@Saketume @joe_lvc Short answer: yes. Long answer: visual art didn't advance to that point of abstraction by abandoning all other forms of visual art, we still have realistic painters and drawers and print-makers, we still have illustrators for comic books, etc. With games the effect will be similar. There will always be games that are just crazy romping shoot-em-ups, even when we are playing games so intellectually sophisticated that they are barely recognizable as games. And as with art, there's still everything in-between.

That painting you posted is considered art precisely because it asks the question: "Am I art?" And someday, we will have games like that, too.

Wait, this game has zombies?

HUGE disappointment... I thought this was going to be a different kind of post-apocalyptic thriller. Oh well, it might still be worth a try.

@OrkHammer007 Right, freedom of expression and all that, but I don't think Tom's actually calling for new legislation here. The piece is on a gaming news website, and obviously it's directed at the kind of crowd who would come here - gamers and, hopefully, game developers. So in a sense you've made my point for me: "it is... our choice not to buy those types of games. That's how you send the message..." You're absolutely right. And this article isn't a cry to lawmakers, it's encouraging us as gamers to use our economic vote and game developers to think about the kind of content they're producing. Nobody's going to jail over this.

That's great and all, but it really has no bearing on EA' s being a horrible video games publisher.

@ErlisRM22 Great critique, except that it's irrelevant to this article. The point isn't that video games cause violence (because they don't, and I'm totally on your side there) but that some games have taken violence to pointlessly excessive levels that contribute to a negative popular image of gaming as an artistic medium.

@OrkHammer007 Hey, I know you're mad about video games having become a bogeyman lately, but by ignoring the actual content of the article you've unfortunately missed a really important point. I don't know what Tom thinks about video games causing real violence but he does acknowledge that there's "no proven correlation."

It seems to me that the point of this article is not to question whether gratuitous violence is damaging our minds or our morality, it's questioning whether or not video games can make a point with violence instead of just being excessive "because it's awesome." And that point is more valid than the one you're assuming is being made, and worth your time considering.

I have to say, I expected to be reacting very negatively to this article - evidence of the knee-jerk reaction I have to blaming video games for violence. But actually I think McShea is right: just because the evidence for video game violence causing real violence is inconclusive (at best, at worst it's intentionally misleading) doesn't mean that video game developers can open the floodgates on gory murder and expect their medium to gain artistic merit. God of War is a really great example of gratuitous violence for no reason besides "because we can." It would be awesome to see the industry continuing to grow in this regard, and use violence in more meaningful ways than it has been up until now.

Great piece, and great shirt by the way. The only thing I would add is to that last point Cam made, making unsubstantiated claims not only muddies the reputation of video games and causes a moral panic while overlooking the real problems, but it also muddies the integrity of journalism.

Don't get me wrong, I loved the first Guild Wars just as much as the next guy, but GW2 is a different game. It's a shame that such a big part of the fanbase was alienated, but a significant part stayed (myself included) and it gained a lot of other people, too. Even if you refuse to believe that its gameplay is superior to the competition - a mistake, in my opinion - you have to concede that it was marketed masterfully. So because of that, if nothing else, a report like this should come as a surprise to absolutely nobody.

@silver_viper219 Why is not having a campaign such an issue? The entire game is like a campaign really the way the background stories of each of the factions is set up, and if you want you can go systematically through each of the game's many maps and have your own sort of story.