[MUD-Dev] Movies bigger than games? (was Re: Digital Property Law)

[Marian Griffith]

In <URL:/archives/meow?group+local.muddev> on Tue 13 Mar, Kwon Ekstrom wrote:
> From: "Tess Lowe" <tess at havensong.com>

>>   "Speaking of which, and just to prove my point, last year people
>>   actually spent more on video games than on movies. You heard me,
>>   MORE. Yet there are hundreds of news stories and entertainment
>>   shows glorifying the cinema every day. Why is it a major news
>>   story if Hannibal makes $100 million? The Final Fantasy games for
>>   the Playstation made over $100 million each, without eating
>>   anyone, and nobody put that on the news anywhere."

> I'd say it's a matter of interests... Afterall, I'd say that the
> news business is tied alot closer to the cinema business than with
> games.  In their own interests they attempt to make their products
> and the products of their affiliates look more promising.

I do not think there is any need to resort to conspiracy theories to
explain this difference in media coverage :) First of all movies have
been around a lot longer than computer games.  Long enough to
establish an automatism when it comes to media coverage

Second movies appeal to a much broader audience than games do. They do
also cover a much wider variety of styles than games do.  You have the
Holywood blockbusters, in many types and shades, but you have also the
independent movies and the "art" movies, each with their own audience.
Games come, basically, in one variety: B-grade (as far as story tell-
ing is concerned).  They appeal to a comparatively minute fraction of
the general populace.

Thirdly, there is (currently) very little glamourous about games, when
there is a great deal of that surrounding movies.  In fact there is an
entire industry to exploit the appeal movie stars have to people. This
obviously is much harder with game characters, though with Lara Croft
there seems to be a small beginning of this.

The games market must broaden to include many genres and quality le-
vels, it must develop its own heroes, both in designers and in game
characters and even then it will take generations before games are go-
ing to be discussed by general media in much the same depth as movies
are.  Take a look at the comics that are very, very slowly shaking off
their early stigma of being both pulp and meant only for children. You
can nowadays find some quality artistic and literary "comics".  But it
has taken seventy years or so to develop both breadth of style and a
recognised unique artform from its humble beginnings.


Marian
--
Yes - at last - You. I Choose you. Out of all the world,
out of all the seeking, I have found you, young sister of
my heart! You are mine and I am yours - and never again
will there be loneliness ...

Rolan Choosing Talia,
Arrows of the Queen, by Mercedes Lackey

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