Video games are not art because art is not interactive

The argument

Proponents of this view begin from a claim about what art fundamentally is: a finished work that carries its maker's intention, complete before anyone encounters it. On that definition, art is not interactive. Anything which requires player input forfeits the creator's control over their work, and that surrender of control is in opposition to the nature of art. Art is meant to showcase the artist's skills, not the player's — the achievement on display belongs to the person who made the thing, and the audience's role is to receive it rather than to alter it. Video games, on this account, fail that test by design. They rely solely on their ability to be manipulated by the consumer; the interaction is not an optional layer but the whole point of the medium. A game may well contain outstanding visuals, heartstring-pulling music, or an incredible story, and the argument does not deny the craft in any of them. But the artist loses control over all of that the moment the player is able to transform it as they see fit. The pattern holds right across the medium. Creator games and art programs hand the player the tools and allow them to manipulate the art directly; music and sound creation games give players the chance to create their own music; and story-based games allow the player choices which can affect the outcome of the story. In each case what the audience finally experiences is partly their own doing. That is the crux of the objection. When the artists involved lose control over their own work, it is no longer theirs; it is the consumer's. Something that can be played with like a toy cannot be artwork. Interactive art is not art on this reasoning; it is an activity for people to take part in. Video games are interactive, and therefore they are not art.

Premises

Counter-arguments

Interactive art is a step beyond traditional art. The artist doesn't lose control over their artwork by having someone else interact with it if that was their intention for the artwork. One could argue that the consumer is being manipilated by the art just as much as the art is being manipulated by the consumer. Video games follow this same principal. The path is all laid out for the player to follow; the choices are not as endless as they may seem, even for the most complex of games. The choices are programmed into the games by the game developers; that means that it was the developer's intention for the player to make one of those choices. Whatever path the player decides to take will lead them through the developer's artwork just as intended.

Rejecting the premises

[Rejecting P1] Interactive art does not take control away from the artist if the interaction was the artist's intention in the first place. [Rejecting P2] Video games are art because art can be interactive.