[casual_games] slamdance competition

[Christopher Natsuume]

Just a thought to add to this:

 

Perhaps some of the perceived anger from people who don't understand why a
game about Columbine should be protected is based on the fact that a lot of
us who have made a living in games for a very long time are already fighting
an uphill battle getting our mainstream commercial games accepted as a valid
form of art worth protecting - not only in the states but abroad - and
things like this don't make our fight any easier. In fact, they make things
much, much harder.

 

Having produced Far Cry while living in Bavaria, the current talk of turning
developing "Killerspiel" (killer games) into a criminal offense in Germany
makes me a bit. nervous. Was that game art? Hell, I don't know, but it was
good fun, and had similar levels of violence to R rated Hollywood movies
shown freely in Germany at worst. And yet, because we are a "game" a
different standard applies to us. And that needs to change. But we're going
to have to be smart about changing that, and I'm not sure "rubbing the
public's nose in it" by making Columbine themed games or having Hot Coffee
in GTA is the right path to winning the trust of the public.

 

I guess my point is - let's maybe fight these battles one by one? Before we
fight for our right to make games about Columbine, and give the
censorship-happy government more fuel to fight us with, maybe we should
develop consumer trust in our ability to produce high quality adult-themed
entertainment that is not nearly so inflammatory, and develop a legal and
moral precedent for games as legitimate art? 

 

Just my 2 cents.

Cn

 

 

  _____  

From: casual_games-bounces at igda.org [mailto:casual_games-bounces at igda.org]
On Behalf Of Allen Varney
Sent: Wednesday, January 10, 2007 10:22 AM
To: casual_games at igda.org
Subject: Re: [casual_games] slamdance competition

 

Jeff Murray wrote:
   (((Nope, to me it doesn't say anything other than 'hey, all us haxxors
can get together and protest against it after I finish doing chores for my
mum'.
   ((('I don't like that others can trivialize my chosen craft so easily.' -
Is that what this is really about? Basement-dwellers feeling like 'the man'
is keeping them down?))) 

   Inasmuch as Jeff Murray evidently thinks only the opinions of the
propertied class matter, I should first mention I own my own large home.

   (((Don't be silly. If enough people won't give up their $19.95, it's not
because of 'the man' it's because of the 'the game'.))) [sic] 

   Slamdance started its Guerrilla Games Festival specifically and
explicitly to highlight ambitious designs that challenge society's
definitions of a "game." Commercial sales have nothing to do with the issue,
though I imagine some may have trouble parsing that idea. 

   (((Games vs movies? I don't remember the last award winning true-story
film about how much fun massacring school kids can be ... perhaps you can
remind me? What a ridiculous argument / detour.)))

   Uh, that would be Oliver Stone's "Natural Born Killers." 

   (((The idea of 'playing out' a real high school massacre can't be healthy
on any level.)))

   Evidence?

  (((As for 'the jury wanted it in, then decided not to' ... good! I'd much
rather they did *that* than give this kind of crap any awards / undeserved
publicity.))) 
   (((I totally agree with Slamdance, their sponsors, or whoever made the
decision to dump it. Let the 'kiddies out to shock their parents' protest
against it and hope that people out 'there' know that not all indie games
are produced by sociopaths with no conscience.))) 
   (((What I don't understand at all is why this guy is getting support for
his cause. He's made a sick, tasteless statement in the indie game world and
for some stupid reason people are trying to make out that slamdance are
somehow oppressing the dude or that they are some evil empire out to destroy
the fabric of independent gaming - he's the underdog? Call me traditional,
but I like to support causes that deserve ... not some kid's idea of getting
some publicity at the cost of other peoples suffering.))) 

   Murray's snidely expressed assumption is that games are pure recreation,
like a sport, and inherently have no purpose as art or social commentary.
The idea of comparing them to film in that respect is "ridiculous." This in
itself shows the necessity for Slamdance -- or, now that it has been
discredited, some eventual successor -- in the effort to broaden the
permissible range of expression and also broaden parochial viewpoints.
Assuming that's possible. 

  (((Let's face it, art can be pretty much any old crap you have lying
around just as long as you can justify it with an intellectual reasoning -
and it's usually the bad artists that get the most publicity by using dead
things cut in half to pass off as something 'thought provoking' to the other
pseudo intellectuals.))) 

   Drat, I wrote the responses above before I got down to this reply in the
thread. Up to this point I thought I was listening to a rational, educated
person. Five minutes of my life, gone.

-- 
-- Allen Varney
    www.allenvarney.com

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