I Propose "Vidcon"
Video Games. What ideas or images flashed into your head when you read that phrase? Were they memories of yourself spending quarters at an arcade machine? Or maybe spending hours behind of a Guitar Hero drum set. Maybe you're a typical parent who thinks of an evil device that erodes your children's brains and turns them into head-shooting Nintendo-worshiping zombies. Or maybe you are one of those zombies and that phrase brought back all the great times you spent killing virtual people. Okay let's get serious, video games deserve the same respect any other entertainment medium has. They may have not had their Citizen Kane yet, but we're all sure that point is not too far away, maybe in the year 2016 or so. If video games are one of mankind's greatest creative and technological achievements, why does their very name carry so much negative baggage? It just might be time for us gamers to think of a new name for our hobby.
Imagine this, the two words “video games” only without the space. It becomes a new word entirely: videogames. The English language is very fond of retaining spaces inside compound words and their removal is a rare and slow process. So by deliberately removing that space, the phrase has essentially been given a boost into a distant idealistic future where videogames are now considered not merely a combination of video and game, but instead are only defined by themselves. How wonderful it would be to get rid of all the baggage videogames have acquired over the years. The mainstream public's irrational misunderstandings of the sport will be gone entirely. We can start from scratch now and create a society where videogames get the respect they deserve. The term “gamer” will hardly be of use because everyone will be a gamer, it would just be the equivalent of “first world dwelling human.” The personal lives of Hollywood celebrities may find competition as grocery store isles begin to favor those of game developers instead. This future that once seemed impossible is suddenly not too far away when we think about it now.
Wait, stop. Our thinking may be still too far in the box. Perhaps the word “game” should be removed alltogether? Does a work of art like Bioshock really deserve to share a category with Mouse Trap? Obviously the offending word cannot simply be removed from the compound, an entirely new word needs to be created. A word that can truly express every aspect offered by the medium. A word that can define the complexity of Pokémon, the art of Braid, and the verisimilitude of Killzone 2. But the catch is that this word must exclude juvenile toys, as well as anything else us gamers don't want to be associated with. Game is not that word, but what is? It seems as though we have truly outdone ourselves, we've created a medium that not even our own English language can label.
As the one word to rule them all seems so close, suddenly it is so far away. Maybe sometime in the future, when gamers are ready, we will finally find it. We know it has been prophesied that one day the Citizen Kane of games shall come and deliver videogames from being merely a niche market. But before that day occurs the world must be ready. A game of that calibur will only come to be when our language is fit for its use. Some day humanity shall develop a word that can finally express all of the deep meanings and complexities that we today can only describe as video games.
Update: I cross-posted this over on videolamer.com if you want to read it again over there.
« A Few Notes for Myself Regarding My Reviews If Braid is Art Then Every Game is Art (An Outline) »
5 comments
Citizen Kane of games? I'd say Citizen Kane is topped by any game that's entertaining, slightly less than stagy and not painfully self-serious. Why is Citizen Kane the bar anyway? A movie that made up stuff about and slandered a guy who was famous for making stuff up about and slandering people, yet still lacking any self-reflection or irony isn't really a classic in my mind: it's just a director with his head up his ass. Oh, yeah, there were some good camera angles or something.
I play games for the same reason I watch movies: entertainment after a hard day at work, and I think more adults are the same. When I was younger I could be all picky about art, but now I don`t have the mental energy and I wonder about the adults who do. Don`t get me wrong, I loved the artsy elements in Psychonauts and Bioshock, but I wouldn`t have played them if they weren`t also fun.
I honestly don`t think gamemakers or journalists should try to live up to cinema or literature. Lit is insane people who base their life on hating fiction, and cinema is the same but much richer obnoxious people who are more often than not idlers. In my mind, right now, video games are the least annoying form of entertainment and I hope they stay that way.
I can't decide if the joke in you talking about self reflection and irony is one that you are telling or one that God is telling with you.
Sorry, that was kind of rude. I just mean, you don't seem to get the attitude of the original post toward the whole "Citizen Kane of games" thing. But now I look over it some more and think maybe you do anyway. Which makes my earlier comment rude and misguided. So, like I said, sorry.
I think any desire I have for people to look at video games and see something of merit comes not from any merit actually existing so much as a desire to justify the thousands of hours I have invested in them. This is goal-setting from the wrong direction.
Erm, my post was overly-caustic anyway, so no worries.
I've been an on-again off-again gamer, but there was a time when I was a little pretentious fool who dedicated my entire life to artsy novels and movies. Stuff I didn't actually enjoy, and only went for because I fooled myself into thinking it gave me some kind of intellectual credit. Eventually it occurred to me that I really do like a good action movie or dumb comedy more than a dull, dense and symbolic-type story. Part of that involved me getting toward the end of university and realizing that genuine intellectuals (I'm thinking of my professors here) actually put a lot of hard work into what they do and don't just passively absorb clever fiction. It was sort of a stunning blow to me to realize I was just wasting my time and patting myself on the back.
Anyway, the point I think I'm trying to make is: entertainment should be fun. The fact that some entertainment does have a deeper message is fine and all, as long as it's entertaining. I like the fact that game reviewers still point readers toward fun games, even if the games are a bit stupid. Fiction and movie reviewers seem to really hate good-but-simple books/movies and point the reader toward drab, slow-paced, abstract artsy affairs, which makes finding the good books and movies way too difficult. I really hope that game reviewers don't fall into the same trap, because right now they're the only reviewers I can half-way trust.
I mean, there's nothing wrong with having a bit of fun, is there?
I agree with the sentiment, and in my own field (software) I'm suspicious of anyone who calls themselves an artist. I was jut saying that I think the original post agreed with that sentiment as well and I thought maybe you weren't getting the tongue-in-cheek tone.
And like I said, it might be nice to say Braid is some kind of aesthetic marvel and that It really made me think about time and loss or whatever when I played it, but it in all honesty I played it because it looked like fun, and I wouldn't tell someone to play it if they weren't going to enjoy it.