Someone who wants to appear smart will often use large academic vocabulary in an effort to add ethos to a piece. Oftentimes, this usage will not correspond to meaning and will not enhance the piece aside from a surface level. In fact, this is a complaint often leveled at the field of philosophy, though I believe there is a sphere where its grasp is even more insidious (necessary at times).
Nowhere is this more true than in the world of criticism, and video game criticism is perhaps the most interesting sphere to examine. Firstly, film has its many technical terms, many borrowed from Russian or French, such as mise-en-scène or montage. Literature has similar technical terms that cross boundaries with other mediums: narrative, prose styling, etc. But, as video games are such a new medium, and largely have not been considered seriously by the general public and the art world, ludology--the study and critical anaylsis of video games as art and media and cultural artifacts to be added to the canon of history--has been reduced to mere social theory and examination of marketing trends, often soaked in a thickly sweet layer of nostalgia.
It is largely this neglect and lack of critical contribution that has led to one of the largest scale erasures of history, seeing the deletion of countless games from digital stores and print copies either never produced or limited in run. This problem is only compounded by the negative stigma placed against pirating and emulation--in many instances, the only way to experience a game older than 15 years.
This disgusting malpractice is a two-fold problem. The first is a near universal problem, as has been seen equally in the world of painting, literature and film. This is the problem of corporate mishandling. Very often, because of costs involved, the rights to Art are held in the hands of a corporation; corporations who have no affinity or care for the work outside of a financial gain. If the work fails to turn a profit, or worse actually decreases company resources, it will often be shelved or destroyed. The reason this problem is especially prolific in the world of video games is the astronomical amount of effort needed to create a work of Art in this medium. Though there have been success stories of entirely solo independent developers (see Undertale, Stardew Valley, Etc.) more often than not an expansive team is needed to create even the smallest title. This often requires the backing of a large corporation whose interests are highlighted above. Scott Pilgrim and P.T. are only two examples of such a phenomenon. Either a game with no physical or very limited physical release that was removed from digital stores to forever disappear from existence. And for historians and archivists, this is an unimaginable nightmare.
This problem is not isolated to lesser known titles either. For instance, the first three Silent Hill games, some of the most important of all time, are nearly impossible to play without emulation.
The second problem is the very critical aspect of the whole endeavour. Without the critical support--and audience consensus--seen in the world of film or literature, game preservation is viewed as a frivolous waste of time. Why save a bunch of time wasting dilatory nonsense? Surely there is no aesthetic value. Not even to mention the space and power required to maintain storage servers.
This is the opinion held by the general public, and though the world has been kinder to games in recent years, the general populace still views it as a timewasting hobby and not a serious artform--a completely incorrect stance.
In my opinion, and that of many others, many of the great works of Art in the 21st century have come from the medium of video games. Shadow of the Colossus, Silent Hill 2, Nier: Automata, Dark Souls, Subnautica, Disco Elysium, Mother 3, Undertale, Soma, BioShock, Alan Wake 2, Morrowind, Pathologic, Sons of Liberty, Majora’s Mask, The Talos Principle, Vagrant Story, and many more. Surpassing any film, and work of literature, any painting, and album, these games manage to create a work so impactful, create an entire world, to transform an entire worldview, to interact with philosophy and religion and human characters and all manner of themes directly instead of as a mediated experience. You become the protagonist of the piece, in much the way Nabokov or Mark Z Danielewski attempted in the world of literature. You are the thematic element in a well produced video game.
The problem is not with the medium or the piece of Art within, but how the medium is viewed and utilised. Because video games have remained the joke of the Art world, companies are allowed to continue producing Content instead of Art. They are allowed to seek only profit and throw away nuance or thematic value. What use is there putting heart and soul into a game if it won’t make money?
Literature, film and painting suffer from a similar skewing towards the Commercial--especially looking at the modern market where the Commercial has overtaken all sense of taste--however, these mediums have the benefit of a critical and analytical audience, small as it may be, to lend credence to the existence of real Art. Video games have not been so lucky.
So, however pretentious as it may seem, these words matter. Ludonarrative, Dissonance, Mechanics, Gameplay, Text, Etc. Having a collexion of approved ways to interact with a medium, no matter how enframing this vocabulary might be, lends weight to the critical sphere. It allows the general audience to interact with a piece as a work of Art and not just a means for entertainment, whether they are aware of this change or not. This is the value of critics--however superfluous they might be in other regards.
The word provided in the title of this essay is perhaps the most important to understanding the critical distinxion between games and any other medium. It refers to a failure of a piece of gaming media to match its ludic (that is mechanical elements) to its narrative or thematic ones. This is the failing of many commercial pieces in the medium, but the opposite is possible. Ludonarrative consistency (or what I care to call ludonarrative synthesis) is the medium achieving its zenith Artistically. Dark Souls forcing you to experience the same as the chosen undead through its difficulty and bonfire system, to hollow with him and face the same desire to give into nihilism, Undertale playing with the meta-text of JRPGs to create a sense of combat that takes into account the themes of the game and axions of the player into the story, Control and Alan Wake 2 placing you in the same mental scenario of the lead characters by creating environments which drive the player to equal confusion or insanity and doing it across games too. This is the aspect that makes games special. The ability to experience Art as one would life.
Let us salute the video game critics paving the way now for the reception we hope to see in the future. Jacob Geller, Whitelight, Raycevick, Henry Boseley, Daryl (of TalksGames), Simon Parkin, Monty Zander, Max Derrat and many more. Let us learn to appreciate the beautiful things humanity is capable of, games chiefly one amoung them.