yooperchick
Registered Member
Roger Ebert responding to a Reader's comment in his column:
Comment from Reader: "saddened to read that you consider videogames an inherently inferior medium to film and literature, despite your admitted lack of familiarity with the great works of the medium. Was not film itself once a new field of art? Did it not also take decades for its academic respectability to be recognised?""
Eberts answer: "I did indeed consider videogames inherently inferior to film and literature. There is a structural reason for that: Videogames by their nature require player choices, which is the opposite of the strategy of serious film and literature, which requires authorial control. [Videogames] can be elegant, subtle, sophisticated, challenging and visually wonderful...the nature of the medium prevents if from moving beyond craftmanship to the stature of art."
"To my knowledge, no one in or out of the field has ever been able to cite a game worthy of comparison with the great dramatists, poets, filmmakers, novelists and composers. That a game can aspire to artistic importance as a visual experience, I accept."
"But for most gamers, video games represent a loss of those precious hours we have available to make ourselves more cultured, civilised and empathetic"
Hmmm...what does everyone think about this?
Comment from Reader: "saddened to read that you consider videogames an inherently inferior medium to film and literature, despite your admitted lack of familiarity with the great works of the medium. Was not film itself once a new field of art? Did it not also take decades for its academic respectability to be recognised?""
Eberts answer: "I did indeed consider videogames inherently inferior to film and literature. There is a structural reason for that: Videogames by their nature require player choices, which is the opposite of the strategy of serious film and literature, which requires authorial control. [Videogames] can be elegant, subtle, sophisticated, challenging and visually wonderful...the nature of the medium prevents if from moving beyond craftmanship to the stature of art."
"To my knowledge, no one in or out of the field has ever been able to cite a game worthy of comparison with the great dramatists, poets, filmmakers, novelists and composers. That a game can aspire to artistic importance as a visual experience, I accept."
"But for most gamers, video games represent a loss of those precious hours we have available to make ourselves more cultured, civilised and empathetic"
Hmmm...what does everyone think about this?