Reid: So, at the time of writing, we're waiting to play more of Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon Wildlands than its beta before we get into discussions about the game proper, but, being a bit unorthodox with our usual format, have decided to start things off with a conversation on the big topic that raises its head looking at Wildlands' premise: Are big budget videogames capable of handling topics as nuanced and tragic as the War on Drugs? I have my own thoughts on this—it's hard not to with a game whose set-up is an American special forces team heading to a fictional future Bolivia overtaken by a Mexican drug cartel—but I'll save them for later and toss the question first to Ed. Ed: My answer is simple: yes, but they won't. Formally speaking, there is nothing stopping games from doing anything at all. Culturally, though, they—we—have . . . I don't think there's any point finessing it, fucked the whole thing up. For decades we've made games that are pure escapism, fun in the very narrowest sense (since when did we decide it wasn't fun to actually learn something substantive? Why is fun synonymous in games with brainlessness?) And now, not only do we keep making escapist games, we seem to argue that this is what games ought to be, that non-confrontational entertainment is some kind of artistic watermark toward which games ought to continue to strive. We've cultivated an industry where stupidity, or at least insincerity, is more profitable than knowledge and real-world experience. We've groomed an audience that is unprepared to accept anything that doesn't pander to their enormous egos. And us, the critics, either haven't done anything to stop it, have actively helped support it, or simply can't get a word in edgewise now because it's too late. Games could talk about any subject at all, no matter how complex or serious. They truly, truly could. And should. They're not young any more, they're not finding their way, they can't boast about making more money than the film industry, for example, or hold award ceremonies for themselves and not try harder than they currently do to actually say something about the wider world. There's no excuse. But games don't care. The people buying them don't care. So all that potential is going to waste—it's like cutting off the fat and throwing away the steak. Patrick, what do you think? Patrick: I agree with Ed. I think games can do anything, but the biggest thing holding back the medium is largely inertia. The basic formula or central Task of what a videogame does hasn't changed much since the home console revolution kicked into gear in the '70s and '80s, and that's cemented our idea of what a "game" is early on. Rather than expanding the scope of the things games are capable of saying as technology and capabilities increased, we've instead decided to fast-track advancements purely along the technical axis, letting narrative and thematic development stagnate. I'm simultaneously more hopeful and more cynical than Ed. I think that we're at a point where games are, despite the best efforts of much of the Gaming Community, starting to break out into the larger consciousness and people are starting to pay attention to things games do or say. Unfortunately, the people who have been playing games the longest—i.e. the primary audience—seem reluctant to move forward and are content to let games be brainless as a rule. I think games are capable of incisive social criticism (if you don't believe me just play Cart Life), but the bigger issue is that we as an industry at large have to be willing to listen. Reid: I think you're both right. I also think, as Patrick mentions with Cart Life, we've seen examples of games doing a very good job exploring difficult topics. Games are absolutely capable of handling anything. I mean, this shouldn't even be a conversation, should it? As much as the discourse surrounding them tries to suggest otherwise, games are not an incredibly unique medium. They're just another way to communicate ideas and feelings—interactivity adding another dimension to what's always been possible in film, books, music, or visual art. But they sure do self-limit a lot, don't they? I know it's a complex problem, the enormous budgets required to make mainstream games flattening thematic intent into what's usually just a mush of “whatever we hope won't alienate the widest possible audience.” But I think the complexity excuse has been trotted out for a while by critics and journalists who support the practice with apathetic complicity. I mean, it should go without saying that mainstream art can be made with purpose. That should be the baseline actually. But in games we don't seem to talk enough about what an individual work is actually about. The toy mentality—evaluate the features, discuss the surface appearance—that Patrick mentions is still the default mode instead of being just one way of discussing what these things are and what they're saying. Something like Wildlands (which, again, we can't talk in detail about yet) shows the failings of this approach. It uses a politically and culturally vital topic as its premise and I have a bad feeling that discussions of its thematic centre are going to be the minority in a larger wave of product-style reviews. If critics don't discuss its portrayal of the War on Drugs or American interventionism with some level of thought, I'd say they've failed. The game presents some argument on a topic and the critic's job is to respond. It's as simple as that, isn't it? Imagine, say, Sicario (which has its own serious problems) was released and the majority of reviews centred purely on its set and costume design. These are interesting aspects of filmmaking, sure, but are they central to what that kind of movie is trying to accomplish? Games are not exceptional, they're capable of discussing any topic imaginable, and I think the inability of the medium's critics (or, maybe more accurately, some game site publishers) to demand more—or to discuss what we already have with a broader worldview—is to blame for current limitations. Am I following the wrong trail here? Is my perspective skewed by focusing on the side of the fence I'm on with all of this? Ed:  I'd like to think games are making a bigger impact on people's understanding of the wider world, and factor more into broad cultural debates than they once did. But never—and I mean never—in conversation with me has someone used an example of something from a game to illustrate their argument about politics, say. I might hear “it's like in The Wire,” or “it reminds me of that moment in Letter from an Unknown Woman.” But never in reference to a game. That might seem like anecdotal evidence, but when you hear game-makers—the most esteemed in the business—so often boasting about the influences they've taken from movies and then see film directors, credible film directors, only talking about other films or maybe novels or TV shows, and not games, you can't help but sense the ostensible cross-pollination is actually just games stealing from better things. There are games that have changed my perspective on life, permanently. Actual Sunlight. Off-Peak. But they aren't coming from where they need to be—it's not like Ubisoft is going to hire the director of this year's most lauded art game to direct the next Assassin's Creed, even though we see that practise in cinema with film-makers like Rian Johnson and Colin Trevorrow getting bumped up to direct Star Wars. Honestly, I think we're a bitter intelligentsia and most of the gaming industry couldn't give a fuck about any of this because it's doing plenty fine as it stands. We are right, though. The people who want games to get in the ring and make substantive contributions to our contemporary world view are right. It just doesn't matter that we're right—in videogames, currently, perhaps forever, wrong always wins. Maybe by that token, albeit accidentally, they do consistently make one observation about real life.

***

Ed Smith contributes to Vice, The Observer, Edge, Play Magazine, and Kill Screen. Find him on Twitter @mostsincerelyed. Patrick Lindsey is a Boston-based game critic who likes to focus on narrative and thematic design. In addition to cohosting the Bullet Points podcast, he also co-edited SHOOTER, an ebook anthology of critical essays on shooting games. Follow him on Twitter @HanFreakinSolo. Reid McCarter is a writer and editor based in Toronto. His work has appeared in Kill Screen, Playboy, Paste, and VICE. He is also co-editor of SHOOTER, co-hosts the Bullet Points podcast, and tweets @reidmccarter.