eXistenZ WAS -- RE: [MUD-Dev] Re: MUD-Dev digest, Vol 1 #163 - 25 msgs

[Raph Koster]

A subject near and dear to my heart.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: mud-dev-admin at kanga.nu
> [mailto:mud-dev-admin at kanga.nu]On Behalf Of
> Zak Jarvis
> Sent: Wednesday, July 19, 2000 3:11 AM
> To: mud-dev at kanga.nu
> Subject: eXistenZ WAS -- RE: [MUD-Dev] Re: MUD-Dev digest,
> Vol 1 #163 -
> 25 msgs
>
>
> > From: Raph Koster [rkoster at austin.rr.com]
> > Sent: Saturday, July 15, 2000 10:09 PM
>
> <snipped bulk of Raph's very nice speech>

*bow*

> Anyone interested in the philosophical side of developing in
> this industry
> REALLY should see eXistenZ.

I have heard VERY mixed things about it from fokls who are game designers
and movie buffs. Haven't seen it yet though.

> The basis of the movie is this interview:
>
> http://zappa.users.netlink.co.uk/cr_rushd.html
>
> where the writer/director of the film -- David Cronenberg --
> interviews
> Salman Rushdie. Among many other things, the two ponder
> whether or not a
> game could ever be art. eXistenZ is a further exploration of
> that question.

Of course it could be. Art can be done with any communicative medium.

Cronenberg: They say this is democratic art, that is to say, the reader is
equal to the creator. But this is really subverting what you want from art.
You want to be taken over and you want to be-
Rushdie: Shown something.

Raph: Games can do that.

Cronenberg: Exactly. Why be limited by yourself? But they say, "No, it's a
collaboration."

Raph: All art is a collaboration. There is the emitter & the receiver. And
how often have we heard that you get out of it what you put into it?

Rushdie: Whereas this is not true of any work of art. You can experience it
over and over.
And if you come back to it in five years it's a different work, it's a
different thing.

Raph: That's a difference between good art and bad art. So most games are
bad art. Doesn't mean that there can't be good art done with games as the
medium.

Rushdie: In the end, a work of art is something which comes out of
somebody's imagination and takes a final form. It's offered and is then
completed by the reader or the viewer or whoever it may be. Anything else is
not what I would recognize as a work of art.

Raph: Final form, then completed. Let's get some words straight here. :)

For my take on all this, cf my essay
http://www.legendmud.org/raph/gaming/games-as-art.html which was recently
reprinted in somewhat altered form at http://www.gignews.com.

-Raph




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