Though it’s grown more mainstream over the years, video games still have a bad reputation, mostly among boomers, as a children’s toy with little more to it than senseless violence. Overall it seems like most people seem to think that video games are just a waste of time. I’m not going to argue that video games are good for hand-eye coordination or something like that because that would be stupid. But I am going to state why I believe video games should be viewed on the same level as a book or a movie.
If this were a pretentious video essay on youtube I’d probably start off with a black title screen that says Chapter 1: What is Art? I’m not going to waste any time trying to define art because art is an abstract noun and trying to put it in words would be like trying to define love or adventure or luck. Instead I’ll just list a few things that are considered art to most people: paintings, movies, books, dances, architecture, plays, and music. While all of these things can be found in video games, I think video games are most similar to movies and books. Most video games have an accompanying soundtrack—songs that are custom made to fit the nature of the game. Movies exist to tell a story, and almost all video games do just that.
Some people try to label video games as shooting people in the head over and over, that it’s silly and mindless. While there are games that are precisely that, the majority of them are not, and if the people saying this actually bothered to play video games, they would know this. Besides, that would be similar to saying that all movies are mindless because of the cheesy action flicks out there, or that all books are stupid because of erotic young adult novels written by fourteen year old girls. Another dumb thing people say is that video games cause violence, which is just silly and was probably conjured up by some guys trying to unravel government conspiracies while wearing tinfoil hats. There hasn’t been any scientific data to back this claim up and again, I don’t understand why movies or books get accused of being a bad influence when there are a lot of violent ones out there.
As a medium, I do think that video games can exceed both books and movies, and this is largely due to the fact that it’s an experience. You are going through a story. You’re not just watching. You’re participating. In a horror movie it’s pretty scary watching someone trip ten times while running away from Chuck E Cheese. But imagine if you were running away from Chuck E Cheese. Think of a fantasy novel like The Hobbit and how wondrous the world is as you’re filled with little pieces of lore as Bilbo’s adventure goes on. Now imagine if you could explore a fantasy world and piece together clues about the world’s history.
There is more to say but I think I’ll leave it at this for now.