Ever since there was that fabulous article by famed film critic, Roger Ebert, I have been thinking about the parallels between film and games. For me, his argument that video games can never be art was a failure simply because film and video games have such similar backgrounds. I’m not going to get into the ‘video games as art’ argument, because it’s completely silly, but I will point out the similarities I did notice. I learned a good deal about film and I’ll share a few tidbits without turning it into a whole history lesson.
When film began, people had never seen anything like it before. Before it came along, people would often go to vaudeville theatres to see people perform all sorts of things: singing, dancing slapstick comedy and all that good stuff. Due to limitations in possible film lenth, early films were mostly just more of the same, just on film. There were a few exceptions, including the Lumière brothers who were interested in filming real life. They showed their film of a train pulling into a station at a vaudeville theater in the 1800’s and the audience pretty much flipped their shit. They thought the train was going to kill them but then totally dug what they were seeing once they calmed down.
In a video game, the audience would have to waggle the left stick to not be hit by the train.
Videogames had a similar debut, although people didn’t think they were going to die, they just thought it was totally groovy. Pong, yes pong! It’s a game on a screen! It is interactive! Terrific! It was a simple start, but it was just about as appealing as early films were, with their boxing cats and all (Scratch that, cats boxing is awesome!)
This is a real film. The forefather of LOLcats, if you will.
It’s too bad there was no place like a theater where people could be exposed to this new and amazing video game technology at a low cost.
Oh wait, they did. It’s called an Arcade.
Film and videogames evolved in really similar ways:
1. Both got more and more complex and longer.
2. Both were originally about spectacle but then took a turn toward emphasizing story.
3. Similar techniques, like the Point-of-View shots (film) and First Person Shooter (games) are used to immerse the viewer in the story.
4. There are shitty films, as well as shitty games.
Basically, I simply think that both genres are valid and wonderful forms of art, and although I think there will continue to be amazing films, videogames may very well transcend films when it comes to emotional involvement. That’s for another day though….
See? Same thing.
