next »

[cactus]

Ultimately I think making fun of art of any kind is entirely valid because no one should take themselves too seriously.

[nihilocrat]

No, really, I'm serious. We shouldn't spend our time on Earth entirely up our own asses.

Yes i notice how the use of the word 'serious' in that sentence is kind of amusing.

[Glaiel-Gamer]

No, really, I'm serious. We shouldn't spend our time on Earth entirely up our own asses.

Yes i notice how the use of the word 'serious' in that sentence is kind of amusing.

I kind of disagree, people seem to be taking my message to the extreme and think I'm lumping all art games together or all retro games together. No, it's a criticism of using excessive abstraction in a game to produce a result. This is common in art games where they just do something completely abstract and let the populace create a meaning for the game. A little bit of abstraction and "fill in the blank"age is good, but a lot of people go way too far on it and any sort of message the game would have had is lost at that point.

Do you see why now the last few signs are unreadable?

[aeiowu]

there's a _very_ good reason these games are more abstract than direct. In both the ways they convey messages and their art styles.

In the beginning of pilgrimage, for instance, I started out as a dude with a big chin (if I remember correctly). At the keyboard, the player is subconsciously thinking: "hmmm, i'm this dude with a big chin" rather than "hey, that's me." There's an important extra layer of interpretation going on when you use realistic representations of people, especially when the game requires you control a character from anything but the first-person view.

It's why passage/gravitation are pixeled. Rohrer wanted to evoke broad archetypes rather than specific characters. Man and Woman. Father and child. In the case of Gray, that's 100% why we went with symbols. Not only so the player would feel like "that's me!" but also so that they'd feel like this mob that they were going against could be dealing with any issue they wanted. It's not important the game be about politics or civil rights or PETA or whatever. It's important the underlying interactive message be conveyed the way the player sees fit.

Abstraction isn't bullshit. It _is_ easy, sure. Once you understand its power, but it's most certainly useful, and I'd argue perhaps the most useful when in interactive form. Take a look at books for instance. People don't see them as abstract works of art, but the nature of typography and written word is a purely abstract form of communication. Abstract != crap on a canvas, but moreso to reduce a physical object or concept down to its most basic elements. Artists take license with this, sure, but back to books. The written word is merely an a marker to convey an idea of an object/feeling etc. If I write "vase" everyone can agree on the basic shape, but we'd all come up with our own adornments, color, flourishes and so on. I've always felt like books/writing is one of the most interactive media we have.

[nihilocrat]

Like happens in most threads, I was talking about something entirely tangential. You probably think I'm an uncultured brute, I guess all I am really trying to say is that if you are trying to convey a particular message through any kind of art, the vast majority of people are going to miss your message entirely, and the comments you got from Newgrounds are evidence of this. As you seem to think, the likelihood of this gets even higher each time you add some layer of abstraction.

I would argue that if you're seriously concerned about your message, just don't bother trying to express it so indirectly. I appreciate artists that aren't concerned with this but see their art as a way of people find their own message and create their own experience, and that the artist was just a vehicle to this rather than a director of the experience. An artist with this opinion needs to be prepared for people who are just going to miss the point, or think it's dumb, or think the artist is a jerk.

[Glaiel-Gamer]

No ya I get that but if you ignore the cream of the crop and the good art games (I enjoyed Gray, it was well done IMO) you end up with quite a lot of "art games" which (while the author may have had good intentions for) really aren't made that well but are unquestionably "art" simply because they make them appear like art games. 4-bit Pixel graphics and some vague words and some sad music and some basic game engine is all you need to make something look like an art game. And people do this. And people get praised for it. And the people who question it get flamed for it, simply because "it's art". Look at daniel benmurgui's stuff: It's abstract yes, but he manages to communicate emotions and messages through his work that most people seem to get, without excessive text or artistic statements.

There's a balance. Most people that played Pilgrimage liked the way the game looked when you reach the area before the platform with like 12 enemies on it. It was pixelly and unique and they liked it there cause it looked cool, but the main character kept going farther and farther and people complained that it was TOO pixelly and hard to make out what anything was anymore at the end. I get comments like "You should have stopped when it was only 8-bit it was a bit too extreme at the end" They don't realize it, but that's exactly the point I was trying to make. I was surprised at just how many of the newgrounds comments were like that. In their comments, they specify points I was trying to make throughout the game without realizing it, often as complaints of the game itself. Or even better, "Then I read the artist statement and got it". Considering that the artist statement was literally randomly generated meaningless nonsense that had nothing to do with the game, it just shows how desperate people are to find meaning in stuff that appears abstract that they will fool themselves into thinking they understand it.

[Afinostux]

Goddamn I just about fell out of my chair with that achievement at the end.

Also, abstraction: It is a tool. nothing more than that. Look at early picasso for instance. Abstraction was something he settled on, not something he fell back on. It's all well and good for communicating concepts and such (aeiowu sedd it betar), but more often than not it's a matter of someone who can't be arsed to learn to art correctly. What I find jarring is when it seems that the artist is using the art style as a crutch, and they are literally incapable of producing something outside of their comfort zone. Basically, the artist should control the art, not the other way around.

I dunno. I play things like audiosurf and dwarf fortress on a regular basis, which are abstract as hell. I have also never liked anything made by messhof. I am one biased mofo.

[Glaiel-Gamer]

Goddamn I just about fell out of my chair with that achievement at the end.

Also, abstraction: It is a tool. nothing more than that. Look at early picasso for instance. Abstraction was something he settled on, not something he fell back on. It's all well and good for communicating concepts and such (aeiowu sedd it betar), but more often than not it's a matter of someone who can't be arsed to learn to art correctly. What I find jarring is when it seems that the artist is using the art style as a crutch, and they are literally incapable of producing something outside of their comfort zone. Basically, the artist should control the art, not the other way around.

I dunno. I play things like audiosurf and dwarf fortress on a regular basis, which are abstract as hell. I have also never liked anything made by messhof. I am one biased mofo.

Ya exactly. I love picasso, I love dali, but I'm not too fond of mondrian or pollock.