Notgames Forum

I've noticed that the notgames movement seems to be invested in asserting a very traditional kind of authorship. If anyone is willing, I would love to hear your thoughts on why this idea of authorship is important to you. In my research on the aesthetics of glitches over the past four months, I have been becoming increasingly aware of the need to re-invent, or perhaps even destroy, the current notion of what it means to be an author. I believe that this can most easily be seen in the current problems surrounding digital media and copyright, the absurd patent war that is being waged in the USA, and in the evolution of popular culture defined by its ability to reconfigure, remix and reconstitute. Who, for example, is the author of Mario, when Mario has appeared in over 200 games created by many different teams of people?

I'm not sure what you're getting at. Are you talking about collective, crowd-sourced authorship? If so, I think that produces crap. As for remixing, we already kind of get that with game mods.

I think that's mostly a coincidence currently. This is a pretty obscure community, so most of the participants here are individuals. Furthermore, many of us here are interested in more artistic experiences, so naturally we'll be biased toward more of an auteur-based creative process, if that's what you mean by 'author'.

But like I said, that's just a coincidence.

If you're referring to author in the fictional sense, like a specific authored narrative, I haven't really noticed an overall investment in that concept. There seems to be a variety of stances in that regard.

Mario is a good example of what most of here do not want to achieve.

For me, individual authorship is important because it allows a vision to be deeper, more extreme. While collaboration always leads to compromise. Sometimes, of course, this is a good thing. For instance, it can improve the accessibility of your work. And even the artistic quality.

But at this point in time, videogames are seriously hurt by their lack of authors. These games are actually saying things, spreading ideas, sharing opinions,. But there is no person behind these expressions. I think this might actually literally be the case in many studios. So all these expressions are unleashed unchecked, uncriticized, perhaps even unshared by the creators of the game, into culture. Causing quite a bit of damage.

I agree that it's fascinating to see this collective machine work. But we shouldn't think that we cannot intervene, that we are powerless.

With authorship comes responsibility. And that is hugely important in our current age.

I think it's interesting you named collaboration always leads to compromise. That's a huge problem. Sincerity is easily lost when making compromises, and the whole idea why you made something can be lost in the process. That's why it's sometimes better when one person is the thought behind a game, whilst the rest just helps creating it.
Never make compromises unless you intend to make a commercial succes. And even then, I think it's possible to make something that people will love without losing the general idea. Just as long other people keep their hands off of it.