The New Generation Of Entertainers

Video Game Designers Strive To Leave Mark On Cultural Landscape

(CBS) 
"There was a moment, say, when film, which as the dominant form, the dominant form of media for the past century, was not considered an important art," Tracy Fullerton explains.

Fullerton, who teaches game design at USC, adds of film, "It was not considered an important cultural force. It was considered sort of entertainment and I think that's where games are. And as we see more and more examples of important games with maybe a deeper content, then I think that notion will change."

Asked if filmmaking and video game design are equally complex, Fullerton, herself a graduate of film school, says of video games, "In my opinion, I think it is technically more complicated. I think that what's interesting is that I think it's become creatively more complicated these days as well."

Creative potential is one thing, but the game industry is hungry for new talent and new ideas.

USC students have already created one game that's attracting attention from the big-name companies. It's called "Clouds" and it gives gamers a chance to play God, assuming God flies around in his night shirt. It's a textbook example of a new kind of game, according to its creator, Taiwanese student Jenova Chen.

"Having been playing the video games for 15 years, I'm kinda tired of the gun, the violence," Chen says.

Chen adds of "Clouds," "It's the kind of emotion I never feel in video games. I'm trying to see if I can do that: make a game that makes you feel like you're a kid again."

And games like "Clouds" just might be the answer to many of the complaints leveled at games: that they're too heavy on the violence, too light on creativity.

"The video game industry is definitely suffering growing pains," Chaplin says. "It's definitely in the early stage. A big question people always ask is, 'Do we have our "Citizen Kane" yet?' And mostly people will answer no.

"So you have to understand, it's really very much at the beginning, just coming out of the Nickelodeon stage," Chaplin says. "And if you think of how sophisticated games are already and how much more room there is to grow, it really takes you into almost a science fiction future."

Ruby adds, "We're kind of at the stage where the train has come, has come out of the screen and the audience is kind of shrieking. And it's not, we're not clear where does it go next."

The video game industry's growing pains are hardly surprising to anyone familiar with the history of Hollywood.

The enormous upside to video games could lead to more aspiring creators hoping to design games as opposed to making films.

"Well, I think you're seeing a whole new generation of people who make entertainment that have grown up on games," Hirschmann says.

He adds, "It's something that shaped people's perception of what's fun, of what's entertaining. And the memories that people have of, 'I saw this great movie and it changed my life,' people have the same stories about games that changed their life."

Like the movies, games are only as good as the minds that make them. And while the game industry has arrived in financial terms, its next step will decide its place on the cultural landscape.