a multiplayer FPS) we are still being subjective and affected by it.

Add to that the care and passion some creators put into their work and I don't think you could argue against games being art.

It has taken my girlfriend nearly two years to start seeing this. I'm quite nervous for when I try and persuade her that cars and engines can be Art too. I think we may break up.

Art is in the eye of the beholder.

yes

It all depends on the definition. For some people art is only stuff like paintings. Others include music. Yet again others include movies too.
I for one think art is everything that a human creates as an interpretation of the world around him/her. As it involves creativity and thought process and the already mentioned interpretation of the surroundings I think it would be very close minded to say only few things are art. So I for one include video games to my definition of art too. Of course some games are more art (Final Fantasy) than others (Call Of Duty) but it's all art in it's own way.
(When I say "more art" I mean that it shows a bigger variety of things and has a lot more to offer)

No.

They have the potential to be art, just like movies have the potential to be art as well.
To me considering something art is like giving it a trophy/medal. You can't go on giving everything woula trophy/medal because game/movie/album is amazing. It wouldn't be fair.

*grabs popcorn*