Video Games in the Papers

Its good to see video games in the papers for the right reasons (ie, not as a knee jerk reaction to all social evils by lazy journalists and showboating politicians). In this case Independent columnist Tom Sutcliffe takes to task the prejudice surrounding the medium, asking why games are criticised for the kind of depictions of sex and violence that wouldn't raise an eyebrow in other art forms. He suggests that its because games still have a foot in the toy box as well as art and the assumption is that as they are for kids they carry certain expectations of moral innocence. Of course we know that this isn't true, but the wider public perception of games still needs to change in much the same way people needed to revise their opinion of animation in the late eighties as something 'just for kids' in order to appreciate the credence of masterpieces like Akira and Perfect Blue. The truth is that since the Playstation emerged the gaming demographic has shifted firmly away from kids towards people in their 20s (a generation who grew up with the medium) and video games are now subject to the same kind of age classification as films.

Tom Sutcliffe also touches on a point that i've been fascinated by for years now. He says: "Video games have been around for years but they are still struggling to pass through that long gestation that any new creative form must go through before it matures from frivolity into art." Film only really attained the status of 'art' in the sixties thanks to a new generation of filmmaker/critics driven by the French New Wave and modernism. Sure there were isolated figures who argued the toss before then (Eisenstien and Vertov, Renoir and Melies) but by and large the medium was seen as purely an entertainment for the first 60 years of its life. Video games are developing much faster and I believe that they have reached roughly a similar stage in their development. Like the directors and critics who fought tooth and nail for cinema to be recognised as an artform, our generation must likewise fight for our medium, the 'eighth art' of video games, to be accepted.