Ah.... gaming. For a long time, it has entertained millions. Gaming became one of the fastest growing media industries in the world, gaining billions of dollars in has little as 25 to 30 years. When it comes to gaming's complexity, a commonly asked question often appears: are video games art? Quite a cumbersome question, with lots of very controversial opinions. Personally, I do not think so, at least in the artistic sense; video games have been a medium which had always focused on a player's satisfaction, so games that try to be artistic ("art games") usually stray from a gamer's expectations for trying too hard, oftentimes becoming pretentious. While games can be a visual art, they can't really be a work of art, at least not traditional art. What do you think? 

I don't think anyone here is going to say no since the website's main focus is the celebration and playing of video games.

Art is the human expression of creative skills, whether visual, auditory, or other. A video game is generally a playable story. And stories are literature. Literature is art, if you ask Shakespeare or Victor Hugo.

Yes, video games, with their visuals, their dynamic story-telling, their scores and music (Medal of Honor: Frontline is exceptionally good with the music), and the creativity that goes into them make them art. Video games can unearth emotions in the players. Video games can captivate and stoke the creative energies of people.

Art can and is money, too. So that video games are also a business does not take away any of the artistic merit they have.

I think they are more of a sport than they are art. They are art also because they are a form of entertainment, but I feel like they are more similar to a game like basketball or baseball. People play those games for fun and even make money doing so. Some people even get paid to play video games and discuss them with other gamers and even hold events/tournaments where these games are celebrated. Tournaments are kind of comparable to what goes on in football with the Superbowl and all. In a way they are artistic, but to me they are more of a sport than an art form.

luigi25 :  I can kind of see where you're coming from, but I'm sorry to say that the majority video games are not sports. Merriam Webster defines a sport as, "an activity involving physical exertion and skill in which an individual or team competes against another or others for entertainment". With this definition, I suppose that some team games could be considered sports, but if we are going by this definition, then the majority of video games are not sports.

It really depends on what you're referring to. I maintain that the moment something is mass produced and industrialized is the moment the art is completely lost. I really don't believe art is art without passion. Is the video game industry slowly sucking out all of the artistic value of video games? In my opinion, yes. But that doesn't mean that the few games out there that were developed with a love of the art, aren't art. They very much are. If it's done right, it's one of the greatest art forms ever. You combine visual arts of animation, 3D sculpting and modeling, you get voice acting and, if motion capture is used, actual physical acting, story writing, music and sound effects, puzzles and rhythm, etc. It's actually rather hard to think of an art form that isn't included in gaming to some extent.

It could be, I guess. It is like art in the sense that lots of time, passion, and work goes into making a game. The storytelling could definitely be considered art as well. But unlike art, a game is expected to keep people entertained for hours, or years!

No question about it. A good example: if I submit a picture of a sunset over an ocean that I nake using a tool like Pixel Create, and upload it to Vizzed, what will that be called? Pixel art. Now if I make a 2D game and place that as the backdrop of a level, why should that image, or the thousands of others that you'll find in the game that are made using the same tools and mediums, not considered art anymore? Because they move? Because you can interact with some of them?

I think ghostbear nailed it when he said art is the expression of creative skills. If I can see art, hear art, or touch art, why can't I hear and see the art through a video game? Why can't I interact with the art?


I never really thought much about this until I started working on making games myself, but video games are so much more than we usually think. They aren't just a way of having fun, they're full of artistic expression. From the scenery to the music, and even the story. Every moment in a well made game is communicating so much more than a backdrop with a few virtual actors. It's communicating what the designers think about the setting, what feelings they invoke in them and how they view the settings or even the world. And the story in a story driven game is no less artistic than that of a novel. Literally the only difference is in the angle from which we view the art. On a wall vs. on a screen. Over the speakers of our stereo vs. over the speakers of our television. Through the narration of a game hero vs. through the eyes of a hero we can't see in a book.

Are they art? Definitely.

It depends. I mean, there are some video games which are more art than game, such as Everyone's Gone to the Rapture... But games are a kind of art like a painting, a movie, a song can be called art.

Video game making is an art just like most other crafts. I would say that video games on their own can be art but are not inherently. I don't think you're going to find many contesting this though on a video game themed forum, seems like you picked a sort of biased environment to discuss this in

Let's limit this discussion to say "Some games are art."

Take gambling games or sports games. Is Madden 2006 really art? It's a football simulator and not a very good one at that.

Is Final Fantasy X art? There's a better conversation because there's a well-developed story, a fully-developed score, and beautiful, immersive environments within which the game operates.

Casino Kid for NES? Nope.

World of Warcraft Online? Sure.

The original World of Warcraft? Eh.

Some games are beautifully done and it takes skill and talent to bring them to light. Or it takes technology to show the motions and movements of animals and humans.

Art? Sure, if you want it to be. But you can call anything art if you really want.

Considering everything that goes behind a video game, then yes it's definitely art. Think about all the hours put to create graphics and animate them, compose music that will enhance the gameplay, write a scenario that makes sense and that will captivate audiences...

Hell, video games are just movies you play yourself. Even sports game are art, for the aforementioned reasons.

Yes, I consider Video Games as Art, especially Breath of the Wild. Very nice and impressing to see a simple cartridge can show us a humongous open world game. You get to move characters, you get to talk with other people and basically you create your own story. There are many games like that. Also, in many video games stories, such as Majora's Mask, many people there are suffering psychological problems, and it's up to Link to help them. These people represent real people, these problems represent problems that we're living with today. They're REALISTIC, that's the word. I always feel good and warm on the inside whenever I help them out in games, just like I help out people in real life. It's very nice.

So yeah, I do think video games are art.

There is no doubt in my mind that it is. How can it not be? Someone has to create it. I believe if you can create it to some point it's all art. There is amazing landscapes in a lot of games, that look better than paintings that I have seen. Then you have a story that goes with it. 

Without a doubt, it is. There's so much creativity poured into so many games, that it has to be art. Some games might not be art, though. Not every game has all that much creativity poured into it, a lot is lifeless, soulless, etc. But videogames are technically art in some way.

I think so. It takes so much creativeness to be able to get a game to completion. 
With that being said, if you just take a game, and reskin it, similiar to Call of Duty, then I don't think that that is art so much as imitation, even if there are multiple studios making the same franchise. 

I usually think of art as showing creativity in things that you make. By that definition, I think video games are art. Professional game creators are showing creativity by making smoothly and cleverly done graphics and animations, but also getting a story involved. I always view poetry or stories in general as art of writing.

I won't hesitate, video games are absolutely art. If you look by definition of art which is, "the expression or application of human creative skill and imagination", video games are 100% art. Video games are put together using many different people in many different steps and processes, and therefore is showing human creativity through electronics. 

All graphics, music, and story that are put into a video game all require a very high standard of artistic talent to be able to make these graphics and music, and even write the story and place it with these graphics. While there are programs in this day in age, these programs were made by developers who used their artistic skill to create them for the use of others in promotion of their own form of art, the video game. 

Making a quality video game, or even just an ok video game, requires tons of creative skill and imagination to be put into it, and for that reason I feel that video games are a prime example of modern age art.