Spector: what Ebert thinks is "irrelevant"

By Wesley Yin-Poole Published 25 July, 2010

"He doesn't get it."

Deus Ex creator Warren Spector has called film critic Roger Ebert's view that videogames can never be art "irrelevant".

Spector, who's in charge of Wii exclusive Disney Epic Mickey, said of the Chicago-based journalist: "He doesn't get it."

In April Ebert once again hit the headlines for weighing in on the eternal "games as art" debate.

He wrote a stinging blog post entitled: "Videogames can never be art."

"One obvious difference between art and games is that you can win a game. It has rules, points, objectives, and an outcome. Santiago might cite an immersive game without points or rules, but I would say then it ceases to be a game and becomes a representation of a story, a novel, a play, dance, a film. Those are things you cannot win; you can only experience them."

Earlier this month he followed up his post, which attracted over 4500 comments, mostly critical, with a more sedate comment.

"My error in the first place was to think I could make a convincing argument on purely theoretical grounds. What I was saying is that videogames could not in principle be Art. That was a foolish position to take, particularly as it seemed to apply to the entire unseen future of games. This was pointed out to me maybe hundreds of times. How could I disagree? It is quite possible a game could someday be great Art."

For Spector, though, Ebert's opinion is moot.

"If we haven't already won, we're inevitably going to win," he told Eurogamer in an interview published elsewhere on the site.

"Videogames are just coming out of the period where I describe them as the medium adults don't get. Roger Ebert is like the adult. He doesn't get it.

"The fact is if we haven't already reached the point where this is true, we're very close to reaching the point where everyone plays games, in the same way that everyone goes to the movies and everyone watches television. We're really at that sort of point where everybody plays games.

"As younger people grow up and as twenty-somethings have kids and they start gaming – it's not like the twenty-somethings are going to stop playing games when they get to thirty, forty and fifty. We're becoming a mainstream medium where everybody plays.

"Eventually some other thing will come along that I don't get or you don't get and we'll all say, 'Oh, those kids today, that stuff isn't art.' The same thing happened with movies. Go back to the early days of movies. Go back to the early days of the novel, for crying out loud. That can't be art. Go back to the days when people gave Shakespeare a hard time.

"Whatever medium adults don't understand can't be art. Eventually those adults go away and new adults take their place, and some other medium takes the place of the thing that everybody hates. We're coming out of that period now. What Roger Ebert thinks is completely irrelevant."

Spector isn't the first creator to hit back at Ebert's thoughts on videogames.

In 2007 Ebert had a very public spat with novelist and director Clive Barker, who said: "It's evident that Ebert had a prejudiced vision of what the medium is, or more importantly what it can be."

"We can debate what art is, we can debate it forever. If the experience moves you in some way or another... Even if it moves your bowels... I think it is worthy of some serious study."

That prompted a response from Ebert, who said: "The word 'prejudiced' often translates as 'disagrees with me'. I might suggest that gamers have a prejudiced view of their medium, and particularly what it can be.

"Games may not be Shakespeare quite yet, but I have the prejudice that they never will be, and some gamers are prejudiced that they will."

Last year immensely successful Hollywood composer Hans Zimmer said he considered games to be as legitimate an art form as films and theatre.

"When movies first came out, maybe they were in black and white and there wasn't any sound and people were saying the theatre is still the place to be. But now movies and theatre have found their own place in the world. They are each legitimate art forms.

"And now this new thing, it's interesting," he added. "We still call it a game. The word has a slightly sort of downmarket quality, that word. It is a trivial word."

Picture of Wesley.

About Wesley Yin-Poole

Wesley is Eurogamer's news editor. He likes news, interviews, and more news. He also likes Street Fighter more than anyone can get him to shut up about it.

Read more articles from Wesley by visiting the Wesley Yin-Poole archive page.

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Comments (34) Latest comment 2 years ago

Comments for this article are now closed, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • Tomo #1 2 years ago

    Wesley, go to sleep man.

  • Haloboy #2 2 years ago

    We'll all lie down. We'll all go to sleep......IT'LL BE ANARCHY!

  • gjgjg #3 2 years ago

    in art speak, ebert is being a typical noob getting pwnd, and i for one love it

  • Mr.Small #4 2 years ago

    Forget about Roger Ebert. What does Roger Art think?
    Edited by Mr.Small at 26/07/10 @ 00:24

  • Lexx87 #5 2 years ago

    Can I just ask that instead of saying "in an interview posted elsewhere on the site" just offer a link to said interview?

  • Gylfi #6 2 years ago

    Mr. Ebert ignores the uniqueness of a media.

    When novels were born, they were consumables, they were chaotic amassment of events, one after the other, it was FILTHY type of writing, rough entertainment, dirty senseless reading.

    That man wouldn't find novels art either, it is rather obvious. Novels never had the type of art of poems and theatre, and notwithstanding the attempts made to give novels aspects of both theatre and poetry, they didn't have a good reputation.

    then something happened. Art began appearing bashfully, conceived, generated by novels OWN UNIQUE matter. It was the whole idea of the INTRIGUE! also called the "romanesque". Art in novels suddenly was sensed in the plot taken as a whole, when you finish reading and you rethink the plot in its entirety.

    Art in videogames follows the EXACT procedure but in its UNIQUE element, which is IN-TER-ACT-ION. The art in pac-man is not the imagery(it belongs to painting), it's in the way you play.

    It's in the:
    structure, the final "spectre" of electrical impulses formed during a session, the way you think, the way you interact.
    Edited by Gylfi at 25/07/10 @ 03:20

  • BabyJesus #7 2 years ago

    Who gives a shit, you lead a charmed life if your hobby being considered an artform is of any sort of importance.

  • Telepathic.Geometry #8 2 years ago

    If we cared what that ebert dude has to say about the medium, then that would truly be sad.

    If I see a beautiful picture, and that can be art, then a beautiful game that surprises, enlightens and elevates me must surely be the same.

  • Genji #9 2 years ago

    Bloody hell, he only said that because the interviewer pushed him for an answer. Just let the interview speak for itself. There's no need to poach it for irrelevant news spam.

  • Harmonica #10 2 years ago

    What the guy above me said.

  • Milkman1 #11 2 years ago

    EG has turned to another gossip site with gaming news.
    Edited by Milkman1 at 25/07/10 @ 08:11

  • TenMinJoe #12 2 years ago

    The key problem with Ebert's argument is that it's a tautology. He says "Santiago might cite an immersive game without points or rules, but I would say then it ceases to be a game and becomes a representation of a story, a novel, a play, dance, a film."

    So, what he's saying is, games cannot be art, because his definition of art is "not a game".

  • Genji #13 2 years ago

    Yeah, that's a tautology, but I don't see a problem with it. If one takes art as an experience to be viewed and not played, then games just do not fit. Simple as that.

    I don't really *agree* with that definition, but that's another matter entirely.

  • rodpad #14 2 years ago

    Limbo says hi.

  • TheJuriel #15 2 years ago

    Ebert is a clueless ass. No news.

    Next he'll be yelling at kids to get off his lawn.

  • Turambar #16 2 years ago

    This all depends on your definition of art. Some definitions would say by their nature games can't art others would say they already are. Really all thats required is to get the cabal of artists that support Damien Hirst to say games are art and they will be, regardless of whether they are or not.

  • Seth. #17 2 years ago

    As far as I know there is this particurlar art movement known as formalism according to which games probably are art in most cases. I think Ebert sees art as strictly a form of "expression" while that isn't necessarily true, to quote wikipedia on the subject " [...] a work's artistic value is entirely determined by its form--the way it is made[...]"

  • dot.dot #18 2 years ago

    Everyone is sure he's wrong but don't bother citing an example. The original point of games is to sell, the original point of art is to instruct. Relatively speaking games became more about selling, art more about skill level. Similarly photography and film started in a functional way and then turned into a quest for aptitude. The same cannot be said for games. They started off life as by-products of machines that did something completely different (eg. oscilloscope, radar).

    This is why when the point of games came around selling them was the only point because archiving them had no merit. I mean Electroplankton, Beyond Good and Evil, they're not art. And if they're not art then what is going to be art? Answer no game, ever. Interacting directly is not art.

  • nickthegun #19 2 years ago

    Who cares? Why are people so desperate to have videogames classed as art?

  • Sunyavadin #20 2 years ago

    Ebert is as relevant to games as he is to film, writing, theatre, and fishing.

  • TeaFiend #21 2 years ago

    Art is subjective. Some people think half a fish in a formaldehyde block is art, some think some music written by a deaf man is art, some think some contempary plays written by a balding gentlemen are art, some think a few people dressing up as animals and singing is art. Subjective innit?

  • Gelgamek #22 2 years ago

    I agree with Genji on this one. I know the news here often gets a lot of undeserved flak thrown at it below the line, but this is borderline entrapment journalism, tabloid style.

    Sure, it isn't fundamentally important or particularly malicious, but it is the cheapest piece of journalism I've seen on this site. Carry on down this road and you may end up taking object lessons in apology from the Daily Star.

  • Bremenacht #23 2 years ago

    How many Hollywood films have you seen where the hero wins? Almost every film? Doesn't matter what the plot is, or who the hero is, the hero wins almost every time. It's automatic and it's somehow art, according to film critics like this guy.

    Yet, if you introduce interaction and call the medium a game, it's suddenly not art?

  • curtlikesmeat #24 2 years ago

    No idea why he gets so much press, I read a few of his reviews once and he's not that great at his day job.

  • guernican #25 2 years ago

    To be fair, many of the things Ebert says seem perfectly reasonable.

    The very fact that the debate is open and attracting interest is an indicator that games have cultural relevance and worth. And, as another commentor has pointed out (using the birth of novels as an art form as an example) culture is constantly evolving, and that in itself is worthy of discussion.

  • guernican #26 2 years ago

    @nickthegun

    Well, on some (ironically quite commercial) levels, it is important. Tax breaks, for example... I believe that currently the British video game industry gets nothing like the public financial support that, say, the film or theatre industry does.

  • metalangel #27 2 years ago

    Given we can't even classify what counts as art, why does it matter games fit into it or not?

    I can't understand why this is so important, why we feel we have to justify or somehow legitimize our pursuit to other people who already couldn't care less.

  • Ryze #28 2 years ago

    It's interactive, computer based entertainment.

    The word 'game' makes certain people baulk at the idea that they could ever be art.

    They only know Space Invaders and Pacman etc.

    Yes - such people very irrelevant - they're ignorant and uninformed.

  • Slipstream #29 2 years ago

    I'm glad to such a clear, concise and very real response Mr Spector. The ring of truth shines around your words.

    Growing up with the industry I've always felt it growing as a medium where the appreciation for it has risen, hell I've seen it with my own eyes, working in a games store at one point has brought before me many varied types of gamers, from all walks of life, some of these people you wouldn't have seen 10 years ago, not unless they were accompanying their kids, but no, in many instances elderly gamers, mothers and attractive business types all have a stake in our industry.

    and YES something bigger and better will come along this is the way of the world.
    Edited by Slipstream at 25/07/10 @ 23:43

  • Kami #30 2 years ago

    Indeed, enough of the Ebert bashing. What Ebert did was actually a great thing - he challenged the games industry and gamers to think about what we call "art". He was civil and surprisingly, was happy to converse with the industry and gamers alike to their thoughts - and we did, and the vast majority of us kept it clean. It was a worthwhile debate to have. Does that mean Ebert is right? No, and he readily admits he isn't an expert on this field (though I found his willingness to learn a little rather refreshing compared to some in his field). But in many cases he does have a point, and I found it refreshing to hear the debate bring up the fact that the games industry is much like the film industry - lots of smaller titles for niche markets amidst a handful of multi-million-dollar blockbusters. The two are not dramatically dissimilar.

    Even if Ebert's feelings are irrelevant, that doesn't mean we shouldn't be prepared to be challenged. The film industry has been challenged many times before now, and we should accept that to grow and flourish the industry we love, adore and in some cases work for does need to be quizzed sometimes on direction, on meaning, on acting and on artistry. It's perfectly healthy and the industry isn't going to collapse overnight whilst we wrestle this thing out.

    Ebert may not understand the medium we choose to be fans of, but that doesn't mean we should ignore him. Much like my grandfather, he didn't understand the industry in the way I do, but he enjoyed games. He often questioned my taste in games (though I admit I often questioned his taste in return!), he often asked me what I saw in games. He never got Resident Evil, but by being challenged on it - and my grandfather being the first to point out how out-of-context you could take Resident Evil 3 - I learned to understand why I love that franchise.

    Ebert isn't irrelevant. It's an important issue, and one that I for one think we should thank Ebert for bringing to the forefront. In that sense, he isn't irrelevant at all, and those who are so eager to dismiss him as such probably have nothing to add to the discussion of worth anyway. Which is the way in some debates, if you can't say anything nice a little mud-slinging will get peoples attention, if only so that we can think "What a cock!"...

  • stoic #31 2 years ago

    Roger Ebert? roger meh-bert is more like it.

  • jaguarwong #32 2 years ago

    Why are films always trotted out as the counter to this age old argument?

    Most films aren't art, most books and a hell of a lot of music isn't art - christ, most paintings aren't even art!

    So why should it be such a surprise that the vast majority of videogames aren't art either?
    Edited by jaguarwong at 26/07/10 @ 09:37

  • gnrlstuart #33 2 years ago

    they can slam us on tv and in the media. but on the internet, where everyone get's a say. rash conclusions and audacious comments get what they deserve. negative feedback.

  • kingmong #34 2 years ago

    I thought this whole thing was hilarious from the start.

    Ebert, a critic who primarily deals in film, probably the newest medium to be "accepted" as a possible expression of art, denounces the next new thing (interactive media) as being artless.

    As Spector suggests, I'm sure theatre critics said the same about cinema.

    Pretty short sighted. Particularly as many games have moved on from being about "winning" to focusing on the user experience. Awareness of user perspective and how to manipulate it opens up opportunities for social commentary, philosophical/moral exploration, or pure visceral thrill. All of which can be found in other art forms.

    However, not all games aspire to being art, just as not all film or music does. I will say that games generally lack subtlety, which is a disappointment.

    Ps I really enjoy many of Ebert's reviews, though I only look at them after I've seen the film. He's a proper dick about dropping spoilers.
    Edited by kingmong at 26/07/10 @ 17:03