Videogames and Their Elements as a New Form of Art

An Introduction

Videogames were born in the 20th century, at the beginning of the seventies. In a historical context of rising capitalism, and as part of an innovation that mixes technology with entertainment. The innovative trait taken from modernity functions as a fundamental axis of the industry and keeps it in constant evolution. An evolution in three fields: technological, ludic, and creative.

Below I present a historical journey through the videogame industry where I will observe and analyze how, through technological innovation and the creative capabilities of their creators, elements are configured to form a new form of representation, inheriting and mixing concepts from other art fields. The objective is to make an analysis through time, managing to interpret how this new form of expression is formed, observe how its elements are configured, and review the present along with the relationship with the art world.

History

The first people to create these programs called videogames came mainly from the field of hard sciences and technology. Electronic engineers or programmers, generally very distant from the art field and more linked to technology and industry in general. As technical capabilities began to be greater, videogames began to have the possibility of being more visually appealing, being able to incorporate increasingly advanced graphic components. From the first ones in 1972, like the classic Pong, until the beginning of the eighties, colors were limited to white and black. Only in 1980 did games begin to appear with 4, 8, and up to 16 different colors. The incorporation of color is a fundamental milestone for the generation of expression, as it enables authors to have new possibilities of representation. Without doubt, technological advancement in the field of computer science is what allows, lays the foundations, and opens endless aesthetic possibilities to generate new graphic, auditory, and interactive proposals.

Pong (or Tele-Pong) was a videogame from the first generation of videogame consoles published by Atari, created by Nolan Bushnell and launched on November 29, 1972.

The basic, irreducible graphic element is the pixel. A pixel is the smallest homogeneous unit in color that forms part of a digital image, whether it be a photograph, a video frame, or a graphic. In the most common form of computer graphics, the thousands of tiny pixels that make up an individual image are projected on a screen as illuminated dots that at a distance appear as a continuous image.

Throughout the entire decade of the eighties and for much of the nineties, this small element would be the basis of all graphic creation, later becoming the definition of an aesthetic, initially generated by a technological limitation, and by the digital medium itself, which restricts in all its fields the infinite intermediate values of the analog or real world.

When in the real world two or more paints are mixed on a palette, infinite color nuances are obtained. That combination, that generation of infinite intermediate values is the intrinsic property of the analog par excellence.

The same occurs in musical notes with the generation of tones with a string or in a conversation between two people face to face, moving their hands, exchanging glances, or using facial expressions. In the digital world, this perfection generated by the infinity of possibilities is finite and limited. While technological capacity when increased provides greater nuances, these possibilities will always be finite; there will always be a discrete value, however immensely small, where the jump between one state and another will be direct, without intermediates. From this it follows that the greater the technological capacity, the greater the intermediate values, and the closer a digital interpretation will be to an analog one. Making an analogy again with the musical arts, it is completely different for a song interpreted by a musician, with all the tonal nuances with which they can personalize their song, than a computer interpreting note by note to perfection. That perfection will be cold and dehumanized for lacking the musical tonalities that an artist can provide. The same as in a computer chat—it is impossible to reproduce at the moment all the additions of a face-to-face conversation. There is information that the digital world is not capable of processing.

But it will be this same limitation of the digital that causes and generates a new aesthetic based on the pixel and these limitations. Over the years, a graphic concept was formed that invokes all these elements that were part of the cultural history of a generation.

PIXELS by Patrick JEAN (OFFICIAL BY ONEMOREPROD - HD) OneMoreProduction 2 videos

Three-dimensional Worlds

Starting in the mid-nineties, 3D technologies enter the videogame industry and computing in general. These technologies begin to allow new ways of generating graphics, allowing more realistic images, the creation of fantastic worlds, and the possibility of creating alternative physics. Elements modeled by 3D artists created with programs with tools similar to those a sculptor might have, but in digital form.

Again in this creation we see the analogy between the analog of the real-world sculptor and the digital of the computer world. In the case of a surface created from some element with molding capabilities like clay, figures can be generated with imperfections and forms as curved as desired, with infinite midpoints. In computer 3D modeling, the created figure will always have a minimum unit, in this case called the polygon.

The number of polygons that a computer three-dimensional element possesses is what will give it its realism. At the same time, this number of polygons will be intimately related to the technological capacity to be able to generate the figures, or sets of figures. These technological capacities increased exponentially from the mid-nineties to our days. The most significant thing about three-dimensional worlds is that creation is partly generated by people and partly by the computer. People create and model objects, place backgrounds, arrange lights, and position a camera, then the computer, through a process called rendering and using mathematical functions of linear matrix transformations, automatically generates this image from the perspective of the placed camera and applying optics laws to objects according to the lights that have been placed.

A not insignificant detail in three-dimensional worlds is the application of textures. Textures are the surface element of objects. They are created by people in a two-dimensional format, as if it were wallpaper, a carpet, or a canvas, and then applied to objects. The calculation of texture deformation on the object is an integral calculation of the computer; the result could be similar to that of an upholsterer doing their work on some chair, or covering some object with fabric or paint. Like the rest of three-dimensional elements, they are restricted by technological capacity.

Videogame Texture Maps

Movement and Interaction

In a format similar to video art, where according to Lopez Anaya in his book “End of Century Rites” describes that video, virtual reality, and digital image originate a series of collaborations between the scientist and the artist, analogously we can affirm that the videogame itself takes these elements from video art in addition to images, virtual worlds, and computer processes, generating a collaboration between the digital artist and the engineer or programmer, who serves as architect and director of this virtual world full of images, textures, and movements originally generated by the artist. According to Frank Popper, these “electronic age media” produce a “new materiality” of the work of art. The movements generated in a videogame are practically unlimited. In almost all cases, the consumer/player is the generator of movement, based on the rules imposed by the established virtual world. Movement has also evolved in complexity and form from the beginning to the present, being initially basic linear movements limited by the technology of the moment, until we find ourselves today with three-dimensional movements performed in virtual worlds with the smoothness and naturalness provided by current analog interfaces that try with each technological leap to increasingly resemble delicate human movement, completely full of infinite nuances and diametrically opposed to a logical digital limitation of 0 and 1 or true and false where movement nuances are completely cut off. And to explain this analogy, one can compare a computer conversation, known as chat, versus a face-to-face conversation. Digital conversation lacks expression, beyond what can be given with the use of capital letters, some exclamation mark, or emojis. Real conversation possesses infinite expressive nuances given by hand movement, tone of voice, facial features, and other elements that make up human expression.

In some current cases, movement itself is the generator of the work of art, as can be seen in the work Vestigios by artist Agustín Perez Fernandez where each player by moving leaves a trail, which changes color according to shots from another player, who also leaves a trail. At the end of the game, a unique work is generated, created by virtue of the movements of each of the participants. In this case, it is clearly visible how movement generates art.

Agustín Pérez Fernández and his work Vestigios, on Xbox 360 platform

Movement is one of the fundamental bases of the game, and thanks to it, most of the interactions given in a virtual world can be performed. Human movement, even in a virtual world, still possesses the human characteristic of chance and the unpredictable. And this trait makes the videogame stand out from computer-generated art, where guidelines, movements, and operations are given by a computer component, with chance limited by the medium itself where it is generated and by movements perfectly according to pre-established mathematical functions. This movement could be considered as the difference between an industrial piece of serial manufacturing generated by a robot and a unique sculpture created by a human.

Movement, beyond the movement itself, allows placing the consumer inside the virtual world and making them a participant in the environment that surrounds them, immerses them and surrounds them, granting them a new sensitive and different experience, where the consumer is at the same time author and achieves interaction with the created work. In the case of the work Vestigios, it is interaction that allows the movement that will shape the work of art created partly by the programmer artist and partly by the players. Interaction allows, among other things, movement and alteration of the virtual world. The virtual world of each videogame responds to stimuli originated by humans through interaction. Returning to the analog/digital comparison, we can infer that the more precise the interface that allows interaction, the richer the player’s experience will be. Again we observe how the passage of time and constant technological innovation make possible increasingly human interfaces giving rise to interactions and movements of freedom and richness unimaginable in past decades.

In general, the interaction itself, and the design of that interaction created in a videogame is also considered art, as explained by Paola Antonelli in her decision to buy a large number of videogames for the MOMA collection in New York.

Art Applied to Videogames

Another no less important element is the influence that art generates in videogame development. While the objective of these games is primarily to entertain, the fact that they receive artistic influences in their aesthetics and designs achieves an addition to the sensitive experience linked to art itself. The integration of artistic components within works achieves a richer creation and enhances its sensitive effect. This addition can be seen from the visual side, from the creation of complete aesthetics inspired by works of art, as well as in musical works applied directly to the player’s experience.

The worlds of the videogame Braid created by Jonathan Blow, with impressionist aesthetics mixed with a pixel-based character.

Videogame Proun, a race over abstract objects.

There are also narrative elements applied to the creation of these interactive pieces. Their main objective is to capture the player’s attention, similar to a novel, with resources taken from that literary genre such as the hero’s tale or the construction of a story itself. Regarding this genre, there were extreme cases where the game completely lacked graphics and was reduced to large volumes of text, which immersed the viewer in a virtual world devoid of all graphics and interactive through texts entered using a keyboard. Today there are platforms such as Twine to create what is now known as interactive fiction, where the player does not necessarily have to write actions as in Zork, but after a text can decide on two or more options put by the author.

The Zork series from Infocom company was a success during the early years of the eighties.

Videogames as Art Form

It is necessary to make a differentiation between videogames, whose main objective is to entertain, and which the art world takes the complete game, or certain elements to legitimize them and convert them into art pieces, as can be observed in various art exhibitions such as: “The Art of Videogames” at the Smithsonian American Art Museum. In this exhibition, graphic frames from certain videogames are taken and exhibited in the Museum. The mentioned exhibition divides videogames into five eras, referring to the historical age and the technology of the moment. Observed in perspective, we see that each era results in an aesthetic proposal referred to the moment and its technological limitations. These limitations collaterally resulted in diverse aesthetics, which at the same time function as engines to create original pieces today.

https://americanart.si.edu/exhibitions/games

Another type of videogame leaves aside the main objective of entertaining and are considered exclusively art pieces with the objective of achieving a sensitive experience in the art consumer/player. Many of these games take the aesthetics created by the technological limitations of other eras, creating current completely artistic works, using various narrative, aesthetic, visual, or interactive resources. A clear example is the videogame Today I Die created by Daniel Benmergui where the player must move certain elements of the game to change a story based on images. Achieving significant changes such as light and darkness or death and life through a phrase generated directly by the player’s interaction with the game elements.

Conclusion

This new medium of expression, like photography, video art, or cinema, does not possess the characteristic of a unique work. However, during these last forty years, a so-called art field has been configured, with three clear spheres given by production, circulation, and consumption. Whether in games with a completely artistic objective, which appeals to generate a sensitive experience in the player, or in games whose own components are artistic components, it can be visualized that art is present in this new form of expression that began in the early seventies. Today hundreds of exhibitions are organized around the world that link art and videogames. So much so that the National Endowment for the Arts of the United States has an artistic category dedicated to interactive media, translating into including videogames as a new form of art. In Argentina, since 2009, the Game On! exhibition has been held, which proposes to analyze videogames as a new form of art.

5th edition of Game On! Art in Play. Interview with Tomás Oulton

We are undoubtedly in the era of remix, and art does not escape from this mixture of elements. Videogames are created taking elements from other fields, creating new works from the mixture and dissection of other components. The videogame as art itself is also a mixture, a remix, a mashup of other art fields such as photography, cinema, video art, painting, music, and sculpture, and adding the interaction of the player/consumer, works can be appreciated and at the same time these serve to create other forms of art.

References

Books

Campo de poder, campo intelectual itinerario de un concepto - Book by Pierre Bourdieu

https://www.amazon.com/Campo-Poder-Intelectual-Spanish/dp/9871139195/ref=sr_1_fkmr0_1

Ritos de fin de siglo: arte argentino y vanguardia internacional - Book by Jorge López Anaya

https://www.amazon.com/Ritos-Fin-Siglo-Vanguardia-Internacional/dp/9500424525

La invención del arte: una historia cultural - Book by Larry Shiner

https://www.amazon.com/Invention-Art-Cultural-History/dp/0226753433/

Supercade A Visual History of the Videogame Age 1971-1984 - Book by Van Burnham

https://www.amazon.com/Supercade-Visual-History-Videogame-1971-1984/dp/0262524201

The Art of Videogames - Book by Grant Tavinor

https://books.google.de/books/about/The_Art_of_Videogames.html?id=LM3hnwGb8xUC

The Ultimate History of Video Games - Book by Steven Kent

www.amazon.com/Ultimate-History-Video-Games-Pokemon-ebook/dp/B003FCVF6I

Websites

Videogames as Art by David Cuen

Game On!

Agustín Perez Fernandez - Tembac

Daniel Benmergui - Ludomancy