Things that are great about video games

I'm a big fan of puzzles, and before writing this list, I just got done playing Picross, a game series on Nintendo platforms that's all about nonograms. Puzzles games are some of my favorites, even if I have a tendency to get really annoyed while playing.

Okay, it's not always unique. Some games are so heavy on plot and so light on gameplay that you're basically watching a movie or TV series. But the ones that don't overstep the interactivity of the medium are genuinely wonderful. A few that I played some years ago and should be easy to get on PC (and maybe even mobile, I'm not sure) are: Limo, Braid, and Journey.

Whether or not that's actually great depends on how you feel about pop culture, but if you want to stay hip with the youth of today, at least knowing about some video games is essential. And quite frankly, video games as a whole are much better than most current music or movies. And they're gaining on TV and books rather quickly.

Not just stuff like virtual reality (of which I'm not a fan). But we're also seeing much bigger budgets go into gaming, more tools that makes it easier to make games with minimal coding experience, and even developers trying to "re-invent the wheel", sometimes with big success.

Okay, if you're buying tons of triple-A titles at launch, you're going to be putting down $60-$70 USD per game, and that's a lot (though that price has risen slower than inflation has). But if you wait a month or two, most games go on sale rather quickly, often for $20+ off. And if you focus on older games and independent titles, you can get great content for not too much money, especially when the digital stores run sales.

Especially when it comes to instrumental stuff. Video games have had some great composers over the years, and as games have gotten more high-tech, better quality music has gotten out there. Two examples I love:

"Sunshine Coastline" from Ys VIII: Lacrimosa of Dana

"Iki Town (Night)" from Pokemon Sun/Moon

One of the first games was called Spacewar! from the early 60's. And if a time traveler were to show the creator a game from 2022--any game from 2022--it would blow his mind. That change is more gradual when you look at it over time, but there are certainly periods of massive jumps. And it's hard to find that sort of evolution in any other form of entertainment/art, except for the printing press changing books forever.

I don't believe that everything that's part of an artform is actual art. You can make a pornographic film, but that doesn't mean it's art. You can make a video game that's built to keep adults playing for hours and spending hundreds of dollars on mobile transactions, but that's not necessarily art, either. That said, some of the games I've mentioned earlier can fit the bill, and there are many others that I think most people (who are not closed-minded to gaming as an artform) would agree upon.