Benjamin Stringer vs The RZA
Round 3 of 3
Video Games Are the Highest Form of Art
I wanted to make this post because someone made a claim to me once and said that “Video games aren’t art, but can have artistic qualities.” Not only do I think this is wrong, I believe that video games, as a medium, are the highest form of art in existence.
So before I start, I want to be careful and define terms properly. When I say that video games are the “highest” form of art, I’m referring more specifically to the expressive ceiling that any given form of art can reach. The upper limit of what any given medium can cause a person to think, feel and understand. My claim isn’t that your average game outclasses the average painting, song, or movie. My claim is that the medium at its best (meaning all or most aspects of it are firing on all cylinders) can (and does) absolutely outclass everything else by virtue of the amount of ground it can cover. Most forms of art speak a single language. Music is organized sound, and granting that lyrics fold poetry into it, it still exists fundamentally as a single channel of expression. A painting is a single arrested image. A novel is prose. These forms of media can demonstrate amazing depth within their channel, but the channel is still largely fixed. Besides games, other hybrids do exist. Film, for example, has the ability to incorporate photography, cinematography, writing, performance, score, etc. But games can do everything film does and then some. All of those disciplines exist within games, and they can reach the same heights there that they do in their standalone mediums.
One pertinent example I would give is music. In games, music isn’t just the import of a film-like score. Instead it introduces a new compositional discipline. Adaptive music reacts to the player. Layers can swell as combat intensifies, themes can resequence depending on where you wander, motifs return at the exact moment you make the choice they foreshadowed. The composer has to write music that stays beautiful and thematic but in an order that is largely out of their control (and in the player’s hands). Baldur’s Gate 3 adds an extra uplifting layer to the combat theme when an enemy falls (and the music likewise turns more somber or desperate when an ally drops). Nier Automata’s soundtrack strips and rebuilds its vocal layers in real time as the world changes around you. The most important thing about these two examples is that the transitions are seamless and fit naturally within the composition. I’ve never experienced that at a live concert.
There are several other examples I could point to, of course: architecture, concept design, sculpture, animation, performance capture and more. But doing each of them justice would exponentially lengthen this post, so I'll take them one at a time if anyone wants to dispute a particular discipline.
So no, video games don’t just have “artistic qualities.” A medium that contains every other art form within it, and does things none of them can do alone, isn’t borrowing art’s qualities. It’s raising art’s ceiling.
I believe I am the person who made the claim your post is meant to challenge. Assuming the gauntlet you've thrown down is intended for me, I'd like to correct the record a bit. My exact words were not that video games "have artistic qualities," but that they "contain art" or "incorporate artistic elements." This matters, because my exact argument is that games qua games do not have any artistic qualities whatsoever, and are categorically different from art. Whatever art is involved in the game is layered over the core mechanics of the game itself, which is non-artistic. In short:
Premise 1: Art is (fundamentally) representational.
Premise 2: Games are (fundamentally) non-representational.
Conclusion: Video games are not art.
Regarding the first premise, I believe that all legitimate art is a representation or symbolic recreation of something that actually exists in the world. Paintings give a visual representation, novels represent aspect of entities and events that are derived from something in reality, etc. This view is controversial and it would require a lot of space to fully validate it here, so I'll just make a position statement for the time being. If you want to challenge the premise we can go into more detail later.
Regarding premise 2, let's consider the definition of a game. "A game is an activity defined by a challenge and a set of rules..."1 Nothing in that definition requires any representation. Tic-tac-toe meets the definition. The challenge is something we can define arbitrarily. Why do we want to get 3 in a row? Because the inventor of tic-tac-toe said so. The rules are equally arbitrary. Why does X go first? Why do we take turns? Why can't I change the location of my X after I've marked it? Because that's the gameplay the designer settled on. It is possible to layer representation on top of this basic mechanic. Let's say, X represents ninjas and O represents samurai. The grid is a battlefield. You can also add graphics, music, and animations, and you might say the end result seems like a work of art. But all of those things are layered on top of the game itself. Strip them away and what remains is a non-representational challenge and rule set.
The same goes for more sophisticated games, like Baldur's Gate 3. It would be possible for an AI or super-intelligence to play advanced video games without ever looking at the interface just by manipulating symbols in the programming. For them, it would be just like playing tic-tac-toe.
None of this is meant to disparage video games or the art they contain. I'm just saying that the art aspect and the game aspect are two different things. Adapting art to fit into a video game adds an interesting set of constraints for the artist and may lead more interesting and innovative outcomes.
p.s. I may have noticed a little bug. If I forget to put a space between two words, the spell checker gives me a nice little red squiggle underneath (e.g. hellohello). But if there is a comma in between them, the spellchecker doesn't notice that a space is missing (e.g. hello,hello). No red squiggle on the latter one.
1 citation
- 1.Wikipedia: Game. Accessed July 26, 2026. para. 1.
Round 1
The RZA
The RZAThe gauntlet was indeed meant for you, and I concede to your correction. "Games qua games have no artistic qualities whatsoever" is a more precise claim than how I paraphrased it. After all the original claim came after New Years and the start of a second (perhaps third?) day of imbibing, so my exact memory was a bit fuzzy. I think this works better for us both.
As you already stated, your first premise is indeed controversial. I think many (myself included) would consider most (or a lot of) abstract art as non-representational. But since you said all "legitimate art" I'm not as interested in getting into the weeds with that. I think the meat and potatoes of our disagreement can be hashed out in your second premise. But like you said, we can dig deeper into it later. If your first premise ends up doing more work against my following objections, let’s revisit it. For right now, let's table it.
I think your argument of stripping everything away is reductive. You say that if we take away the graphics, animation, story, music, etc then what we have left is the game itself, and that's what a game fundamentally is. I think if you apply this to any other medium you would accept as art, you would run into exactly the same issue. If you take away a novel's represented content then all you have is grammar and syntax. Grammar is itself an arbitrary rule set. Why does a subject come before a verb? In a haiku, why are there 17 syllables? Because that's what the form settled on. If stripping everything away found the essence of any given medium, then nothing would be art. I could use the same logic to say the only fundamental truth about a human is a skeleton.
The second premise fails particularly on the game in question. In Baldur’s Gate 3, the rules generally can't be stated without the represented fiction. If I cast invisibility on myself, it's easier to pickpocket an NPC. If I decide to betray the druid’s grove or slaughter the tieflings inside it, most of my companions will disapprove of my actions. So which part is the rule and which part is the representation? Furthermore, game mechanics on their own can be representational. Flight Simulator is a good example of representation being expressed through a ruleset in the form of things like lift, speed, drag, etc.
Similarly, I think your AI argument works against you as well. All digitized artwork can be parsed and interacted with by AI already. Text-to-speech can read a novel without feeling anything. Any LLM can scan a jpeg of a starving child in Africa, explain in great detail what is being displayed, and not feel the suffering conveyed through the image. What matters is the engagement that we as individuals experience through the medium. If AI being able to navigate something discounts it as art, then every ebook and scanned painting becomes invalidated as well.
So my last thought (and question) before I pass it back to you is this: if what you're saying is "abstract rule systems aren't art" then I wouldn't argue with that any more than I would argue that marble is art. But sculpture is. Video games are the composed whole, which is what we engage with and makes us feel the way we do. The representation isn't layered on top of the rules but instead is enacted by them. If the invisibility rule and the pickpocket fiction can’t be separated, what does that do to the “layered on top” framing?
Round 2
Benjamin Stringer
Benjamin StringerLet’s take your arguments one-by-one:
1. “If stripping everything away found the essence of any given medium, then nothing would be art.”
But I’m not saying it applies to “any given medium.” I’m saying art and games are different. If you strip the representation out of art, it is no longer art (or more precisely, you aren't engaging with it as such). If you strip the representation out of a game, it is still a game.
2. “In Baldur’s Gate 3, the rules generally can't be stated without the represented fiction.”
It’s not that the rules can’t be stated without representation. The rules can’t be stated as easily to most players without representation. But the representation and the underlying rule structure can be separated. For example, what does it mean to “cast invisibility”? Couldn’t you change it to some other designation and get the same result? Instead of “invisibility” we could call it “a vigilance-decreasing aura.” So the representational element can be swapped out without changing the game function one iota. To take it a step further, we could get rid of the representation altogether and still have a functional game. Let’s replace “invisibility” with “condition XYZ,” which doesn’t represent anything. So now the rule states that whenever condition XYZ is enacted at a specific decision point, the subsequent decision tree parameters are altered in such-and-such ways. This also applies to something like a flight simulator. The values don’t have to be considered to correspond to real-world conditions like altitude or barometric pressure in order to function as a working rule set. The raw numbers by themselves do just fine.
3. “If AI being able to navigate something discounts it as art, then every ebook and scanned painting becomes invalidated as well.”
I’m not sure where you’re getting the idea that AI navigating art discounts it as art. If a blind man interacts with a painting by smelling it or licking it, he may glean some information about the painting, but he hasn’t interacted with it as art. But the painting is still art. It still holds representational content for those capable of accessing it. LLMs arguably can’t relate to art on a representational level in the way that humans do. But they absolutely can play games. I.e., they can implement rule sets to achieve some defined goal.
4. “The representation isn't layered on top of the rules but instead is enacted by them.”
I just don’t think that’s true. I can’t think of a rule that has to be tied to a particular story or image in order to function. Certainly connecting rules to a storyline makes games more engaging and accessible. It’s a natural marriage and I’m all for it. But the crucial difference is this: if we approach art by engaging with some underlying set of constituent variables, one misses the representational element which defines art. If we do the same thing to a game, the underlying goal and ruleset remains intact and fully functional. We are still very much playing the game, even without engaging with any representational aspect whatsoever.
Round 2The RZA
The RZA1. I think I’m still not understanding the justification for the distinction you’re making. If I strip away the representation from any novel, it's still writing. If I strip away the representation from a painting, it's still paint. If I strip away the representation from a movie, it's still film. If I strip away all the representation from a video game, it’s still a game. All the substrates survive, but none of the works do. Why are we setting a different set of standards for video games?
2. Any representation can be stripped away and be renamed to XYZ. Sure, I’ll grant that. If I do that for every bit of representation in BG3 and replace them with XYZ placeholders, then would you still call the finished product Baldur's Gate 3? I genuinely don't believe either of us would. I believe you need the composed whole to make the art what it is. Apply the same logic to a novel, I’ll use The Green Mile since I like it. Person A imprisons Person B. Event C comes after Event D. Person E dies. Relationship F changes to Relationship G. You could argue the narrative beats are still there, but now everything has been reduced to an abstract relational tree branch. Is that book still the Green Mile?
3. “If a blind man interacts with a painting by smelling it or licking it, he may glean some information about the painting, but he hasn’t interacted with it as art. But the painting is still art. It still holds representational content for those capable of accessing it.”
I believe you're making my point for me. My point has always been that an authored work is meant to be engaged with in a particular way. DaVinci did not intend for the Mona Lisa to be a scratch-n-sniff any more than Larian Studios intended for BG3 to be manipulated strictly through code. BG3 still holds representational value for those who are capable of engaging with its representational content. Same as a painting.
4. "Certainly connecting rules to a storyline makes games more engaging and accessible. It’s a natural marriage and I’m all for it. But the crucial difference is this: if we approach art by engaging with some underlying set of constituent variables, one misses the representational element which defines art. If we do the same thing to a game, the underlying goal and ruleset remains intact and fully functional. We are still very much playing the game, even without engaging with any representational aspect whatsoever."
I simply disagree. You say the marriage is separable, I say the marriage is called Baldur's Gate 3. If you purposely ignore nearly everything the developers created and are only interacting with an abstract ruleset, you might be playing a game, but you are very much not playing Baldur’s Gate 3. You are the blind man licking the painting.
It seems your argument assumes that because a video game’s core mechanics can be defined in abstract terms, then that abstract definition is more fundamental to what a video game is than its representational content. I don’t see why. Because there is a lower level description doesn’t mean that lower level is the work. If that were true, I could conclude novels are fundamentally syntax, paintings are fundamentally pigments, music is fundamentally sound waves, and video games are fundamentally abstract rulesets. Artwork simply isn’t defined that way in any other medium. Why should the abstract description of a video game’s rules be treated as its true identity when we don’t impose that same reduction to any other artistic medium?
Round 3Benjamin Stringer
Benjamin StringerI’m not applying different standards to art and games. It’s the same standard. Let’s line them up in parallel so it’s clear:
For art:
The question is, if we strip the representation out of novels, paintings, and movies, is what remains art, or non-art?
For games:
If we strip the representation out of BG3, flight simulator, etc., is what remains a game, or a non-game?
First let’s consider art. You said yourself that stripping the representation out of novels, paintings, and movies leaves us with “writing,” “paint,” and “film” respectively. Are writing (in the form of non-representational syntax), paint (raw material), and film (raw material) art? According to premise 1 of my initial argument, no.
Next, consider games. Does stripping out all representation leave us with a functional goal and ruleset, which is playable as a game? Yes.
Same standard. Different outcomes. Which supports my position that games and art are different things.
Part of the confusion around this may come from a misunderstanding about what it means to “strip out the representation.” When you talked about removing the representational elements from the Green Mile, you mentioned renaming persons, events, and relationships to A, B, and C, etc. (but for some reason retaining concepts like imprisonment and death). That is not at all parallel to what I was talking about doing when I suggested removing the representation from BG3. Having no representational elements means that none of the content symbolizes anything that exists out there in the world. There are no persons or entities of any kind, other than some variables. There are no relationships or events, other than those defined within the internal structure of the game itself. Concepts like imprisonment or death are not employed, since they reference real phenomena. What we are left with is something like a Sudoku puzzle, where putting a particular number on one square of the grid holds implications for where the next numbers may go, according to an internally-defined set of rules. In other words, a game.
You say “Because there is a lower level description doesn’t mean that lower level is the work.” But I’m not giving a lower-level description of a game; I’m giving an essentialist description. A lower-level description would mean we include the the code that makes birds tweet and campfire light flicker. After all, those are also parts of BG3 which can be reduced to an underlying syntax. You seem to think all I am doing is indiscriminately reducing everything in sight to constituent components. What I am actually doing is more akin to those elimination diet tests doctors use to detect food allergies, where they remove and reintroduce one food at a time and note changes in symptoms. What happens if we remove (or disregard) the campfire flickers and bird tweets? Is the game still functional as a game? Yes? Ok, let’s keep going. What else can be taken out? I am trying to find the essential characteristic of the game, without which, it would cease to function as a game. This exercise uncovers something very interesting: ultimately, 100% of the representational elements are non-essential to the game itself. The same is not true for art. Removing representational elements from art leaves us with non-art constituents, like paint or arbitrary syntax.
Round 3The RZA
The RZA“I am trying to find the essential characteristic of the game, without which, it would cease to function as a game.”
I think I see now where we fundamentally disagree, so I’ll keep this short. You’re attempting to identify the essential conditions under which something continues to function as a game. I’m talking about what constitutes the identity of an authored work, in this case Baldur’s Gate 3. Removing variables one by one tells us what is enough for a game to function as a game. I don’t believe it tells us what the work fundamentally is, only what’s sufficient for it to continue functioning as a game. In other words, you’ve identified the essence of a game but not the essence of Baldur’s Gate 3. As I said before, all artwork can be stripped down bit by bit until only its most basic substrate remains, but that doesn’t mean the substrate is identical to the work. So I’ll simply repeat my question from before. If I strip away every bit of representation in Baldur’s Gate 3 and replace it with anonymous variables, is the end result still Baldur’s Gate 3?
I still don’t believe that all art is fundamentally representational, as I mentioned in my first rebuttal. Abstract art has a relatively established history at this point, and I’ve avoided engaging with that premise because I still don’t believe it’s where our fundamental disagreement lies on this topic.
I think you’ve argued clearly that representation is not essential in order for a game to be a game, but I don’t think the conclusion “therefore video games aren’t art” follows. Setting aside my disagreement with the first premise, all you’ve shown me is that the minimum conditions for something to be a game are different from your proposed minimum conditions for something to qualify as art, but not why those categories are mutually exclusive.
So I’ll close on the same question I ended the last reply on. "Why should the abstract description of a video game's rules be treated as its true identity when we don't impose that same reduction on any other artistic medium?" I don’t dispute you’ve identified the essential conditions needed for a game’s functionality. I dispute that you’ve shown that those same conditions constitute the identity of the authored work.