Roger Ebert is Wrong

 

Acclaimed critic Roger Ebert once commented that a video game can never be art. I think Mr. Ebert severely underestimates the talent and the skill of modern video game makers. He should consider what goes on in the creation of games as well as the full effect of the final product, if well made. Video games do not deserve some of the stigma that they receive, especially the ones with such a rich cinematic feel. A well done video game has a number of artistic qualities in it, including, but not limited to, architecture, music, painting, 3d modeling, storytelling, and so on. In the right combination, this can deliver a masterpiece.

Of course, this must begin with the age old question of “what is art?” Art is subjective, so on some degree I suppose if Ebert doesn't want to see a video game as art, that's his prerogative. But on the other hand, I think he's ignoring a vast amount of artistic quality over the stigma on video games being cheap and trashy. Art is any expression of human creativity, meant to evoke a response from the viewer. That response may be an emotional reaction, or a sudden insight, or a simple thought provocation. A stick figure is not seen as art in most cases (though I've seen some funny stick figure animations on youtube that might counter this statement, humor is of course an art form) because a stick figure is too simple to provoke any real response. This too is subjective, perhaps it provokes a response in someone else. The Mona Lisa is the most famous panting in our history because the aesthetic value of the painting elicits a response from most people who view it.

One does not have to like a work of art in order for it to be art either. I'm one of the few who sees the Mona Lisa and I don't understand why it's so famous. It's a beautiful painting, it's artist was a man of many talents, but I've seen numerous works of similar quality that are less famous. Regardless of my own opinion, it is still a work of art. A child might draw a picture of a house, the lines all crooked, the windows deformed and the coloring going beyond the lines and yet it's still a child's artwork regardless of the lack of talent. Thus even if Ebert believes all video games to be talentless trash, they are still a form of art, a form of human creativity.

All video games are works of creativity and all video games attempt to provoke a response in the viewer (or in this case, the player) and thus by definition a video game is art. Adventure games try to, at the minimum, provoke an adrenalin fueled rush, while puzzle games try to intrigue the player so he keeps trying to solve the game. This is the base however. Better video games can evoke so much more. The Mass Effect (ME) trilogy by BioWare Corp is a grand example of this. I think that trilogy managed to evoke every single emotion I have through its eighty hour adventure across the Milky Way. I laughed, I got angry, I was excited, and I think there may have been some dust in the room at some other points, coincidentally during the sad moments. Weird how that works. Anyways, since ME is such a good example, I will be using it in this essay to provide examples though this is not meant to be a review of the game. I will also point out other games as they become relevant.

Before I talk about how the game as a whole is a work of art, I will break it down into components. Video games are a mix of other art forms. Architecture is found in level design. Painting and graphic design can be found in the texturing of the levels and skinning of the models. Modeling can be akin to sculpting, making a three dimensional shape out of nothing. If the game features a story, there's story telling and characterization. Music and ambient sound sets the atmosphere.

All three ME games feature a vast space station known as the Citadel. It sits in the Serpent Nebula, an enormous, rotating ring (the Presidium) with five arms extended from the rings (the Wards) each with a city built upon it. Level designers use architecture to design such a device, as fantastical as it is, to make it believable. Once Commander Shepard (the protagonist, note that since Shepard is player created, his or her attributes can vary, I refer to her as 'her' because she was a she in my playthrough) is on the Citadel interior, the level has gardens, pathways and lakes. There are stores and nightclubs of every type along the hallways and corridors in the Wards and Presidium. A good level designer has to create floors and walls and ceilings with light sources, windows and every other aspect of architecture that is applicable to his work to create a design that makes sense. He has to decide how the doors open, what the ambient light is, what the over all look and feel of the station is. The Citadel is a futuristic station, a safe haven from the dangers of the galaxy and it is the heart of civilization and thus all these things have to be considered in the design.

When we land on Thessia in Mass Effect 3, and Illium in Mass Effect 2, the architecture is distinctive to the asari culture (the feminine aliens that live on those planets.) The builds are lean and slender, with elegant and graceful curves. Omega is a dank and dirty city, dark and ugly and rife with crime. The Collector Ship in ME2 is creepy and foreboding, built like an insect hive. And such a look works, given how insectoid the Collectors are. Level designers use architecture to create consistency. Throughout ME, we find ourselves on three different geth ships (geth are a synthetic race of machines) and each ship is distinctively geth in it's architecture, the way the doors and hallways are designed. When you're on a geth ship, you know it. Architecture is a key art for any game that requires any sort of exploration. Skyrim uses architecture to create a Norse atmosphere, drawing from Scandinavian styles to build the many cities in Skyrim such as Whiterun or Windhelm. Both Jorvasskr and Dragon's Reach look like they are straight out of Norse mythology. World of Warcraft gives Night Elves an exotic look with their distinct Asian architecture and they give the Horde a war-like look with their heavy use of hard metals, spikes, and blood red banners. I could go on listing examples.

And this alone can make a game art. There have been so many times that I simply stopped in Skyrim to stare at some of the landscapes (though to be fair, landscaping is a separate art from architecture.) Entering the new upgraded Orgrimmar (a Horde city in WoW) I had to stop and enjoy the sights. The level designers put a lot of hard work in creating an aesthetically pleasing, consistant and believable world and this alone is art.

Jorvasskr, in Whiterun, Skyrim

What of painting? Painting and drawing is perhaps the oldest form of art aside from speech and storytelling. Well all that architecture is pointless if you don't give it any skin. No one wants to look at a gray-shaded mass of polygons. Our world needs to be textured. It needs a feel to it. Texturing is a key element to level design, creating the base look of the game, often using skills from both painting and using photomanipulation to create textures. The walls and floors and the cielings of the Citadel in ME need a look to them and BioWare gave it a look akin to a futuristic city, with neon lights and metalic colors. There are advertisements too for various stores, advertisements that someone had to actually sit down in front of Photoshop and actually create. 

It is not only the levels that need painting but also the models. Shepard's armor must be painted. Colors must be chosen, at least for the default colors, as well as a theme. Shepard's face and hair must also be painted, in fact, as Shepard is a player designed character, many faces and hairstyles must be painted. The other characters are not player designed. Characters such as Garrus Vakarian must have a consistent look at all times. In all three games, Garrus's quality and detail steadily improves, because the technology improved between 2007 (when ME1 launched) and 2012 (when ME3 launched.) But while Garrus gained detail and quality, he looks otherwise the same in all three games. He is distinctively Garrus because the artists picked a theme for him. They determined how his face paint would look, his eye color, his typical armor style, his facial features. This is all derived from painting the textures that wrap around the model.

This goes beyond character models. Everything must be painted, from weapons to coffee pots. Books on shelves, computers, even the silly space hamster Shepard has in the commander's bunk on the Normandy. And speaking of the Normandy, that ship must also be painted, inside and out, giving it its distinctive look. Though the texture artists might not pick up a brush (and in some cases they might pick up a brush, or more specifically, an electronic stylus and paint on a tablet,) they must, just like a typical painter, pick between color themes and determine how to best color the world. It is a different application of an age old art, aided by computers and filters, but don't let that fool you; the computer may aid the artist but it will only produce great work if the artist puts talent into it.

For a two dimensional game, such as the classic Mario World, Mario and every element in that game was painted from the artist's own creativity. Every enemy, every block, the background, menu elements, all of it. And the artist had to use every ounce of creativity he had to create his vision with the technological constraints of that time. Somehow the artist created an italian mustachioed plumber in a red hat and overalls in a graphic eight pixels by eight pixels. And moving back to the three dimensional world, the storm troopers in Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II (1997) have fewer polygons than Commander Shepard's face in Mass Effect 3 (2012.) Point is, these artists work in very tight constraints, or at least, they use to, and they still bring out their creations, they still create a distinctive and beautiful world.

Creating the models that populate the world is also an artistic form. In fact, 3D modeling is already culturally accepted as an art form. These artists can create models that are impressive. I've seen some renders that were so lifelike, I thought they were photographs until I inspected them closer. In ME3, when the Reapers invade Earth, Shepard is in Vancouver. While the city is under attack, she (or he) makes her way to the Normandy. Along the way, you encounter a Reaper standing in the river. Just the size and the scale of it is enough to take your breath away. The monstrous and malevolent machine towers over the skyscrapers of the city, and Shepard appears to be an ant at it's feet. The modelers created a model that is pure intimidation, which goes along with the storyline of these evil Reapers who are devastating and nearly impossible to kill. They are loosely based on Lovecraftian mythos, great cosmic beings from the darkness beyond, with dark metalic skins, blue glowing trim and, in Harbinger's case, glowing golden 'eyes.'

The Reaper Harbinger at the Citadel conduit

The Reaper Sovereign and one of his infamous quotes, from my deviant art page

Or on a lighter note, the Normandy is an agile and graceful ship and it is modeled to appear graceful and agile, with its smooth curves and aerodynamic shape. It does not matter that aerodynamics mean nothing in deep space; we equate aerodynamics with speed and agility. By designing the Normandy in that manner, we expect it to behave as if it is aerodynamic, even in the dark of space. 

SSV Normandy SR-2, Mass Effect 2, during battle with Collectors.

The smaller details in the game, the design of weaponry and basic homegoods is both futuristic and realistic. Since the game only occurs two hundred years in the future (the story has a good explanation for how we become so advanced in such a short amount of time) many devices look advanced, but not so far. There's nothing terribly unrealistic about many of the weapons Shepard and her squad uses. And whenever you find yourself in a domestic setting, a coffee machine still appears like a coffee machine, kitchen goods are still familiar. Point is, the models are designed to match the environment, to create a world we can believe in. Much like the architecture used in level design, culture also plays into a factor. The asari-made Disciple shotgun has the same elegant curves as their buildings. The geth plasma shotgun has similar designs to geth spaceships and architecture. Reaper husks have the same color scheme and theme as the Reapers themselves. Care is taken to ensure that the models match the culture that created them, again requiring creativity and talent. The modelers who design these things are artists in and of themselves, and their product is art.

Music is another artform encountered in a video game. Mass Effect 2 ends with the destruction of the Collector base, met with a heart-pounding song consisting of trumpets, violins, a choir, all at a fast paced beat. The final space battle for earth begins with the Normandy entering the Sol Relay (the Mass Relay that enters Earth's solar system) followed by a massive fleet that Shepard put together. First the Normandy exits the relay, then hundreds, perhaps thousands of ships come out of faster-than-light behind it, in an awesome moment coupled with a powerful battle theme, with subtle notes from ME's first theme song. It is a song of inspiration and hope and galactic unity, a song that says “we will not go without a fight.” Or take the music that plays as Shepard is leaving Vancouver as the Reaper invasion of Earth begins. As the Normandy begins to take off, a sad song begins to play. She's watching from the open cargo door. Two shuttles are loading evacuees, including a small boy. As the shuttles are loaded, a Reaper descends upon them. The Reaper's appearance punctuates the music with harsh chaotic sound. The shuttles take off. The Reaper fires and destroys both shuttles. Shepard looks away in horror and grief and then enters the Normandy, shutting the cargo door behind her. As the music continues, the Normandy ascends, and we see Vancouver under assault from many Reapers. Then once out in space, we see the reminiscent of the destroyed human fleet and the firetrails of the Reapers and their forces descending on to our planet. And we can see the outline of the continents on Earth began to light up with fire. The music enhances the sorrow of that scene, making the player feel shocked and horrified by what is happening to our homeworld. I literally was so taken back by seeing that little boy get killed, I shouted “No!” at my computer before I even realized it.

Here's the scene:

Music adds an emotional atmosphere to the game. The Suicide Run theme at the end of Mass Effect two makes an exciting scene even more exciting by adding music that pumps adrenaline. The Leaving Earth music adds sorrow to an already horrific scene. The music at the end of ME3, much like Leaving Earth, is also sorrowful, yet bittersweet, for the sacrifices required to finally defeat the Reapers. Music is a very powerful tool when used correctly.

The Suicide Run:

 An End Once For All (played at the very end of ME3):

Related to music, is sound. Sound may not often be considered art, yet I would say it is. Ben Burt, who designed most most of Star War's sounds was very creative creating the sounds in the Star Wars films, often using the weirdest sources to come up with the sound of a hyperdrive or a blaster or a lightsaber hum. The world is full of sounds and it is an art to produce sounds that work.

Sound, like music, can also elicit emotions, fear being the easiest. Of all the creatures the Reapers unleash upon us, I hate Banshees the most, because of that unearthly wail they make when they approach the player. It's bonechilling, not only because they are difficult to defeat, but because it's such a high pitch wail. Half Life 2 features Fast Zombies, another example of a good use of sound. They too feature a high pitched wail that sends tingles up the spine, but worse, you can hear their footsteps, which is just as chilling. In the Ravenholm mission, the Half Life protagonist Gordon Freeman finds himself on a rooftop with a shotgun. It is dark and you can hear them screaming and coming up the gutters, shaking the pipes and they come from every direction. You know you are surrounded. In another episode, Gordon is in a tunnel, his only light is from a few flares and a flashlight with dying batteries and you hear them from every direction.

Sound can also be rewarding too. There are upbeat chimes and tones that play in Mario games when Mario finds a powerup of some sort, letting the player know he found something good. Knowing when and how to use sound is an art in and of itself.

Perhaps one of the most enriching aspect of a video game often frequently downplayed by men like Ebert who probably don't play a lot of games, is their ability to tell a story. Books and movies are great mediums to tell a story, but a video game puts you in the protagonist shoes. Mass Effect and Dragon Age lets you even make choices for the protagonist. It's more personal this way, when done right, because now you see the world as the character sees them, not as some third party reading or watching the story unfold. You see Commander Shepard's galaxy as she sees it, not as a person sitting on a couch watching from afar. You become more invested in the story, more emotionally involved. At the start of the game when I saw that little kid get blown up, it wasn't only the music that made me feel it, it was my own involvement in the game, how I was drawn into the world of the game itself. I could feel what the Commander felt, and that was a feeling of shock and grief. For a fictional, computer generated kid.

Mass Effect is full of all these little moments, good and bad, where you you're drawn into the emotional content of the game. You feel enraged and helpless on Thessia when Kai Leng escapes with the data that might defeat the Reapers, as Thessia falls to the Reapers. You laugh when Shepard and Garrus have their little shooting contest. You feel angry and disgusted when you realize the abomination Cerberus has performed at Sanctuary, tricking refugees from the war to turn them into test subjects. You feel sorrow when you're forced to escape Earth as the Reapers invade. You feel proud when the krogan are freed or the quarians regain their homeworld. As I said earlier, these moments are enhanced by music, but they are made by the storytelling that occurs. You began to care about the characters and so when one dies, you feel it. It hurts to leave Ashley or Kaiden behind at Virmire to die. It hurts to see Mordin Solus die at the Shroud facility in order to give the krogan a future. It hurts to see Legion die to free the geth and enable the geth to stop their war with the quarians to aid them in rebuilding their world.

The Death of Dr. Mordin Solus (scene begins at 1:35 if you don't care for the Reaper vs Thresher Maw bit)

Acting is a part of story telling and while it may be strange to call it acting when the actors are computer generated models, except for their voices, yet it is acting because the body language and facial expressions in the animations give you the emotional story, as well as the dialogue done by BioWare's talented team of voice actors. After escaping Earth and Mars, at one point Shepard is in the communications room, after discussing things with Admiral Hackett with squadmate Liara T'soni. Liara says to Shepard, “its going to get worse, isn't it?” Shepard stops, looks at Liara, and grimly says, “if we don't stop the Reapers, yes.” It's difficult to describe in words but visually (the image is below this paragraph) that scene sells the emotions. It's going to get worse. And part of why seeing the little kid get blown up on Earth is so difficult is Shepard's facial expression, first one of worry and fear, then one of dismay and grief. Another moment that is perhaps not so grim is in Mass Effect 2, at the end, when Shepard shuts off the Illusive Man. Having finished the mission and no longer wanting to work for him, she shuts him off mid-sentence and then walks away with a big smile. As she makes her way through the damaged Normandy, her team looks to her and nods in acknowledgment, loyal and proud to work under her command. No words are spoken at this point, just body language and facial expression. With a team of talented animators, the use of flesh and blood actors is not a necessity to illustrate the emotional content of a story. Again, this requires talent and creativity on the part of the modeling and animating team.

"It's going to get worse, isn't it?" "If we don't stop the reapers . . . yeah."  Even a screenshot can't do it justice.

Storytelling is the oldest form of art. Our history was brought down from older generations through oral retellings. Mass Effect is one of the games I've played with a well written story that just took me in. From the initial mission on Eden Prime, seeing Sovereign ascending in the sky, to finally firing the Crucible to defeat the Reapers at the end, it is a long, yet fascinating story that hooks the players. As an example, Mass Effect 2 perhaps has my favorite beginning for a video game. It begins with Miranda Lawson talking to the Illusive Man about Shepard. The first impression of the Illusive Man (TIM) is that he is a man with ulterior motives, a man who's interests won't be what they appear to be. You know he is sinister, even though what exactly is sinister about TIM is not revealed until ME3. Then it turns to the familiar Normandy and its crew looking for geth, orbiting a planet. Suddenly, the Normandy is attacked by a mysterious ship. The Normandy is pulverized, half the crew is killed and Shepard is launched into space, where her suit springs a leak, she asphyxiates, falls into the planet's gravity, and dies. It is a jaw dropping opening. Who is the Illusive Man and what does he want wish Shepard? What was the mysterious ship and why did it target the Normandy? And how in the world did the game start out by killing the protagonist? Well as the game continues, Shepard is revived after two years on an operating table and the story slowly answers most of those questions, but that first ten minutes just hooks the player into the game.

The Illusive Man

Mass Effect 1 was very effective as well, in how it revealed its plot. For the first three quarters of the game, Shepard is chasing Saren Arterius, the apparent antagonist of the game, but at Virmire she learns the truth. Saren is not the antagonist. Saren is nothing but a puppet. Saren's ship, Sovereign, is the true antagonist of the story. Saren is not using Sovereign, Sovereign is using Saren. Sovereign is in fact a Reaper using Saren to allow the rest of the Reapers, awaiting in dark space beyond the galaxy, to enter and began their harvest of the galaxy. It is a very effective plot twist because upto the point where Shepard talks with Sovereign at Virmire, Sovereign is barely spoken of and most certainly not seeing as a sentient, intelligent being.

 

The cinematographic teams used their own creativity to advance the plot, especially at the climax of each game. The Battle of the Citadel at the end of Mass Effect 1 is an exciting end to the game, as Shepard uses the Conduit to return to the Citadel and races to stop Saren, while Sovereign and the geth assault the Citadel through the Mass Relay, pulverizing Citadel and Alliance forces in their way. As Sovereign works to activate the Citadel and allow the Reapers to enter the galaxy, the galaxy fights back, but Sovereign makes short work of any ship that tries to destroy him until Shepard destroys Saren, disrupting Sovereign's shield. The game ends with Sovereign being obliterated and a piece of Sovereign crashing on Shepard, who is believed to be dead until she pulls herself up from the rubble.

During the Suicide Run in Mass Effect 2, after going through the Omega 4 Relay to attack the Collectors on their home turf, there's an exhilarating scene with the Normandy evading Collector forces in the debris field on the far end of the relay. It's exciting not only because its action packed, but also because, depending on how you played the game so far, the player might lose squad mates due to the damage the Normandy takes. With the right upgrades, everyone will live, but without those upgrades, upto three will die. The assault on Earth in ME3, which I already mentioned when talking about music, is a visual treat when the fleets arrive through the Mass Relay. The Normandy comes through the relay, followed by a massive fleet from every species in the galaxy, united under Shepard's banner. They quickly make their way to earth, passing some familiar planets along the way, to engage the Reaper forces in what might be the largest sci-fi battle in history. These plot points are definite works of art, designed and written by talented animators.

ME3 final battle:

The overall plot is not the best plot I've ever read, but it is still a very good plot. However, whether or not I think it is good is irrelevant, the plot is a work of creativity and its purpose is to evoke a reaction, which it does. The plot keeps the player interested and invested. It's a fascinating plot, in part because it explores the galaxy's cultures, it threatens the galaxy with annihilation, it has conflict and romance and many philosophical moments. It makes you think at times.

The characterization is some of the best I've ever seen. Many video games have dry and shallow characters. Duke Nukem is just a macho gunslinger who kills bad guys with a big gun. Shepard has a personality, or perhaps I should say personalities, since it depends on how the player chooses to play her (or him.) The side characters all have good back stories, they add to the story and they are interesting to engage in conversation. You are made to care for the ones on your team and to be frustrated by the ones who oppose you. Udina is a great example of a frustrating character, he is an ambitious and selfish politician who gets in Shepard's way too many times. You find yourself hating the man, but you have to deal with him. You get to know your squadmates. Garrus becomes your loyal protege, taking Shepard's lead in his own actions. Thane's death is touching because his last thoughts are to pray to his gods, begging them to forgive her.

With a strong plot, good characters, powerful moments and surprising twists, the story itself is an art. Even from the first mission of the game, arriving at Eden Prime, being attacked by the geth, betrayed by Saren and seeing Sovereign in the sky, the game draws you into the plot. It is an entertaining journey from Eden Prime to the final defeat of the Reapers with the Crucible. And I was downright impressed with how well the trilogy was put together, but again, this is not meant to be a review of the ME trilogy. Half Life has the same elements in it, though perhaps at a smaller scale. Half Life also has a story that draws the player further into the twists and turns of the game, especially with the mystery of the G-Man, who controls Gordon Freeman throughout Half Life and its sequals. The story element is the last art element in the game.

All these elements, when put together and executed with talent, can create a masterpiece, a supreme work of art. Yet, a game doesn't have to master every single one of these elements to be art, the game doesn't have to master any of them, they simply have to exist within the game. Not every element needs to be there either. A game is art so long as it is a creative expression and it evokes a response in the player, thus any game can be art, even Minesweeper. Roger Ebert is wrong. Roger Ebert looks at a game and is prejudiced to believe it is nothing but vapid trash. Games with outstanding visuals, storytelling, world building and so on and so forth, such as Half Life, Mass Effect and Skyrim can be masterpieces. And lesser games are still art, because aesthetic quality is subjective to the viewer. All games are art on some level or another.

J Kuhl Signing Off