Tension and opportunity: Creativity in the video gaming medium

Abstract

Structural tensions within artistic media have always provided much of the impetus for the creative development of art forms. This is equally the case with the new art of video games. Many recent games are complex and creative artifacts, involving multiple formal and interactive aspects, and engaging the player in a variety of modes of interpretation and play. A game may aim to furnish a fictional world to be explored, allow for collaborative multiplayer game play, tell a complex interactive story, depict complex characters and character development, or provide the player with a range of traditional game play puzzles and challenges. How these formal, depictive, and interactive features fit together within a single game is often a complicated affair, providing the design problems that provoke many of the more creative episodes in game design. This chapter explores how the structural tensions and complications within video games provide opportunities for creative development within the medium.