Coyote_Seven

Originally Posted by Bill Z Bubba

As I've stated before, when the law goes against honor, I'll choose honor every time and the law can eat a bowl of #&$^#.

Originally Posted by Shellback

There could be a new "prison break" zone event in Brickstown where you have to enter the prison and stop the riots.

Originally Posted by GibberingLunatic

MAKE THE "SECRET ENTRANCE" RESIZE-ABLE! Give us more sizes than the usual 2x2. Seriously when I'm trying to center my base up (I like the symmetrical look) I would honestly prefer a 2x3 or a 3x3 or something to that effect.

Allow us new entrance rooms and the old one can only be deleted if another is in the area AFTER the entrance has been moved to the new one.

Originally Posted by Golden Girl

A mall would be cool, with all the origin stores in one place, and maybe a WW and Icon attached too, and a Vault - put it in Steel Canyon, and use lots of glass and shininess for the new graphics

Originally Posted by Daimyo_Shi

Buses, there are stops bu no buses and I want to ride on the roof of said bus.

Originally Posted by Captain_Photon

All I know is, I would at this point be willing to part with a small sum of actual currency in exchange for the pair'a ya putting a cork in it.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville

I think the real issue in this context is "can an 'artist' be a group of people?" If artists aren't required to be individuals, then its much more obvious that CoH isn't a "collection" of art, its a singular piece of art created by the artist "Paragon Studios" with different parts worked on by different people. If a sculpture was created by ten different people, with some working on the feet, some working on the face, some working on the hair, would it be more debatable as to whether the final sculpture was a work of art than if one person did it alone? In my opinion, not really.

Originally Posted by Khellendrosiic

MY GOD I THINK HE'S GOT IT.

You're right! If a bunch of art put together (art being something that is the sum of more than it's own constituent parts), then that means the sum of all that art is also more than the sum of it's parts! Which is like greater than the sum of all parts twice in a row!

And I don't know about you, but video games certainly evoke a response from me. Generally either "Holy **** this is awesome" or "...that sucked."

Originally Posted by Khellendrosiic

So if we add this obviously art things together and call the result a video game, then this means video games are art. Simple math. Art + art + art + art = Art. Or Artx4 if you want to get picky.

Originally Posted by Khellendrosiic

So if you're refusing to fall for the 'groupthink', then does that mean you will disagree when we say the sky is blue?

Originally Posted by Bright Shadow

First of all, quote snipping is not a good idea in a debate, Mr. McDebate.

Originally Posted by Bright Shadow

Debat?! Since when did this become a debate?!

From what I see, this is just you claiming your opinions to be facts. A debate is a setting in which people argue maturely over a certain topic using logic, reasoning, and facts.

Originally Posted by Bright Shadow

Originally Posted by Bright Shadow

Originally Posted by Rodion

It's self evident that computer games use the same methods of artistic expression and sharing that humans have used ever since they gained a sense of Before and After, and ever since they began to make up tales of Gods and Monsters to explain why the sun goes away at night and why the thunder is so loud.

To demand that it's not art unless you can see the point of it, is the ultimate in snobbery and close mindedness. Couching that in a way that makes you sound open minded is disingenuous at best, hypocritical at worst.

Originally Posted by Fulmens

I like to take a kindlier view of humanity; they're wrong, or possibly lying to themselves, and then repeating that information to you.

I'm actually a big fan of ten random rolls over one carefully selected recipe. I would approve of ten random rolls even if the math was against it; however, I believe that the math is for it, these days. I have no mathematical proof, because we don't know the exact numbers for the drop table weighting, but anecdotally I've gotten more than 10% of my rolls in the "good enough to buy with 200 merits" category.

Originally Posted by Rodion

We've learned a lot about what constitutes an art form in the last century. Any medium that combines creativity and craftsmanship is essentially an art form. An art form's tenure really has no bearing on legitimacy. Whether or not society has granted its imprimatur to legitimize an art form is beside the point. Something becomes an art when the artists and their audience agree that it is.

Now, while most objects of any type of craft are mere handiworks, there are exemplars that are definitely works of art.

For example: an authentic Ming vase is a work of art. The flower vase I buy at Bed, Bath and Beyond is mere handiwork. Pottery is an art form. The vast majority of pots that have ever been made are simple objects with no artistic value.

Paintings by Rembrandt are works of art. The illustration on my cereal box and most book covers are handiwork.

Film is an art form. The vast majority of commercials and popular movies are simply handiwork.

Handiwork becomes art when its aesthetic sensibility and craftsmanship exceeds the mundane and becomes something more than its basic functionality. But it's more than that. We as a people imbue things with a sense of time and place that reflect their origins and history, and our feelings about them.

That means it is possible for a mundane, well-crafted object to become art over time. Like the pottery of ancient Greece. Or some of the common, mass-produced yet well-made porcelains of the nineteenth century that have now become rare -- and somehow through the magic of time -- works of art.

So it is with computer games. The problem with computer games is that they are so complex, crafted by so many different hands, that it is almost impossible to maintain a high level of craftsmanship and artistic sensibility throughout. They are filled with rambunctious and profane players who constantly break the mood of the artistic sensibilities of the game.

Yet there are almost certainly many beautiful and artistic images throughout the world of computer games, wonderful pieces of music, well-crafted words and set pieces combining all these elements to evoke a sense of mystery, wonder, joy, foreboding, fear, elation: the whole gamut of emotional reactions.

And isn't that what art is all about?

Originally Posted by Starsman

If some one is opinionated it's an artist, and I speak as one. Artists tend to question whether some other "art" should be considered an art at all simply because they either are so self centered that they think their art is the only true art, or because they feel that as an artist they have the ultimate say on what art forms they can approve as true art forms.

I stand in interesting grounds because I'm both, an artist (as a hobby) and a computer programmer (for a living.) My mother was a fashion designer and my father a car mechanic. I guess I had two very opposite viewpoints of the world handed down to me. I sometimes argue the topic with myself but ultimately both my opinons always end up agreeing.

I consider video games to be art forms, but I'll grant you that just as with commercial movies/books/anyartformyoucanthinkoff there is a lot of stuff that can't be considered an art form at all. I find it similar to movies in that they tend to mix many art forms into a composed art form, but unlike movies I find there are additional layers that can exist in games that don't exist in movies (like code writing.)

Oh and you asked earlier, there is a British Academy Video Games Awards that has been running since 2003, and I know there are others just don't have much time to look for them right now.