Thank you for pointing out Okami as an example of art. I tend to be more literary-based (as I focus on the Humanities and Film in my academic pursuits), but Okami was truly creative and one of the finest examples of video game art. I haven't had a chance to play much of it, but this reminded me I need to pick it up.
On the literary end, I find it hard to believe that a game like Final Fantasy XIII cannot be art, when it so obviously starts playing with existentialist themes and making commentaries on religion and political campaigns. I could write an entire thesis on that game alone. Hell, I wrote a term paper on a single aspect of Final Fantasy VII (the nature of the religious hero, which I argued was Aerith, not Cloud, as Cloud was merely the avatar of her will), which my professor gave highest marks to (to my surprise, since she was in her 60s and I thought might not be receptive). I am most familiar with the Final Fantasy series, and from FF7 on (where FF's stories started to mature and grow self-aware), you can actually have a great academic time pulling apart themes and narrative (hell, I'm not even a fan of FF10, and could still have a good time pulling it apart and showing all its mythological themes in an academic sense--and I'm still in the beginning). This is a sign of art, of literature. It's a far cry from the "go here, slay a dragon, and go there, save a princess" type of video games that the Ebert-types seem to think it is. Be it traditional art or literary forms of art, video games encompass both.
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On the literary end, I find it hard to believe that a game like Final Fantasy XIII cannot be art, when it so obviously starts playing with existentialist themes and making commentaries on religion and political campaigns. I could write an entire thesis on that game alone. Hell, I wrote a term paper on a single aspect of Final Fantasy VII (the nature of the religious hero, which I argued was Aerith, not Cloud, as Cloud was merely the avatar of her will), which my professor gave highest marks to (to my surprise, since she was in her 60s and I thought might not be receptive). I am most familiar with the Final Fantasy series, and from FF7 on (where FF's stories started to mature and grow self-aware), you can actually have a great academic time pulling apart themes and narrative (hell, I'm not even a fan of FF10, and could still have a good time pulling it apart and showing all its mythological themes in an academic sense--and I'm still in the beginning). This is a sign of art, of literature. It's a far cry from the "go here, slay a dragon, and go there, save a princess" type of video games that the Ebert-types seem to think it is. Be it traditional art or literary forms of art, video games encompass both.