The video game business continues to thrive in first-world
societies, particularly in America. Sony recently announced the development of
a PlayStation 4 that will hit store shelves in late 2013, and Microsoft is expected
to follow that up with the release of the Xbox 720. There’s seemingly no
slowing down this business that, according to the Entertainment Software
Association, earned about $25 billion in 2011. For the past four years, the top
selling video game has been from the “Call of Duty” franchise, a war simulation
that has sold more than 100 million copies since its original release in 2003.
But what does it mean that America’s favorite video game is nothing more than a
first-person shooter with good graphics and gameplay that entices users to spend
hundreds of hours playing?
Twentieth century German philosophy Herbert Marcuse wouldn’t
be too pleased. Not because the Call of Duty games often shed a bad light on Germans and glorify the killing of various Europeans, but because COD seems to
find its success in taking advantage of society’s growing proclivity to find
enjoyment in simple and gory things that hardly make us think. While the incredible
technology and realistic graphics that allow COD to develop such a following
are impressive and would be considered by many to be a significant artistic
achievement in modern society, others would say that putting so much research
and effort into a video game for nothing more than profit hurts our culture.
Would Marcuse call Call of Duty “art”? Probably not.
In chapter three of his 1964 book One-Dimensional Man, Marcuse says that “art contains the rationality of negation,” and he goes
on to argue that true art offers some insight into what our world could or
should be, a “Great Refusal” as he dubs it (Marcuse Ch. 3).
What “Great
Refusal” does Call of Duty suggest when it leads players on a mission to kill
appearing zombies for as many levels as possible? How does 10 online gamers on the
same map running around trying to kill each other in virtual reality stimulate
our minds and require us to think about improving society?
The answer is easy: It doesn't.
As someone who
frequently plays video games, including the COD series, I agree with Marcuse’s
probable answer by saying that there is little-to-no cultural positive
result from the Call of Duty games. Video games like COD take advantage of our
need for instantaneous entertainment and communication—I play the games mainly
as a means to stay in touch with my friends who attended other colleges. The
other cultural significance I can think of resulting from the Call of Duty
franchise is the brief, largely distorted history lessons about past wars that occasionally
pop up in the game’s storyline. Meanwhile, the often-discussed negatives—addicting kids to video games
instead of activities like playing sports or reading, limiting actual
face-to-face interactions with family and friends, and, most worrisome some
would argue, creating a culture of violence that has led to more mass gun
shootings in recent years—far outweigh any potential benefits that COD
produces.
But although he
would undoubtedly be infuriatingly annoyed by the prevalence of video games
such as Call of Duty in the twenty-first century, Marcuse was willing to accept, even 50 years ago, that type of popularity is to be expected in a capitalist society dominated by rapidly
increasing technologies that have essentially made true art irrelevant.
“Now this
essential gap between the arts and the order of the day, kept open in the
artistic alienation, is progressively closed by the advancing technological
society,” Marcuse said. “And with its closing, the Great Refusal is in turn
refused; the other dimension" is absorbed into the prevailing state of
affairs” (Marcuse Ch. 3).
The other dimension being the zombie farm on
Call of Duty: Black Ops II.
1 comment:
I like the question at the end of the first paragraph. Not that we should draw *too much* from popularity, but we shouldn't draw *too little*, either. Anyway, it seems like a fine beginning.
Question: is it almost unfair to ask if "Call of Duty" is art? Isn't that like asking if the 5th Die Hard movie is art? In other words, should we focus on at least arguably good video games and movies when asking this sort of question, rather than going to the obviously bad ones? There's a danger here of just becoming obvious.
Your ending is funny, and acknowledgement of the uselessness of COD and games like it is fine, but what purpose are you serving here?
Everybody knows, for instance, that reality television is bad; everybody knows that bad videogames are bad. We defend them, if we defend them, because our days are long and hard and it feels good to relax at the end (Marcuse, obviously, has a lot to say about the ways in which mindless relaxation is *imposed* upon us). So one might ask whether a "good" t.v. show (say, *Girls* - Janine's essay) or a "good" videogame (say, *Bioshock* - Brian's essay) does real cultural/intellectual work. But how often is COD defended? Even you, a regular player, don't want to defend it.
This strikes me as an opportunity for self-reflection. What does it mean that we play mindless games that we know are bad for us? I think answering that question in more depth (using Marcuse's thoughts on that topic, most likely) is a good topic. Or you could defend COD as art (difficult but maybe interesting). But as it stands, you're hitting an easy target.
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