Our conscious minds can correct that gut reaction. Our reasonable, intelligent, objective state of mind can stop us from continuing along a faulty, misguided strain of thought. Yet its very existence is what concerns me.
The fact is, research can and is being done where video games are the source material. In order to conduct research, one must go through the art in a comprehensive manner with an analytical mindset. In the online journal Game Studies, researcher Greg Smith played Final Fantasy VII to study the role of dialogue in setting the game’s tone, and how dialogue conventions can be used in what many consider to be a primarily visual medium. Whether publishing in a scholarly journal or not, we as a society should start to process the idea that games aren’t just for pleasure.
Now, compare the image above to what is pictured below, a compilation of all the books I read this semester for my Classics of Rome class. (A class where we read english translations of Roman literature.)
By contrast, this stack looks like a compendium rich with meaning. If I drop this stack on a table, it makes a clap guaranteed to shock nearby onlookers. The Classics stack is daunting. One almost trembles at the thought of having to pore over each page, as I did, in writing several papers. Unless you’re a classics major, a historian, or a university professor, the idea of going through all of this is off-putting.
Yet if I’d dropped a stack of Ms. Sarkeesian’s games on the table in front of you, the reaction would be happier and more appreciative. And that’s fine. Games are inherently a fun medium, and we’d be lying if we said that we didn’t enjoy playing them, even when it’s with a purpose. When I sat down to prepare for my blog post about Japanese/Western elements in The Last Story, I had to go back, load some old save files, and replay parts of the game. I spent several hours playing, brainstorming, and playing again, followed by a healthy dose of research and consulting my notes from my Japanese Literature class. And I had fun while doing this.
But I also had fun reading through (most of) my Classics books. Horace is funny. Juvenal’s biting wit was enthralling. Cicero’s speeches were utterly brilliant. Lucretius, while a tad didactic, was interesting. Seneca’s tragedies were like a car wreck from which I couldn’t look away.
Yes, I was reading literature that’s two millennia old. The books were numerous and lengthy, and at times they were dull. But I enjoyed reading them while I prepared for papers and exams, just as I enjoyed reviewing The Last Story for the Japanese/Western elements blog post. (And I’m not a Classics major, a historian, or a university professor. I’m an undeclared economics major.)
These two scenarios are nearly identical. I went through the work, taking notes, referencing older parts of it (by page-turning or older save files), and constantly developing a stream of thoughts and ideas that I could then shape into a definitive thesis. Games and books only differ in how one accesses them.
During Ms. Sarkeesian’s kickstarter campaign, one of the more dim-witted attacks on her project and her character was that she was ‘getting other people to pay for her to play games’. The spirit of that attack is completely wrong-headed, and it’s one of the main reasons why video games are unable to get themselves taken seriously as an art form worthy of literary analysis. You know what college professors do? Yeah, they teach a few courses, but they mostly are paid to sit around, read, and write. Why? Because we recognize that having a class of experts who can devote their time to research and analysis is beneficial to society.
As gamers, we need to become more aware of our perceptions in regards to games in different contexts. If we have a difficult time seeing games as potential research materials, as possible mines for analysis, then how can we ever expect mainstream society to do so? Games are art, and while we’re well-familiar with the entertainment side of that art, we need to become acquainted with the research/analysis aspect. If we see games as art, then we force others to investigate why, and that investigative process opens their eyes as well.
So, tell me: What do you see in Anita Sarkeesian’s photo?