It's always interesting to experiment with computer games without the use of music, but music as tool in game making is very effective to create mood, so I think that one should not refuse to use it.
The mood of the music does not always affect the mood of the game directly.
I used gorgeous music of Taylor Hayward in "Just Close Your Eyes". This music is extremely beautiful, and I used it to create a contrast to static noise. Some people considered this game as "creepy" and, wow, they called music "creepy" too 
Another example is in Kubrick's movie "Clockwork Orange", where classical music is played during the scenes of extreme violence

Also

Hey man, I was going to post on your forum, but apparently you're too much of a sissy to let me post, so I'll just write you an email instead.

He didn't read about manual account activation due to a spam attack?

You basically make my point yourself, right here in your keynote: "When you come to video-games late, like we did, when you missed Mario, skipped Zelda and can’t distinguish too well between childhood memories of Hide & Seek and Pac-Man, video-games seem like an exciting new medium for artistic creation! In video-games you can make living worlds to explore, you can breathe life into artificial characters, you can set up conditions for situations without knowing how they will play out, you can create a visceral form of visual poetry that makes the separation between the art and the spectator very small."

I started with games like Mario and Zelda when I was a kid, but now I can't play such types of games, I just can't enjoy them. And then I accidentaly found an "art game" (it was Everything The Same Dream), which I enjoyed.
For me "art-games" is new branch of games with new attitude to gameplay. Storytelling could be a part of gameplay. So I don't understand why people write such letters and hate such games.

Lone Flower is great, this game I enjoyed the most of all.
I haven't had any problems with the controls.
I liked the mood of this short game. Sound design is excellent!

Look at Radio Silence. This game has simple 3d models, but it looks really good.
It is possible to create simple meshes and make them look awesome without a textures by using some methods such, in example, post effects - blur, depth of field, noise, glow - it will make game looks interesting.
Also look at Hide, this game has pixelated 3d view, and it looks awesome

I think that paintings, photo, movies and even music is representation of atmosphere.
Atmosphere is the most important goal in my "Game Session" concept. You can describe gameplay, you can describe plot, but you cannot describe atmosphere.
Atmosphere is creating by both gameplay, plot and many more components.
In my concept "atmosphere" is a whole feeling of game.

I think that in the instructions must be written only technical information. Any other information about the plot and purpose of the game must be independently identifiable from the game by the player.

Hi there!
My name is Ivan and I live in Russia.
One year ago I started to create games with my own conception. This conception called "Rorschach\Larshe".
I wrote a manifesto, which describes the main features of Rorschach\Larshe games. Here are excerpts from the manifesto:
1 - dominant element in a R\L game is an atmosphere.
2 - abstraction and primitivism graphical content (Rorschach)
3 - darkness and symbolism (Larshe)
I call my games "Game Sessions", because they usually short and have strange gameplay (some people say that my game has no gameplay, though)
I think that my Game Session conception is very close to Notgames. I looked this page http://tale-of-tales.com/tales/ArtWithGames/, and I found that you prefer to compare Notgames with the classic painting. I tend to compare my games with the paintings of the Surrealists, Impressionists, Cubists. I am not a professional artist, musician or programmer. I just want to create games that I want to create. Also, I am not bother - is games is art or not - I just like this game design approach, and I don`t care how it is called.
You can play my games here - http://rorschach-larshe.tumblr.com/. I hope you like it.
I think that this forum is interesting place to communicate with others game developers.
Thanks for attention