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https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5178-2549

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Uniwersytet Jagielloński w Krakowie

Poland

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Art, Not-Art or Simply Aesthetics? (Book review: Frank Lantz, The Beauty of Games, The MIT Press, 2023)

Filip Jankowski

Arts & Cultural Studies Review, Issue 2 (60) , 2024, pp. 390-397

https://doi.org/10.4467/20843860PK.24.024.20335

This article presents a critical analysis of Frank Lantz’s book The Beauty of Games. The book proposes a reevaluation of whether games can be considered art. Despite some inconsistencies, Lantz shifts the focus to a less controversial question: whether all games can be regarded as aesthetic objects. He structures his arguments by referencing various types of games – from board and card games to contemporary digital artifacts. He then highlights that the beauty of games stems from the nuanced simulations of the real worlds that these games emulate. Lantz emphasizes the role of games as cultural objects and the significance of digital games as by-products of the modern world in which we live. Although the dilemmas concerning the artistic status of games remain unresolved by Lantz, his book is written in accessible language and offers a fresh perspective on the issue of the relationship between games and art.

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Towards the French Emancipatory Game History (Une histoire du jeu vidéo en France 1960–1991: Des labos aux chambres d’ados by Alexis Blanchet and Guillaume Montagnon)

Filip Jankowski

Arts & Cultural Studies Review, Numer 3 (49) „Powrót futuryzmów”, 2021, pp. 650-657

https://doi.org/10.4467/20843860PK.21.044.14364

This article is a critical reading of the book Une histoire du jeu vidéo en France by Alexis Blanchet and Guillaume Montagnon. The book – divided into five chapters – explains the first three decades (1960–1991) of digital game development in France, stretching from scientific experimentation, through the rise and fall of console and arcade gaming industry, to the rapid increase in microcomputing and the emergence of a French gaming identity. Close to the increasingly popular emancipatory paradigm in historical gaming research, the publication relies on comprehensive and exhaustive material, stretching from the gaming magazines to interviews with French game developers. Even though the book does not delve into the cultural contexts around the popularity of specific games, it remains an essential work for readers willing to understand the processes contributing to the French digital game field’s state.

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Uniwersytet Jagielloński w Krakowie ( Poland)

Filip Jankowski