Play the art: Artistic value in video games

Klaudia Jancsovics

doi:10.18778/2391-8551.08.02

Authors

Klaudia Jancsovics University of Szeged

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.18778/2391-8551.08.02

Keywords:

art, immersion, feedback loop, feelings

Abstract

Playing a game does not mean that we are doing something childish and useless. Using a new technology to express our feelings and raise the awareness of social issues does not mean we cannot call it art. If we go back in time, we can realize that there has always been a resistance to novelty and machines. Sometimes, they were even considered harmful. The same life cycle happens with video games: they are valuable in many ways, they are far more developed than they were twenty years ago, and they have even reached a stage where we can find art in them. But how can they be art? Is the answer in the story or in the audiovisual elements?

Author Biography

Klaudia Jancsovics, University of Szeged

Klaudia Jancsovics – is a doctoral student at the University of Szeged in the Department of Comparative Literature. Her research belongs to game studies, and she examines video games with the methods of literary and film studies. Her aim is to prove that video games can tell stories in unique, interactive ways while using the methods of literary writings and films. So far, she has published several studies focusing on different video games (e.g., Heavy Rain, Detroit: Become Human) and various approaches (like the characteristics of detective stories, movie language, or horror stories in video games). She has also been interested in narratology, game studies, digital humanities, intermediality, and film studies.

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